Won't be coming to PC
very disappoited.
Forum Discussion
EA_Aljo
Community Manager
Community ManagerGolf is a huge sport played worldwide. I imagine it also attracts a bit of an older crowd that doesn't necessarily own a game console.
American football, while possibly not as global as hockey, has an insane following in the US. The Super Bowl is practically a holiday.
Regardless of these, when looking at the overall market for interest in a PC version of a sim-style hockey game, if that interest was there, chances are excellent we'd see this and invest in it. I get that you all think because we're EA we can do this. Sure, I imagine we can make that happen, but is it really the best investment when it comes at a loss? You all like to tell us how money focused we are. If we weren't going to take a loss, don't you think we'd have a PC version? If the PC hockey market were as robust as everyone here is theorizing, wouldn't another company be doing it? EA isn't the only developer capable of making a sim-style PC hockey game. Why is nobody else doing this? Most likely because developing an authentic hockey game isn't as easy as everyone thinks.
With all due respect, given the EA NHL 23 forums most trending topic is the NHL PC thread, every EA social channel is flooded with messages asking for a PC port, and the EA NHL subreddit has daily posts asking when the PC version will come, I just don't understand how there isn't a perceived demand.
In every single place I see EA NHL being discussed, people are asking for a PC port.
Also - it's pretty easy to clarify some of the numbers for EA Sports games on PC, just reference steamcharts. Right now FIFA has 48,561 concurrent players. That is A LOT, that is within the top 30 most played games on Steam. Conversely, EA Sports PGA Tour only has 243 concurrent players. That is pretty low. Still, EA Sports saw value in bringing that game to the platform.
I have a hard time imagining NHL would draw lower numbers than that.
Here is a post from the NHL Reveal on r /hockey, the BIGGEST hockey subreddit. As you can see, the upvotes asking for a PC version of the game are LARGER than the post itself.
Here is a collection of comments on EA's official release video for NHL 2024
Anyway, this pattern is evident if you look anywhere. Twitter, Facebook, here, reddit, doesn't matter, people are asking for a PC port.
I don't think anyone at EA is telling you guys that you're mistaken about the interest in a PC version.
What they're trying to tell you is that interest doesn't rise to the level of EA wanting to invest into a PC version.
- EA_Aljo
If NHL did FIFA numbers, there would be a PC version. Unfortunately, that's not the case. Yes, I agree it's a popular request, but when you compare how popular the console version of NHL is to FIFA or Madden, there's a huge difference. People regularly comment here about how this game doesn't sell like those 2. Putting out a PC version isn't going to suddenly change that. I'm not denying that there are a lot of PC players, but they would still be a far smaller number than console players. There is a demand, but it also comes at a huge cost and chances aren't good that demand is going to offset the cost of building and supporting a PC version.
Everyone assumes a PC version would sell amazingly well. Why is it that game developers aren't seeing this? Most likely because they've done the research and feel it's not worth the investment of development and support resources. That and hockey on consoles is traditionally not one of the bigger selling titles each year. Hockey also not having the popularity of bigger sports is probably a part of that.We hadn't released a PGA version in a few years so they could build the game to support PC from the beginning. We really can't sacrifice the console version of NHL to port it to PC. Putting the console game on hold while a less popular PC version is built would not be a wise decision.
- nah, I can't believe porting a game to PC is such a huge deal. I bet (no numbers available so I can only bet) they would get a ROI from sales alone but there's no player base big enough willing to spend money on dead multiplayer modes (which fuel FIFA/FC and Madden and are anything but dead there).
Easy money from microtx must be the key difference.- @MlecznyDuet I've said it so many times already. They don't get the money from HUT sales. They are given a budget based on sold copies by "x" they predict. That Ultimate Team money goes into things like marketing, creating new games, and most of all investors.
- FIFA now EA FC sells over 10mil copies a year.
NHL at it's best probably sold 2mil
Simply just porting the game to PC isn't that easy. Look at the trainwreck that was Last of Us for PC and so many others that were terrible. And I believe they would need to work out another deal with the real NHL/NHLPA and others to create a game on PC for licensing reasons. Which means more investment money wise from EA.
@EA_Aljo Plus the number of sales might not even be that big of an increase. As I would swap from console to PC that means it's not a new sale just a continued one overall.
@EA_Aljo wrote:We hadn't released a PGA version in a few years so they could build the game to support PC from the beginning. We really can't sacrifice the console version of NHL to port it to PC. Putting the console game on hold while a less popular PC version is built would not be a wise decision.
That's curious. There hasn't been a UFC release in years either but it seems past-gen consoles were dropped while PC is still not going to be supported.
At least judging by the beta registration page: UFC 5 - EA SPORTS - Closed Beta Registration
- @youneverknow8 This whole thread is too funny, you all could have played NHL on PS4 10 years ago...and now you all gonna whine for the whole new generation AGAIN 🙂) just bite the bullet, swallow your pride an buy the damn console lol
