EA Bets on PS2, Says it Will Support Cube and Box

http://ps2.ign.com/news/34437.html

Electronic Arts puts its money on Sony in the next-gen wars, but pledges support for Cube and Box.

May 11, 2001

In an interview with Bloomberg Media, Electronic Arts\' Chief Financial Officer Stan McKee said today that the company would continue to devote the majority of its resources to Sony PlayStation 2 development, but that it would also fully support both Nintendo GameCube and Microsoft Xbox.

McKee explained to Bloomberg that despite Sony\'s inability to meet hardware demands for late 2000 and early 2001, EA still managed a significant revenue stream directly from next-generation software sales for the system. It predicts that if Sony\'s projections to deliver more than 20 million PS2s worldwide by next year are true, EA will not need to worry about slowing software sales for the currently released consoles.

Meanwhile, when asked if EA would support Xbox and GameCube equally, McKee indicated that the company would. "We\'re a little bit ahead on our Xbox products compared to our GameCube [ones]," he said, "but we are more or less have the same range of resources devoted to each."

EA\'s financial officer indicated that the company would watch how the next-generation market plays out before deciding which platform to ultimately assign more of its development resources too. "I think we\'ll see how it goes. We strongly believe that Sony will be the leader," he said. "But we think that both the other platforms are very good with good opportunities and we\'ll support them."

Finally, when asked by Bloomberg if EA had received beta Xbox development hardware, McKee commented simply: "Not yet." He stated that he did not believe Microsoft\'s inability to ship beta development hardware leading up to E3 suggested that Xbox might see a launch delay, and offered that EA would not worry unless kits still hadn\'t arrived in a month or two.

Electronic Arts already has published more than 18 PS2 titles, with as many as 20 more in development, including dozens to be announced at E3. EA currently has 10 projects in development for Nintendo GameCube, including NFL Madden 2002, FIFA Major League Soccer, NBA Street, SSX, Harry Potter and James Bond. The company\'s NFL Madden 2002 will be playable on GameCube at E3.

Or, to put it in English:

PS2 is the biggest so far, and will be for a while.  We will therefore try and make more money with it.  We will re-evaluate the positions of the console\'s market shares next year, and re-distribute our efforts.  

Now I personally think the PS2 is going to come out of this generation of console wars on top, the way things currently stand, but anything is possible....  This company thinks so to, but they are hedging their bets by developing for all the consoles.

[GmanJoe]

GO SONY!

GO STEELERS!

He really didn\'t say much other than he feels Sony\'s console may win the console war. He still said he was developing in full for the X-Box and Gamecube.