Video Games, Electronic Arts | featured news

Electronic Arts Inc. said Monday its Chief Executive John Riccitiello is stepping down and that its fourth-quarter results could fall short of expectations.

With the announcement that all EA games would contain microtransactions (just kidding, all mobile games, sure...), it seems Activision had a war room strategy meeting of their own. They're now rolling out the model for their most popular series by far: Call of Duty.

The Internet horde handed Electronic Arts the Golden Poo Award in 2012, naming it the Worst Company in America. While few would argue a video game publisher is actually the true embodiment of corporate evil, it's clear why EA came out on top, er, bottom. Many loyal and vocal fans feel mistreated, they don't like how EA has handled its biggest franchises and studios, they don't appreciate being forced to play games through Origin on PC, and they feel nickle and dimed by EA's fondness for paid DLC. That last point brings us to today's news: Dead Space 3 launches today, and, as if to add fuel to the Golden Poo fire, EA announced the first DS3 $10 DLC pack, Awakened, will launch in March.

The boss of Electronic Arts (EA) has denied there is any link between video game content and "actual violence". John Riccitiello spoke out on the subject during a conference call with bank analysts following his firm's latest earnings forecast. But he acknowledged that his industry did face a "perception issue".

Zynga has countered a copyright-infringement lawsuit from Electronic Arts with its own allegations that EA sought a potentially illegal agreement to avoid poaching each others' employees.

...with Sony, Nintendo, Microsoft, Electronic Arts and Ubisoft starting things off early with press conferences and showcases galore, we've already seen a lot of gaming goods. Here's a look at some of the games that have already wowed us...

On Tuesday, PopCap games announced it was being acquired by Electronic Arts, confirming speculation that circled late last month. The deal is valued as high as $1.3 billion in cash and stocks. But the company reportedly also fielded a huge offer from social gaming giant Zynga.

As if the idea of 100% voiced dialogue trees wasn't ambitious enough in an MMO property, word has now come out that EA and BioWare are expecting to have two million subscriptions for Star Wars: The Old Republic.