News
‘Investors don’t give a sh*t about quality’, says Riccitiello
Tim Ingham Jul 22 2008, 11:56am
Comments (10)
But Take Two rival Strauss Zelnick says he’s always ready to shake EA boss's hand
EA CEO John Riccitiello has said that, as far as game content goes, his investors “don’t give a shit about quality”.
Riccitiello was speaking in an E3 interview with Venture Beat, in which he also asserted that Metcritic scores were a good way to judge the quality of EA’s games – and the improvement in what the company has developed since he took over in 2006.
When asked why EA’s stock hadn’t moved despite a noticeable raise in its average critical rating, Riccitiello said:
“I don’t think the investors give a shit about our quality. They care about our earnings per share. They wait for it to happen. We had three years where we didn’t make our expectations. If I were an investor, I would wait and see. That’s fine with me.”
In a separate E3 interview on Venture Beat, Riccitiello rival and Take Two executive chairman Strauss Zelnick said he’d shake the EA chief’s hand if he bumped into him.
Zelnick and Riccitiello have been locked in an intense war of words since EA's first bid for the Rockstar parent in February, as the Redwood publisher has continue to pursue its aggressive acquisition attempt.
However, Zelnick told the website of his relationship with Riccitiello:
“We’ve taken enormous pains to be judicious in everything we’ve said. No, this is business. It’s not personal.”
In his interview, Riccitiello added: “I don’t care if people write about Take-Two. It doesn’t matter to me. What matters to me is that the best developers want to work for EA. That the best games are published by EA. And we’re making progress toward that goal.”
Comments
“Maybe not...”
Posted by: Brett Stocks - Jul 22, 12:20pm
...but gamers do. That's why sales of Fifa and other titles shot up even more than what they normally did when you actually put some effort into the titles.
One of the main reasons why GTA sells so well is because it is a very well made game.
“Crap”
Posted by: Chris Ratcliff - Jul 22, 12:27pm
John Riccitiello having a Gerald Ratner moment.
“Re: Maybe not...”
Posted by: Bytesander - Jul 22, 12:37pm
Actually the correlation between games ratings and sales is "statistically insignificant", see here
http://www.gamasut...10924
Using it as a measure of quality is fine however.
“Re: Re: Maybe not...”
Posted by: koti - Jul 22, 1:08pm
I'm guessing one CEO is getting **** from his board today.
Oops.
“Re: Re: Re: Maybe not...”
Posted by: Jon Hare - Jul 22, 3:13pm
AAA games take around 2 years to make and another year to establish enough sales to really maximize the IP value for sequels and conversions, that is 12 financial quarters.
History shows us that most investors from outside the industry struggle with the concept of not seeing profits on their shares within 4-8 quarters.
This is why they don't give a **** about game quality and often don't see the bigger picture about how to make really big money out of this industry (with great IP that you own), because they get too jumpy to see the returns on their money too early in the production of the latest round of such titles.
I would have thought that with a company like EA the investors money is just about as safe as it can be in the industry. So unless the whole company has several Baron Munchhausen moments on the spin their cash should be OK in the long term and they should just trust the professionals to get on with it, which I am sure they probably do anyway.
“Re: Re: Re: Re: Maybe not...”
Posted by: schmix - Jul 22, 3:33pm
If you keep on writing articles like that, your credibility will suffer. Riccitello said exactly: "I DON'T THINK THAT INVESTORS DON'T GIVE A ****...".
Which has a totally different meaning, right? So maybe you should do your homework before starting such a cheap flame war.
“Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Maybe not...”
Posted by: Ben@MCV - Jul 22, 4:29pm
Schmix - you are completely wrong. Check out the original article linked in the story. The direct quote:
"I don’t think the investors give a **** about our quality. They care about our earnings per share."
If you keep on writing comments like that your credibility will suffer. Perhaps a bit more homework was in order ;-)
“Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Maybe not...”
Posted by: crapsells - Jul 22, 7:12pm
Yeah, right, like the best developers want ANYTHING to do with EA. NOT!
“Re: Maybe not...”
Posted by: Andy - Jul 23, 2:05am
I think to be in the top 10 in sales, you need a well-reviewed game. But a high score doesn't guarantee that you'll be in the top ten - there are plenty of well-reviewed games that didn't sell well. However, when you go below the top 10, say games that sell 200k or less, then I think reviews don't matter as much.
“of course”
Posted by: Avenyet - Jul 23, 8:18am
of course they don't give a **** about quality they just want the game out the door now so they can get the money.
hell my boss doesn't give a **** about quality he just wants the game now... and then bitches at me for changing code (WTF i'm damn programmer) this is the reason why there are so few good game out these days. there are alot of average and poor games and hell look at the wii 90% of it is crap