Won't be coming to PC
very disappoited.
Forum Discussion
EA_Aljo
Community Manager
Community ManagerIf 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.
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.
- @KlariskraysNHL "EA studios' budgets are not informed by the revenue accrued by the games they make." Is that the argument you just made?
HUT revenue is CERTAINLY considered when determining future budgets for future games. It's ALL considered. Sales projections also include microtransaction projections. Are you privy to EA's financials? I find it hard to believe what you're saying is true. In a perfect world a portion of all Ultimate Team earning would be pumped back into the games, making them better quality overall; Unfortunately, this is the real world and UT earnings prove time and time again they don't need to improve anything and they'll still net crazy profits.
The game won't really get any better, nor will it have the ability to branch out (PC version for example), until people kick their gambling addictions and tell them NO.
@TTZ_Dipsy wrote:In a perfect world a portion of all Ultimate Team earning would be pumped back into the games, making them better quality overall; Unfortunately, this is the real world and UT earnings prove time and time again they don't need to improve anything and they'll still net crazy profits.
The game won't really get any better, nor will it have the ability to branch out (PC version for example), until people kick their gambling addictions and tell them NO.
That what you described up there is 'capitalism', where a company makes a product, and sells really well, and makes a profit, and then uses those profits to invest in it's employees/technology/infrastructure/innovate/better products/etc...
EA has long joined the 'crony capitalism' era, which is just make obscene profits, buy back shares, get higher stock prices for shareholders, continue to pump out same product with new number, charge more, spend less, buy up then let go entire dev companies, make employees do more with less, make record profits, lay off more people to increase share price, buy back stock, continue to sell shareholders on HUT, make sure CEO gets another yacht, to hell with customers who want a specific game for a specific platform from a company that used to pride itself on having started out being on every console from Atari/Apple/IBM/Amiga/Atari. Of course that was BEFORE the dark times.. before the 2000's.
Electronic Arts used to stand for something. Now, EA stands for low effort high reward HUT and microtransaction obsession to pad the shareholders.
Apologies to the admins for this diatribe. I'm venting. I haven't played NHL Hockey on PC since 2003.
- EA_Aljo
@TTZ_Dipsy wrote:
In a perfect world a portion of all Ultimate Team earning would be pumped back into the games, making them better quality overall; Unfortunately, this is the real world and UT earnings prove time and time again they don't need to improve anything and they'll still net crazy profits.
The game won't really get any better, nor will it have the ability to branch out (PC version for example), until people kick their gambling addictions and tell them NO.
The money made by all modes, including HUT, goes back into the game. There isn't one person just stuffing their pockets with all the HUT profits. If it weren't for HUT, we'd most likely have less progress on this game.
@NeonSkyline21There was an article 4 or 5 years ago that talked about the money from Ultimate Team and how it went to funding marketing and new projects. The game studios budget was determined by how many supposed copies they were predicted to sell. You have to remember shareholders want as much money as possible so giving back the bare minimum is probably the goal. And granted the article was mostly referring to FIFA which we know is a huuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuge ultimate team cash cow who if they got all that money they should have the worlds greatest most polished game ever. lol
