Old news, but I wanted to know your opinion anyway

[gnosis301]

Sure, it's old news, but what do you think of EA's exclusive licensing agreement with the NFL? If, for some reason, you are unaware of this, it is an agreement that only EA can publish NFL titles. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I also believe that this agreement exists for NCAA and one/many arena football leagues. Is this monopolistic behavior?

[sideshow]

It certainly is. EA's main cash cow is the madden franchise which is probably one of the most lucrative video game franchises ever so they are going to protect that from ever branching to another game company.

[CrazyJo82]

i've always enjoyed playing EA Sports....

As for monopolistic behaviour... isn't it possible that it's NFL that made the agreement? Considering they would have everything to gain and nothing to lose...

my only problem with EA sport games is... they come out with friggin' new version every year so, it's pointless to buy the game and play for one year and then buy the following year.... yes, i know the graphics are upgrade and some gameplay has been improve but still.... it's still the same game...

[Falcom Director of Fanservice]

Never been much for sports games, myself. Really never been much for sports. I do remember good ole Blades of Steel for NES, though.

I wonder, are all franchised sports games one publisher only? Like whatever the official name of the Major League, for instance? What about Hockey or Soccer? Are they also all done by EA?

[Inochi 命]

I only really enjoy playing EA Big sports games (namely, their SSX snowboarding series) or Nintendo's sports games (the one that people criticize for having Mario star in them). But I don't care for many sports outside of games either, besides Cricket (it's mostly because I'm Indian, seriously) and possibly Soccer.

As for EA taking the NFL license exclusively... I don't see what's wrong with it at all, just because Madden is really the only American football game that sells like hotcakes to the masses (and how...). I think I remember some 2K sports (or something like that) fans saying a while back that it was the superior football video game series, but that already ended a while back anyways. Also, this is EA we're talking about... I'm not at all surprised by this news ("monopolization" isn't new to them). I'd never care for playing a Madden game anyways, but my respect for the series and it's company has changed a little over the past few years to a more positive view as they seem to be putting real effort into all iterations of the games now (but it's still an awesome cash cow for them). They even did an unusually fabulous job on the Wii version of the last Madden game. If any company were to get exclusivity, it's probably better for American Football fans that it's going to EA. If another developer wants to make a realistic football game, it'd be incredibly tough to match Madden anyways and they'd do better to go a fantasy-sports route instead.

and no, all sports aren't exclusive to EA. For example, Konami does another iteration of Soccer called Pro Evolution Soccer - Winning Eleven (in my opinion, it's superior to EA's series and my brother, who's a huge soccer fan, thinks the same). Although it doesn't have the FIFA association with it as that is exclusively licensed to EA Sports. But if your asking if EA holds the rights to all or most of the official sports titles... I think that's probably correct. FIFA, NFL, NHL, NBA, and I think even ICC (cricket) belongs to EA.

EDIT: hehe, just visited IGN and this cought my eye. Perhaps you might find it interesting, gnosis. It appears 2K sports is continuing it's football series despite EA acquiring rights to NFL and all that.

[Stan]

gnosis301 said:

Sure, it's old news, but what do you think of EA's exclusive licensing agreement with the NFL?

Tecmo Bowl is the only way to play. All video gamers know this.