It is a common practice in the gaming industry that developing studios first develop their games for the consoles since the sales on consoles are better, then the game is ported to PC which often requires fixing after launch. But According to EA, they have changed their development cycle a bit, as they develop their games for high-end PCs first and then port it to consoles.
EA Chief Financial Officer Blake Jorgensen said during UBS Global Technology Conference in San Francisco that EA develops all of its titles first for high-end PCs and then scales them down for consoles.
He further noted that it is certainly good for EA, since the consoles are becoming more and more like PCs, and we are also witnessing a mid-generation console upgrades.
He also said that mid-generation console upgrades are also good for the company, as it allows EA to not worry about their games not selling well on the old hardware when a new console is out.
He also added that this situation is also beneficial for the consumers as well as they can get a powerful console without waiting 5 or more years. One bright side of the mid-generation upgrade, in my opinion, is that the games are no longer held back by technical limitations of the older hardware.
According to Jorgensen, mid-generation console upgrades can also be seen as the end of the old console cycle and opening new opportunities that will be beneficial to all.
During the conference, Blake Jorgensen said that EA is currently looking to invest in making its game better in every way to attract a wider audience. He further added that the move to the Frostbite engine has been “incredibly powerful” for EA, as they went from 26 different game engine to just one.
Do you think it is a good approach to develop games for high-end PCs and then post them to consoles? Let us know in the comments.
