Hey Aljo, appreciate you taking the time to keep these conversations going. Has the NHL team or other EA Sports titles ever seriously looked into a live-service or subscription model instead of annual releases?
Not asking for future plans — just curious if it’s been discussed before, and how those talks usually go between the dev team, the league, and the business side. I think the community would love to know more about what factors EA has to weigh when deciding how to release and update the game.
Well over 10yrs ago they were thinking about it then decided against it. We have EA Play is what ended up happening and it never became a thing again. They probably realized it would be more work adding and removing content and that people might not always sub so they would lose in the long run.
https://www.eurogamer.net/ea-sports-absolutely-a-time-for-subs
Thank you so much for taking the time to read and share that info — it really helps put things in perspective. That makes a lot of sense.
I’m just wondering now if, with the advances in AI programming, the model I’m suggesting might actually make more sense financially. If the game was built as the ultimate fan experience, couldn’t a lot of the ongoing updates be handled automatically — keeping things fresh without constantly relying on the full dev team? It seems like that could reduce the workload and still keep the content flowing year-round.
Really appreciate you sharing your insight!
You see you said the most sensitive word in the market of gaming, movies, drawing. AI while it can be a gamechanger is also something that is frowned upon by apparently consumers and also puts fear into employees thinking their jobs are lost. So companies are trying to be as careful as possible when it comes to that. Like I get people want AI to add facescans and we'd have all these players, but you also have to remember that the real NHL has rules and such in place. The team isn't allowed to just design and add faces they haven't scanned.
Trust me if EA knows there is more solid money to be made in the long run they will definitely take that avenue.
KlariskraysNHL thanks again for the reply. I get what you’re saying on the AI and licensing — totally agree it can’t replace the people actually building the game, and the NHL has its own rules for adding players. (really hope they add on what they did last year and getting rid of a lot of generic faces at least veterans and young players included ) To create the best game we’ve seen to date it’s always going to come from passionate, dedicated human developers. Best games ever made have always had that, definitely not advocating for more AI. It’s like I said in the other post — it’s all about the business model changing so EA makes their money and we get what we want. EA’s got a monopoly here, no other hockey game is coming in to push them. ( maybe a competitor could create NCAA college hockey, but I see that very unlikely ) Unless profits take a dip let's hope and they’re convinced a subscription model would make them more money, I don’t see them changing much.
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