The name Electronic Arts is widely synonymous with plenty of things: profitable and undying annual sports franchises, being the proverbial 200 pound gorilla of the games industry, that whole “EA Spouse” fiasco… Creativity however, is not a word which generally springs from the tongue. That’s (supposedly) going to change — at least according to Alain Tascan, the general manager of Electronic Arts, Montreal.Gamasutra recently conducted an feature piece with Alain, who had some interesting things to say about the new directives emanating from the top over at EA Montreal.
Along with co-op paramilitary blaster Army of Two and SSX Blur for the Wii, Electronic Arts is apparently spending some coin on producing a (currently top-secret) intellectual property. Though he was unable to talk much about it, Tascan fingered the new title as being a serious departure from the established EA format and one of the top three titles currently being worked on over at EA Montreal.
“EA has realized that what we need now to stay number one and keep that edge is really to focus on creating new IP.” he said. “I mean, we just did Superman Returns and all the sports, but we feel that we are now ready to take big bets on new IP, and not bet the farm on the established titles.”
“We think this is something that people are going to react well to, because EA is not known for this. I mean, if you look at the comments of people on some of the things I’ve said and they say ‘how can you dare talk about innovation?’ And that’s what we want to prove that as a company we can do it.”
Along the way, Tascan took some time to comment on the policy changes which EA has enacted as a response to recent criticism. As readers may recall, EA caught some serious heat a while back, after their ‘80-hour workweek’ policies were publicly outed in a widely-popularized letter written by a desperate spouse. The affair (which ultimately spiralled into a class-action lawsuit) is now largely water under the bridge — apparently.
“It was an issue, and I think that there was a big wake up a few years ago, that EA really, very drastically changed the situation, especially at the studio where there were all of the problems. Even if there was bad press I feel that we reacted fast in a measurable, tangible manner. We get it, and now we manage it far better.”
“It’s hard, though, as soon as you work out a method of working with a system, there’s a new system and you have to learn how to work with that one. It’s like a new start up all over again.”
Tascan went on to say that now Electronic Arts’ new policy is aimed at reducing crunchtime pressure “across the entire company”.
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