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EA Originals: "We are moving away from niche"
Why EA Originals is pivoting towards AAA content
www.gamesindustry.biz
EA probably hopes we'll open this article by talking about It Takes Two.
It is the biggest game from EA's ever-growing indie label, EA Originals. It has picked up numerous awards and has just surpassed 10 million sales worldwide.
But we'd much rather talk about Knockout City, an altogether different EA Originals title created by Velan Studios.
GamesIndustry.biz has followed the story of that game – an online dodgeball title – ever since EA and Velan announced their partnership back in 2019. Knockout City was revealed during a Nintendo Direct and PlayStation State of Play in early 2021 and was launched to much fanfare and plenty of positive reviews a few months later.
But it struggled, and after a few months, Velan realised that Knockout City needed to be a free-to-play game. This was a problem. The partnership Velan had with EA simply didn't work if the game didn't carry an up-front fee.
If you were hoping for drama, you'll be disappointed. Although EA had never encountered a situation like this before, the publisher simply worked out a way to tear up the agreement and hand the publishing duties to Velan. It was complicated because it involved things such as user migration and privacy. But the two sides worked on it and 12 months later, Knockout City was self-published and free-to-play. (Unfortunately, last week Velan announced the game will shut down in June).
"It really is partner first with EA," Velan boss Guha Bala told us last year. "It can't be economics last (laughs), but it is partner first. I am really appreciative of the effort. It's not an easy thing to unravel a deal and put it into a totally new context."
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