EA Sports: The 'Universal Experience'Recently at an EA Sports event IndustryGamers sat down with Andrew Wilson, Executive Vice President of EA Sports (who replaced Peter Moore), to talk about how EA Sports sees the future of their business and how it's evolving, and where some key franchises are headed.
IndustryGamers: First of all, you've been on the job for six months. How do you like it?
Andrew Wilson: Not even six months yet. I love it! It's challenging. I had the great fortune of being a developer in the organization before, and now I get to direct all of the development, and the marketing side, and the communication side.
IG: You said earlier you're trying to make your games go social and mobile, so doesn't that mean marketing and development have to work more closely together?
AW: Yes, that's perceptive, and I think that's the shift that we're seeing. The teams that are really successful are the ones that have strong partnerships between marketing, development, product management, production, design, because it's a day-to-day interaction with gamers. That's different for us; typically developers would talk to marketing people once every four weeks when they get to a milestone and then really get together once a year, and now on the EA Sports FIFA Ultimate team, the Madden Ultimate team, those guys and girls sit next to each other and they interact on an hourly basis, in realtime.
IG: They can see problems as they appear, what's working and what's not working, in real time, which is important for the developers to know about.
AW: It's completely changed how we organize, it's completely changed how we build games and how we deliver games, and more importantly how we service the gaming community after the big launch. It's a really fun transition to plan for us, I think this is probably the most revolutionary thing that's happened in our industry for maybe a decade. I think the PS2 was a really a big thing for our industry, that really changed what we could play; but I think the live service nature of our industry is changing the way we think about building, delivering and servicing games and gamers.
IG: Is there less focus on the individual platforms now because of this comprehensive approach?
AW: We think there is a universal experience in the middle, and there are pieces of hardware surrounding that experience, and our job for each of them is to provide your window into that experience by providing for the capabilities of that hardware that you have access to at the time. And so what it means is, it's not so much about not applying focus to a platform, it's about considering the connected nature of the experience to make sure that if you have an iPhone, you have a fun iPhone experience, and if you have a PlayStation 3 you have a PS3 experience, but when you play on both those things it's connected, so what you do here in your iPhone shows up on your PS3 and what you do in your PS3 shows up with your iPhone. That's the shift for us; the design effort we've put into building that universe in the middle is exponentially larger than anything we've ever done or undertaken before. We've got new people, we've got more people, we've got an organization that more than doubled.
IG: There's a lot of moving parts.
AW: Yes, a lot of moving parts. I've heard people describe it like an aircraft carrier. You've got planes on the deck, you've got planes taking off, you've got planes landing, you've got planes in the air, and any one crash of any part is a multi-million dollar exercise. But for us, delivering those kind of experiences to gamers is one of the funnest things that we can engage in on a day-to-day basis. Gamers are feeding back that that's exactly what they want; they're playing more, their experience is better,. They're engaging more with the service at levels that are off the charts, and you're seeing them engage with social media. With Facebook right now, EA Sports and FIFA and Madden are up there with some of the most engaging brands in social media. Certainly this vision that we have of connected gamers, connected platforms and connected franchises is something that's resonating extremely well with gamers.
IG: Isn't the dark side of that, as you engage users more with a particular titles like FIFA, they are less likely to go and buy another title? Before, you'd play a game for a couple of weeks and then you'd get bored and look for a new one. Isn't this partly responsible for the lower levels of disc-based sales we're seeing in the industry in general?
AW: No, I think that every entertainment market and, and every market in general, polarizes around quality, whether it's music, books, movies, cars, whatever it might be. For many years the definition of a quality game was a 90 rated packaged goods game. Today, the definition of quality is a 90-rated packaged goods game that has a large service that changes the experience day in and day out, week in and week out, throughout the entire year. There is a new definition of quality that is being born before our eyes. Gamers have PS3s, they have iPhones, they have Facebook pages, and they are gaming in these different places, and what they're saying to us is instead of a 90-rated game that I might play for three weeks, I want a 90-rated game I play year in and year out, and oh by the way I want when I do things on these other pieces of hardware, I want that to count. So it's an evolutionary thing based on consumer demand.
IG: On a pure business level, when you have 25% margins on the packaged goods versus 50% margins on the digital goods, there's an incentive for you to get more revenue from the digital products. Do you see that's eventually leading to a point where we're just going to subscribe to Madden or FIFA, and only go to the store for a special edition? Really the essence of the experience is more and more online, it's not in the box. Isn't that a good thing from a business perspective?
AW: You know, I don't think there's as big a disparity between the two as some would perceive. For us, it's less about does it come in a box or by digital distribution; the distribution method is of less importance. We're happy for our consumers to get the product however it makes sense for them. For most people, I think getting a lot of the content on a disc is the right way for them to get that content. Getting challenges pushed to you on a week to week or a day to day basis is the right way to get that content. So for us we're building an experience that we want you to access from any piece of hardware that you have, and you will decide what is the appropriate distribution method for that piece of hardware that you are using at the time. For us it becomes immaterial because that's what we experience. The experience is what you play on a day-to-day, minute by minute basis, and how you get it is what makes the most sense to you.
IG: The players will tell you how they like to get the material by voting with their dollars.
AW: Yep. Our job is to build the experience and make it valuable for them in whichever distribution channel makes sense for them.
IG: Shifting gears a little bit, it looks like we're beginning a new console transition with the Wii U, and rumors flying about a new Xbox and a new PlayStation. I know EA has announced generalized support for the Wii U, but any idea when specific information might be forthcoming?
AW: I think in the coming months you'll hear more from us in terms of specifics around what we're doing on the Wii U. What I can say is that we're excited about the Wii U. Anytime Nintendo brings out a new console with a new way to play, that's exciting for us as game makers. The challenge of delivering innovation with that new way to play from a hardware perspective manifests itself with a new way to play from a software perspective is always exciting for us. We are focused right now on delivering some experiences that we think make sense for that platform, and where we can deliver truly innovative, game-changing ways you can play some of our experiences.
IG: Do you feel you're reaching the limits of the platforms currently?
AW: I think our engineers are some of the smartest people on the planet, and I wouldn't pretend to understand the nuances of how they get what they get out of the platforms, of anything, whether it's an iPhone or a PC or a PlayStation 3. When I think of the ongoing evolution of the experience the core FIFA gameplay is better than it's ever been, but then you add the connected component, a large service component, you get a multiplier of innovation irrespective of the technology capability - it's more the experience we can deliver. I fully expect our engineers can continue to get more because that's what they do. But that isn't the huge driver of innovation and creativity for us. There are lots of things that exist in and around the technology that deliver consumer experiences that are more meaningful than anything else we can do.
IG: It used to be a platform transition was a terrifying moment in the publishing industry. Place your bets on the right platform, and if you bet wrong you could lose big. Now since , as you expressed it, it's about the service, does that mean you still want to support these new platforms but it's not as critical because the service is going to be expressed on the different platforms, so it reduces the dependency on the individual platforms?
AW: Yeah, I think there's a nuance there. I think there's a singular relationship that goes with that core twitch gameplay experience and the service that drives that on a day to day basis. I think they're equally important. When you think about it, you're thinking about how can I get the best core twitch gameplay we can and and what is the right service that delivers that core twitch gameplay. I think about that new definition of quality and I don't think you can't have one without the other. Five years ago it was all about the core twitch gameplay. There is no lessening from that, it's just that you also have to have the live service.
IG: This year, you skipped doing a new NBA simulation title. Was that a blessing in disguise?
AW: The decisions we made around NBA and shipping next year are completely disconnected from what's going on with the NBA right now. We made a decision based on the time we believed we needed to reboot a team around new creative energy in Tiburon and deliver a true gameplay experience that is both core gameplay plus service. So that timeline that we have is all based around that. In terms of the NBA, we're NBA fans - we want NBA action just like anyone else.
IG: What about baseball? Is there an opportunity if Take-Two drops the ball?
AW: We have World Series Superstars right now on Facebook, that's doing very well for us. As it relates to baseball, that's our focus right now. We're always watching.
IG: What about other sports? What sports game would you really like to do that you haven't done?
AW: I would like to build a surfing game, but no one would play it.
IG: Is there an opportunity with youth soccer in the US, since it's so popular?
AW: The US has more junior soccer players than any other country. If EA Sports FIFA was a football team, they would be the fifth most-followed team on Facebook in the world. That's a pretty dramatic thing. That youth culture through social media is what's driving that engagement. I think those people are more engaged in soccer in this country now than they ever have been. I think we might see a shift in five or ten years from now, when you don't have the same migration away from soccer when you get to high school that we see today. As the soccer industry grows there's that ongoing support. We're seeing tremendous growth in the MLS in this country, we're seeing tremendous growth for our FIFA franchise in this country. I see wonderful things for soccer in this country's future. Everyone was watching the World Cup this year, it was huge.
IG: How has the Online Pass been going for you?
AW: It's going fine. When we brought that out, we said there's more and more live service features coming for our games, and I think gamers recognize that's exactly what we've done. This has been our biggest year in terms of quality and gamer engagement with our products and our biggest year of online features and services, so I think clearly the gamers recognize that is such a small piece of the overall puzzle - we've ended up in a really good place.
