Re: 'People like to hate EA, I don't know why'

On Sat, 29 Mar 2025 09:07:30 -0400, shawn
<nanoflower@notforg.m.a.i.l.com> wrote:

On Fri, 21 Mar 2025 17:13:36 -0500, Zaghadka <zaghadka@hotmail.com>
wrote:
>

On Wed, 19 Mar 2025 15:15:05 -0400, in comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action,
Spalls Hurgenson wrote:
>

The sad thing is, I still think EA is one of the _better_ triple-A
publishers... because the rest of them are even worse!
>

I remember back in the C=64 days when I would buy anything published by
EA, because they were *that* good. Of course I would immediately crack
their stupid 10 minute long half-track loader (their proprietary DRM) and
have the game load up in 3 seconds with FastLoad.
>
And for people who didn't crack the endless EA logo loading screen? I
made a fortune realigning 1541 hard drives so it would work. I always
offered the pirate tool though.
>
But still, Archon, Seven Cities of Gold, MULE. They were amazing.

>
Indeed back in the Trip Hawkins era they were a great company. Focused
on making money but also celebrating the developer. Sadly those days
are long gone.

The myth is that Hawkins founded EA based on the idea of promoting the
developer and that the entire "album cover" packaging was to push the
idea of software as 'art' and developers as 'rockstars. I don't doubt
there was some truth to it (if only because the act created the ideal
rather than the other way around), but from what I've read, internally
the company was as ruthless and pushy with its developers as any of
its competitors.

But it made for a nice story and even if Hawkins didn't personally buy
into it, it did help to raise developers from faceless backroom
number-crunchers into human beings and game development into something
that might be an enjoyable career.

Me, I just loved the album-cover form-factor. Had PC gaming fully
embraced that, I might still have all my box-covers ;-)