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[mcc]

Damn it

http://www.giantbomb.com/news/electronic-arts-purchases-popcap-jeff-green-for-750-million/3476/

[Golds]

Steve Swink mentioned that the $650 million acquisition price seemed low, and that's my first impression too.  I wonder if their revenues have been dropping the last couple years?  

I can't think of any big PopCap games that are micro transaction supported.  Social + micro transactions for in-game currency / avatar items seems to be where the money is in the casual market these days.  Maybe that's part of the reason?

[Tanner]

I'm cautiously pessimistic. As long as they don't can 4th and Battery I'm fine.

[Hangedman]

Hope it doesn't bone up PopCap's tradition of making moderately interesting and abusively addictive games. They're not the subtlest, but they're still very fun.

Remains to be seen.

[Paul Eres]

i think ea is gonna buy everyone eventually, they already bought like 100 game development studios and own like 40% of the market share for games sales

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_acquisitions_by_Electronic_Arts

[eiyukabe]

Hope it doesn't bone up PopCap's tradition of making moderately interesting and abusively addictive games. They're not the subtlest, but they're still very fun.

I didn't feel any of Popcap's games (that I've played; Bejeweled, Peggle, PvZ) were "abusively" addictive though. They felt legitimately fun. Speaking of abusive game design though...

i think ea is gonna buy everyone eventually, they already bought like 100 game development studios and own like 40% of the market share for games sales
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_acquisitions_by_Electronic_Arts

I'm more scared of the rampant Zynga acquisitions that have happened lately (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zynga#Studios_and_subsidiaries). At least EA lets some of the companies keep their original name instead of just becoming "EA Whereversville". Zynga might not be as big as EA (or maybe they are, I don't keep up), but they've only been around for four years and they openly admit to mimicking other games and studiously constructing their version to be as addicting as possible. (sigh) I guess that kind of behavior is what gets rewarded nowadays...

Either way, business men conglomerating power of development into their hands can only be good for those business men and bad for the developers and gamers. This industry disgusts me every day :/.

"I did every horrible thing in the book too, just to get revenues right away. I mean we gave our users poker chips if they downloaded this Zwinky toolbar which was like, I don't know, I downloaded it once and couldn't get rid of it," -- Mark Pincus, Zynga CEO

[TomHunt]

EA and all the other big profit-minded corporate game publishers are looking at casual and mobile and social with greedier eyes now that there are some real, solid numbers and pie charts to back up what everyone has been talking about for the past couple of years. It's like the day everyone's moms signed up for Facebook and started playing Farmville incessantly.

They are all used to, and the model they all follow favors working within the big box retail world. In the digital world, things work a little differently. You don't have the pretty box art to go on.  There's usually at least a youtube video involved, and that can show off interesting gameplay a lot better than pictures and words on a glossy box ever did.
 

[moi]

I'm sure the popcap owners wouldn't have sold if they hadn't smelled the future demise of this model already. New paradigms are coming.

[eiyukabe]

I'm sure the popcap owners wouldn't have sold if they hadn't smelled the future demise of this model already. New paradigms are coming.

But their deal promises them even more money (something like an extra $550million) for good performance, so they have incentive to keep performing well.

[Impossible]

i think ea is gonna buy everyone eventually, they already bought like 100 game development studios and own like 40% of the market share for games sales

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_acquisitions_by_Electronic_Arts

And then Zynga will buy EA completing the cycle of life.

[Nix]

It weirds me out to read about corporate acquisitions as a method of buying people.

[Player Ʒ]

It weirds me out to read about corporate acquisitions as a method of buying people.

Modern slavery. Somebody inform the president.

[Sabby]

It weirds me out to read about corporate acquisitions as a method of buying people.

Modern slavery. Somebody inform the president.

Not sure if you meant that seriously, but I'll take it as such. What of the workforce and the idea of money if they aren't modern slavery. But I digress.

Anyway, this is certainly going to be.. interesting to follow in the next few years.

[Nix]

It weirds me out to read about corporate acquisitions as a method of buying people.

Modern slavery. Somebody inform the president.

Not sure if you meant that seriously, but I'll take it as such. What of the workforce and the idea of money if they aren't modern slavery.

You can quit if you want.

[eiyukabe]

It's not literally slavery but the way it works now is still kind of slimy. Unless you're rich or from a rich family, you get paid just enough to cover rent and health care and such so you can keep living to keep working. Sure, in a good economy you can quit and find another job, but in a bad economy (guess which one we're going to be in for a while) you can't guarantee that you'll have another job so you're kind of stuck. If you're rich and you see a bad deal, you can wait it out and use pressure to make it a better deal for yourself; there's absolutely nothing forcing you to take a bad deal. If you're poor and starving, you need money now, so you have to take whatever you can get.

Calling the modern workforce slavery isn't completely accurate, but it isn't just an angsty trendy complaint; there is a lot of truth to it.