EA Announces That All Franchises Will Be Set In “Online Universes”
Now, here’s an interesting scenario as posed by Keith Ramsdale, head of EA’s Northern Europe division. Using FIFA as an example, he said “Imagine a player gets up in the morning, plays an online match on his 360 before going to work. On the bus, on his way to work, he practices his free kicks on his table. At lunch he looks at the transfer window on his PC. On the way home he chooses his kit on his smartphone. Here’s the thing: when he gets home to play again on his 360 that evening, all those achievements and upgrades will be alive in his game.”
In other words, what he is saying is that games won’t be limited to one title, but rather, it’s going to feature various games and apps all linking to a central theme. Here, a game brand is going to transcend a single console, and envelop the devices in your life. This is the online universe, and Sim City 5 is to be the start of what you might call a “revolution”.
I’m not going to lie when I say I think it’s a cool concept that all these different games and apps can be combined to essentially contribute to the same end goal and profile, as long as all the extra apps are optional. However, some people don’t agree, as they say that the fact that Sim City 5 requires an always-on internet connection shows that EA is being over-zealous in preventing piracy. EA, on the other hand, has claimed that it was the development team who pushed for an always-on internet connection, as “the dev team feels like it really does add a lot to the game”.
