The Sims Spark'd - Coming July 17th!

Huh, well...I can't say I was expecting this. It does seem like an interesting concept, though. (And as far as marketing techniques go, I'd much rather see this than a clothing line nobody can afford.)

It makes perfect sense that they would test the concept using their Game Changers first, since they already have a working relationship with them. It will be interesting to see what the vetting process looks like for season 2 and what the in-game challenges actually are.

I do like that the premise includes not only character creation and building, but storytelling as well-and that the judges include people from outside the Sims development team.

Speaking of, I did want to add to the discussion surrounding the prize money. First of all, as many others have already stated, the marketing budget and the development budget for the game are two separate entities. Scaling one back does not increase the other. However, it's also important to remember that in this case, EA is probably farther removed from the prize amount than you may think.

This show is airing on TBS, which is a commercial cable channel in the US. That means that there will be ad breaks during the airing of the show. I haven't watched anything on Buzzfeed Multiplayer, but I assume that ads are incorporated there as well. Those ads are where the prize money comes from, not EA.

That's not to say that EA hasn't made a financial investment in this show. But that investment most likely came in the form of paying a production company. The production company then helped develop the concept, sold the show to TBS and Buzzfeed, who agreed to purchase it because of how potentially appealing it was to advertisers. The production company then used that revenue to produce the show-including setting $100,000 aside as prize money. EA could not have used that money for game development if they wanted to, because it was the production's budget, not theirs. The only other uses for that money would have been building a nicer set or putting the contestants in a nicer hotel.