EA’s Origin To Offer Downloads From Other Game Publishers

Electronic Arts is stepping up its competition against Valve Software’s Steam in digital video game distribution, with the publisher announcing Oct. 27 that its direct-to-consumer Origin platform would soon offer PC game titles from other publishers including Capcom Entertainment, THQ, and Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment.

Beginning in November, Origin will add new releases including Warner’s “Batman: Arkham City” and THQ’s “Saints Row: The Third” to the platform’s current library of more than 100 EA PC games. Since its launch in June, Origin has garnered more than six million registered users; eight-year-old Steam claims a user base of 35 million.

More on Origin’s competition with Steam at Forbes.

EA Adds ‘Bejeweled,’ Other Digital Games with PopCap Deal

With EA’s planned acquisition of PopCap Games, the publisher gains casual titles such as Bejeweled, whose various versions sell a copy online every 4.3 seconds (according to a recent Wall Street Journal profile of the company).

“Here you have one of the last great acquirable franchises in casual gaming and with it, it puts EA back where they belong: front and center in the digital gaming conversation,” remarked PopCap board member Rob Ward, whose venture capital firm Meritech Capital Partners was a late-stage investor in the company (via GeekWire).

Analysts are relatively positive about the deal (via GameSpot), under which EA will pay between $750 million and $1.3 billion, depending on PopCap’s achievement of earnings milestones through 2013.

EA: Publisher Reaching New Markets with Free-to-Play Games

In an interview with GamesIndustry.biz (registration required), EA’s Frank Gibeau says that the publisher’s online free-to-play games group serves a user base of 17 million worldwide — including markets that the company has never been able to penetrate with packaged media.

When free-to-play services “get to scale,” Gibeau says, they “have huge audiences [and] are very profitable” — as profitable as packaged console titles. Moreover, free-to-play services “are not cannibalizing the main games and they actually reach markets that we’re not currently serving,” Gibeau says. “With ‘Need for Speed World,’ Russia and Brazil are number one and two…I can’t sell packaged goods in those territories. But I’m reaching an audience with ‘Need for Speed’ content.”

Report: EA in Talks To Purchase PopCap Games for $1 Billion

Video games giant EA is in negotiations to acquire casual games publisher PopCap Games for more than $1 billion, according to a TechCrunch report.

The acquisition, TechCrunch writes, would serve to bolster EA’s position in the casual games genre. PopCap, whose titles include “Bejeweled” and “Plants vs. Zombies,” has found particular success in marketing its titles as mobile device and social network apps. “Plants vs. Zombies” is the tenth-highest-grossing game app on Apple’s App Store; on Facebook, PopCap titles collectively average more than 18 million monthly active users (via AppData).

NPD Plans Greater Coverage of Digital Game Distribution: Report

Research firm NPD says it plans to publish monthly sales reports on the digital videogame businesses — from downloadable content to online subscriptions and social games — following complaints from publishers that the firm’s data was underinclusive of such increasingly important segments.

On Friday, NPD reported that videogame software sales had fallen by 8% in February. That data only takes account of physical software sales, which by NPD’s own estimate comprises 60% of the current overall games market. But even with the stipulation, publishers were quick to criticize the report.

“Using NPD data for video game sales is like measuring music sales and ignoring something called iTunes,” EA corporate communications executive Tiffany Steckler told CNN on Monday.

NPD analyst Anita Frazier tells GamesIndustry.biz (registration required) that the company “is expanding the number of digital retailers we have relationships with in order to develop a digital POS [point of sale] service.” In reiterating why the industry needs an “objective third-party source” for sales data, Frazier says that retailers’ sharing of such information, Frazier says, remains crucial as digital channels account for more of the overall market: “It will be harder for companies to manage their businesses and resources without visibility into all forms of distribution.”

EA: Downloads To Comprise 20 Percent of Game Sales

Electronic Arts is on track to sell $750 million worth of full-game downloads and other digital content this year, accounting for 20% of the company’s annual revenue, CFO Eric Brown said at a UBS investor conference in New York yesterday.

The publisher’s digital business, which spans games for social networks, smartphones, and console systems, is largely based on “organic” franchises such as Madden NFL and FIFA soccer. “We think we’re growing most rapidly in DLC for the console; the majority of our growth — 85% — is organic versus acquired,” Brown said (via Gamasutra). But the executive also noted that growth opportunities remain for packaged media as well: “We think digital starts with the disc and the high-definition platforms.”

EA in Virtual Currency Deal With Facebook for Social Games

Electronic Arts says that a five-year virtual currency agreement with Facebook “will create a simplified, more accessible experience for people who play games and purchase virtual goods” on the social network. Under the terms of the agreement, Facebook Credits will become the exclusive payment method in EA games on Facebook.

“Pet Society” and “Restaurant City,” both marketed by EA’s Playfish division, continue to be two of the top 10 games on Facebook measured by daily active users. Upcoming EA games for Facebook include one based on Hasbro’s family game property, Monopoly.

As part of the Facebook agreement, EA receives a standard 70% revenue share for Facebook Credit purchases, with the social network retaining the balance.

‘Call of Duty’ Developer: Key To Discouraging Trade-Ins Is Keeping Fans Engaged

Major videogame publishers including EA and THQ have sought to mitigate the impact of previously-owned videogames on new release sales this year by making some titles’ online multiplayer modes accessible only with a one-time download code. Gamers receive the code with factory-sealed copies of the game; presuming previous owners used the codes, purchasers of used copies must purchase a new code directly from the publisher.

That’s not how Activition’s forthcoming “Call of Duty: Black Ops” (in stores November 9) will work, according to Mark Lamia, head of the game’s developer Treyarch. From the development studio’s perspective, encouraging consumer retention of games comes down to offering continually compelling content.

“I want to take [the strategy] in the other direction and bring consumers really great reasons to keep their games, rather than trade them in,” Lamia told gamer site MCV at a recent promotional event for “Call of Duty.”

“We’re going to support the hell out of ‘Black Ops,’” Lamia continued. “That will be our focus post-release: making sure we keep our fans engaged, and hopefully as a result, they’ll want to keep playing our game and won’t want to trade it in.”

EA: ‘Madden’ Game Sales Up 5%, Digital Revenues Surge

EA’s “Madden NFL 11” looks to be the top-selling game in North America for the month of August, with the publisher estimating sales to be up by approximately 5% year-over-year across all platforms for the month.

Digital revenues for the game are up by more than 200% year-over-year, EA said, on the strength of a virtual-trading-card mode called Madden Ultimate Team.

“Madden NFL 11″ gamers have averaged more than two million online connected game sessions each day, according to the publisher. Nearly 20% of all online play has been logged on a new 3-on-3 multiplayer feature, Online Team Play.

EA also is taking the franchise into the social gaming arena with “Madden NFL Superstars,” which launched on Facebook Aug. 31.

EA: Digital Growth Will Offset Physical Game Sales Decline

Reporting better-than-expected quarterly earnings yesterday afternoon, Electronic Arts reaffirmed its full-year outlook, saying that revenue from digital content will drive overall industry growth.

Reuters reports that while EA expects industry-wide sales of physical videogames to decline this year by 3%, the company looks for 7% overall growth off of revenues from downloadable and mobile content.

EA’s own digital business (including wireless, Internet, and advertising) increased 52% year over year in its first quarter, with net revenue of $188 million.

EA Unveils Plan To Charge Used Game Buyers For Downloadable Content

Beginning with the release of “Tiger Woods PGA Tour 11” next month, EA Sports games for PS3 and Xbox 360 will include a single-use “online pass” for downloadable content and online services such as multiplayer modes. Purchasers of pre-owned copies will receive a seven-day free trial of the online access, but thereafter must pay $10 for the downloadable content.

Used game purveyor GameStop endorses the move. “GameStop is excited to partner with such a forward-thinking publisher as Electronic Arts,” GameStop CEO Dan DeMatteo, says in EA’s release. “This relationship allows us to capitalize on our investments to market and sell downloadable content online, as well as through our network of stores worldwide.” Via Joystiq

GameSupply: At EA, Digital Markets Bring New Risk Management Framework

Videogame developers have long been averse to working “under any regime,” notes Spencer Mott, Chief Information Security Officer of Electronic Arts. But with game publishers now reliant on a global network of developers, and gamers themselves increasingly adopting online subscriptions and other digital models, Mott says the industry needs a new framework: “we need quite mature ways to assess and address risk when working in a secure environment.”

Mott oversees global security and risk management (SRM) at the world’s largest games developer, leading a team of consists of 27 security specialists and employee “sentinels” who formally advocate SRM goals and objectives. EA’s SRM team focuses on three operational pillars: risk management services, data compliance, and security operations.

The year 2010 is seeing the publisher push further into direct-to-consumer models for downloadable game content. Subsequently, Mott points out, EA is increasingly involved in e-commerce customer details. The regulatory compliance aspects of “how we manage that relationship” encompass “a great amount of work” for the software publisher’s SRM unit.

Flowing from closer customer relationships is the need for EA to maintain an “instant response” plan for recovering from online game server outages or hacker attacks.

“We have to expect things are going to happen,” says Mott, who looks for publishers in general to promote security management “as more of a business-type function” than a back-end operation.

Continued development of open, industry-wide standards for baseline security and risk management help EA and other publishers “set an expectation level with our partners,” Mott says. But amid ever-shifting markets and consumer preferences, Mott advocates a flexible approach to implementing risk management practices industry-wide. “When the business is changing — and over the past couple of months, all of the projections were wrong on how the game business was changing — if you introduce too much policy into the process, you can stifle innovation and creativity.”

Mott will join BayTSP’s Matt Sprague in a presentation on content security at the GameSupply conference Feb. 10 in San Jose, CA. For more information, visit www.GameSupplyAcademy.com.

EA’s ‘Need For Speed’ Franchise Passes 100M Unit Mark

The videogame franchise has generated more than $2.7 billion in sales over its 15-year history, says Electronic Arts. Via Reuters

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