Apparently EA has outbid Take 2 to ink an agreement to buy Codemasters. As a somewhat casual racing game fan I was already disappointed that Take 2 was going to make the purchase, since they cram microtransactions into basically everything, but EA is probably even worse. Not only do they cram microtransactions into all their games but they have their famed reputation for killing studios and specifically for mishandling racing game properties. On the one hand I used to like the Need for Speed series and I also think that Dirt 5 is a fun arcade racer, so there's potential synergy there, but then I remember what happened to Criterion and the fact that EA canceled the Burnout series and chose instead to spit out a series of Need for Speed titles that range from pretty okay to dreadful, and I become less excited.

I'm sure that some of Codemasters' series will survive for some length of time, but this is probably going to result in fewer racing games in the 9th gen than we even had in the 8th.

Racing games used to be a major genre with a huge number of diverse offerings, including multiple major series competing at once on the same console. Like most genres the field has consolidated significantly in recent years, and at this point it seems like we're down to just a few major budget entries, with most of them being not very good. There's still niche stuff on PC, and low budget console arcade racers, but the genre has become more and more niche, and now it looks like that niche is shrinking further. Codemasters bought the Project Cars studio, now EA has bought Codemasters. Basically in the mainstream somewhat arcadey genre we're down to Forza, The Crew (if that's a continuing series), the very occasional Gran Turismo title, and now EA's portfolio. There's other smaller stuff, of course, and some of it is quite good (I liked Fast RMX a lot) but the mainstream is pretty small at this point, and launching new stuff seems harder and harder. Does anyone remember Gravel? That was published by Square Enix. There are zero forum posts about it on this site. There are also zero forum posts about Dirt 5, which is the biggest racing game released this year.

The Kart racer genre seems to be going okay, with both Nintendo and Sega putting out games pretty regularly, lots of smaller indie stuff, and the revival of Crash Nitro Kart, but mainstream racing games are an endangered species.

Does anyone remember that the Project Cars people were going to make their own super powerful console? That was a weird announcement that didn't even go as far as the Phantom before dying.

Anyway I'm not 100% sure why this news made me feel so sour but I think that I just miss the days when the genre used to be more diverse. I miss games like Blur and Split/Second and especially Driver: San Francisco. Driver: San Francisco was fantastic.

Now at least we'll get Project Need for Speed: Dirt Rally Cars. So we've got that to look forward to.

Preferable to TakeTwo, but not by much. Hope they'll at least leave the F1 games alone.

I'm mixed, on one hand the games Codemasters was putting out weren't bad at all, but they always had some issues, and non of them have been as polished as the first 3 Dirt games.
F1 has been great, but again there's just always something missing, why doesn't the career mode have online co-op? Every team has two drivers it's so obvious.

So, if this ends up being the extra bit of backing they need to boost their games that's a positive, but if EA start meddling and putting pressure on the devs then it's worse.

I'm trying to see this as a good thing, but just can't. The F1 games will likely be stuffed full of micro-transactions, there will likely not be more Dirt Rally games because they cater to a more niche audience and Dirt 5 already felt too casual for my taste and with this news I can't see that series reversing course.

But hey, if EA owns Codemasters and EA Play is a part of Game Pass then I guess these new driving games will get trials and eventual vault status on Xbox. Maybe that's the silver lining.

EDIT: Oh, does anyone know if Codemasters owns Operation Flashpoint? There could be room for another one of those games.

@isomeri: I assume they still own Opflash, but the only way i could see it coming back is in the form of a battle royale.

EA is definitely not a great parent company.

I'm curious to find out what the heck happened here. They bought Slightly Mad who were struggling due to the Madbox debacle and whatever Project Cars 3 development was. What was the deal with that purchase? Did they inherit some debt? Being up for sale would imply it but then maybe they saw an offer too good to refuse?

I don't see this as an expansive move for EA unless they want to put out more racing games, maybe to take the heat off Need for Speed?

On the Codemasters end of things, it's access to new tech, even if it is Frostbyte. Are they looking to move into something other than racing game development? This would be the way to do it rather than taking the risk alone.

@shindig: The whole Madbox thing just seemed more than slightly mad from beginning to end. The only companies to successfully enter the console business since the 80s were a consumer electronics mega-corporation, and one of the largest software companies (and overall companies) in the world, and it's questionable whether Xbox has been "successful" in a traditional sense (I continue to believe that it functions in part as a branding tool for Microsoft so it seems less like a stodgy purveyor of business software and B2B server stuff.)

In terms of Codemasters...who knows regarding their finances. Zenimax was not, to my knowledge, in business trouble when it cashed out to Microsoft and while this deal is much smaller $1.2 billion is nothing to sneeze at so it might be a similar thing. On the other hand it doesn't seem like Codemasters has had a big hit for a while so it's quite possible that they were under stress.

Even EA doesn't throw around a billion dollars for nothing, so I think it's pretty clear that they intend to expand their racing offerings in some way. Maybe Need for Speed will eat the Dirt series and Dirt Rally or something, but I'd imagine that the F1 series at least will live on as its own thing.

The last Codemasters game that wasn't a racing game was Overlord: Fellowship of Evil. Before that was Dizzy Prince of the Yolkfolk and, uhhh, Bodycount, so I can't imagine EA bought Codemasters for anything other than racing games (and maybe help with vehicle sections in other EA titles.) Though personally I would love to see what Codemasters could do with Anthem 2, of course.

In terms of tech...I played Dirt 5 and it seemed super solid so I'm not sure whether access to Frostbite 2 is something Codemasters needed? My guess is that this is what it looks like. EA wanted to expand/fix its racing portfolio, and Codemasters either needed a financial bailout or had executives/shareholders who were ready to cash out and move on.

Pretty much my opinion as well. EA has a very bad track record when it comes to acquiring and shutting down studios, but at least they won't have to put out WWE 2K games.

I'm both intrigued and horrified about the prospects for the Need For Speed and Operation Flashpoint franchises in the future. Will OPF become a bland hero shooter to compete with Rainbow Six Siege?

@fisk0: Why does anyone think there are going to be additional Operation Flashpoint games? The series was never huge, the last entry was almost 10 years ago, and EA has a massive portfolio of FPS games (including its own hero shooter in Apex Legends, though that's also a Battle Royale.)

This is like people speculating about what's going to happen with Jade Empire after EA bought Bioware.

Except that Jade Empire was much more recent at the time, reviewed better, and probably sold better.

Operation Flashpoint may get some remastered re-release thing but I find the idea that EA is going to start releasing yet another FPS highly unlikely. I mean they won't even make another Titanfall, and that's a series from the 8th generation that a lot of people really like!

Obviously just from seeing more racing devs consolidated under one house it's bad from a competitive and creative standpoint.

That said; I don't know. Would they stuff microtransactions in their things? Like I'm not here to defend EA, they deserve just criticism for their approach in the gaming sphere a lot. But since the Battlefront 2 fiasco EA has actually kept microtransactions out of a lot of their properties. The only games to still feature it so heavily and grossly has been the sports games. My fear is, that EA will see the racing sphere similarly and think they won't get backlash to having their "Ultimate Card" type systems in the game.

Personally the only real benefit I see to having multiple good in house racing style devs is for games that may be outside of their wheelhouse. So many games are trying to do a lot these days, and there is a plethora of those games that include trash driving in them. So I could see it being a plus to use people who know how to make racing/driving games from that perspective. It's a huge wait about the rest though. Likewise to the OP I also miss the days when there was more diversity in the racing space. But I don't know if this move in any way looks to open that transition up again.

Operation Flashpoint is just your granddad's ARMA. There is some hope for a racing studio to pivot, assuming Playground Games is definitely working on Fable 4. Even their new neighbours Criterion do 'stuff' that doesn't involve cars. Unless they gave Darth Vader a handling model in Battlefront.

So who's left in the space as independently owned driving folks? Kuounos, Milestone and erm .... that might be it. Ah, no. The Automobilista guys. And the iRacing cabal.

And Simbin. Shrodinger's GTR3 has to come out at some point.

I'm even more wary of this deal than the Take 2 takeover. I can't see much good news coming out of this buyout as a fan of racing titles, and sim-to-simcade racers in particular..

Between Slightly Mad Studios being bought out and then dumping out a lackluster arcade follow-up to the Project Cars series, and now all of it being under EA and likely killing the Dirt Rally series, it's been a terrible year for racing news for me personally.

@shindig: ARMA is not the kind of game EA makes though. I can imagine Codemasters working on other non-racing games, of course, especially as a support studio (I always assumed that Criterion helped on the vehicle stuff with Battlefront, especially because they wroked on the X-Wing VR stuff) but I just don't see Operation Flashpoint in particular being a fit for EA. I also think Playground Games is a more natural studio to pivot because while it is a racing studio, it's also a great open world game studio. The Forza Horizon games have some of the best and most fun open worlds in gaming, and that's a skillset that translates to other genres pretty well.

Do the Bigben Interactive studios count as "independently owned?" I think Kylotonn is arguably an important studio still out there doing its thing, and Zordix. Then if you want to include the futuristic stuff there's Shin'en and a bunch of others like the guys who made that new Grip game.

@bigsocrates: It is basically the only relatively recent franchise Codemasters have had that wasn't just another driving game, and, well, EA has plenty of those already as well.

@fisk0: Sure, but I just don't see it as a property EA would care about. I'd think it would be more likely that EA would put them on some other IP, like a Star Wars game or something, than revive that old warhorse.

Plus technically Codemasters put out more recent games in the Overlord and Dizzy franchises so...

You heard it here first folks. 4K 60 FPS 3D relaunch of the Dizzy games in Frostbite 2.

It's like choosing where you'd want to get shot; with a 22 caliber bullet, either an arm or a leg. They're not aiming to kill; just a flesh wound, but you're still getting fucking shot, which seems to be a very unfortunate occurrence from what I can gather from other people's experiences.

Goodspeed Codemasters. I'll be ready to pour one out in 2025.

Eh, this is EA we're talking about. There'll be plenty of competition. Amonst themselves. When EA releases 3 different racing IPs within the same week.

Another one bites the dust. EA will slowly drain them of life until they are a husk of thier former glory. If they can do it to Bioware, they'll do it to everyone.

Dig another hole in EA's graveyard. 2020 just won't stop.

EA is hot dog sh*t. I look forward to endless gambling mechanics and microtransaction in all Codemasters' future games (THAT I WON'T BE BUYING.)

Codemasters' just wanted the largest payday possible; watch all the major creative, technical, and managerial talent, e.g. anyone making bank on this sale / acquisition) to "retire" / leave the studio, once they've fulfilled the obligations of their sale contract with EA, in addition to everyone who won't tolerate EA's BS.

With EA holding the Star Wars license, this will be podracing!

As dumb as that would be, even dumber will be the car racing franchises they control getting worse now. Maybe the bright side of this will be some devs leaving to make a new racing-focused studio.

I suspect they are basically just buying the F1 license. I wouldn't be surprised to see overlap between the FIFA and F1 fanbases.

@bigsocrates: Ah, Kylotons, yes. Where the WRC and TT lives.

If EA does anything to their output, they'll probably add an XP doubler for career mode. Maybe the usual pre-order stuff gets DLC'd. It's not like F1 isn't a fit for EA. They've had the license before and this time there's no competition.

DiRT's a weirder one because, on the one hand, the main series has devolved into a serviceable arcade racer. DiRT Rally still has sim clout but they're also up against a licensed product with the WRC games.

I still find it strange to think of Codemasters as essentially a racing game only company. I grew up with their 8bit output being such a big thing here in the UK, they were everywhere despite them primarily being a budget game producer. It can be hard to divide the Codemasters of old with the current set up but part of me would like to (very optimistically) think that EA/Take Two were after the business for the current roster of driving games and also to acquire some of those older IPs for some of their other studios to have a go at. Unlikely though. Codemasters themselves acquired Sensible Software, if I remember correctly, and that in itself holds a few games that I'd like to see revitalised.

My biggest hope is that the people employed there get to continue making games for a good while. Some of my favourite UK based Developers/Distributers have dissolved after their takeover from a larger firm which saddens me. I get that we might be a bit garden shed like when it comes to making games against US/Japan/EU development but the techniques these designers found to make what they could with limited budgets meant every now and then a little gem would appear in the wash of perfectly acceptable (and sometimes terrible) releases. In a perfect world for me, Psygnosis, Free Radical Design and Bizarre Creations (among others) would still be out there making games less hampered by the "every game must be a hit or we're shuttering you" and instead knocking out those weird, sometimes good, sometimes not so good games. The homogenisation of the holders of the budgets of game production is no good thing but I'll do my best to stay hopeful Codemasters can make this work, they have survived this long so it is possible.

I think EA buying it is a very bad idea and likely it's death sentence.

Unless they sort of let them do their own thing I worry what will happen to them as they've made some of the best racing games I've played over the last few years. I guess we'll find out if they force them to switch onto the frostbite engine or not - will probably be indicative of what's to come / how they view them.

So . . . should we start digging the grave now or would that be considered gauche?

I was someone who was defending EA for a while as I found the hate on them overblown but as the years have gone on they've run things into the dirt and the last few years have been totally awful. The last few E3's when they've just shown concept art and their CEO looking like an animatron hasn't been great.

4 years until they close the studio.

Part of me wonders if EA wouldn't have thrown their hat in if 2K weren't in the running.

"Our sports rivals going after another licensed property!? THE HELL THEY ARE ..."

I see a need for speed game with a huge city that has down tracks and off road tracks.

I missed them picking up the WRC license in the summer. So that's two going concerns for Codemasters, depending on the length of the licensing deal.

I don't think this changes how I feel about codemasters at all. Some of their games were already starting to get mountains of DLC so I don't think EA will make them worse in that regard. I guess I'm bummed that a DiRT Rally 3 might require Origin.

I wonder if EA will be able to bury Codies quicker than most of their other acquisitions, since this one already comes with the Dirt.