Topic: Frostbite 3 ported to mobile platforms

[Seacor]

 

One of our most exciting current projects is called Frostbite Go, a mobile division empowering EA game developers with Frostbite’s proven excellent workflows and features to bring true Frostbite experiences to all major mobile platforms.

Source:  http://www.frostbite.com/about/history/

/facepalm

As EA previously announced that they didn't bother to test and port Frostbite 3 to Wii U because Frostbite 2 tests were not good on Wii U.  Yet, they just announced that they are porting Frostbite 3 to mobile platforms.  Are you kidding me??? 

EA:  Just tell us the real reason Frostbite 3 isn't being ported to Wii U and stop the BS.

[Spak-Spang]

Well, don't you know mobile phone devices have a more powerful CPU than the Wii U. 

[paleselan]

Nintendo doesn't need EA, honestly. I'll buy a PS4 and play EA games on there. They've never supported Nintendo before, so why would we expect them to now? As long as Ubisoft continues support for the Wii U I'll be happy, although I'm pretty sure Zombi2 will be multiplatform.

This is just like Activision hating on Nintendo; we don't need them.

[pokepal148]

Well, don't you know mobile phone devices have a more powerful CPU than the Wii U. 

not really... more cores /= more power...

[Kytim89]

It appears that Frostbite has replaced the Unreal Engine as a OS that is not able to be used on a Wii system.  :

[NWR_insanolord]

And like Unreal, it's unable by choice. Both engines could be made to run on the platform, their respective holders have just chosen not to put in the effort to port them.

[Kytim89]

I think that it is official to call EA the "asshole" of the gaming industry.

[azeke]

It's quite obvious who is the abusive side in third-parties/Nintendo relationship.

That's why headlines about studios saying how their devkits are gathering dust and blaming Nintendo for their own impotence are so stupid.

[alegoicoe]

It's the same as when Epic announced that the Wii was not capable of running UE3 but develop a version of UE3 fro the IOS, I call that bulls*it.

[Adrock]

Nintendo doesn't need EA, honestly. I'll buy a PS4 and play EA games on there. They've never supported Nintendo before, so why would we expect them to now? As long as Ubisoft continues support for the Wii U I'll be happy, although I'm pretty sure Zombi2 will be multiplatform.

Need vs. want. Wii U as a whole looks a lot worse with one of the largest publishers not supporting it. That, in turn, affects consumer perception. The dominoes will just keep falling. EA has supported Nintendo before. Even when Nintendo launched a cartridge based system in a time when the industry moved to optical media, EA supported Nintendo. Madden has been on Nintendo home consoles for over 20 years. This is the first time they've decided to actively drop support.

And I wonder if you'd be saying the same about Ubisoft if they followed EA's lead.

I think that it is official to call EA the "asshole" of the gaming industry.

We want EA to tell the truth about Frostbite 3, but we'd be mad either way, just for a different reason. "Test results weren't promising" or "We just don't fucking feel like it." Take your pick. Either way, it's not happening. The line they went with is PR 101. It's vague, sounds circumstantial (it shifts the responsibility away from EA without specifically blaming Nintendo), and makes it look like EA put some effort ("We tried. Whomp, whomp.")

There's plenty of reason to hate on EA. However, not supporting a struggling platform is at least reasonable, especially when they've been cutting cost everywhere. One could argue that Wii U would be performing better if third parties supported it more, but Nintendo has done a poor job of supporting it in general themselves. There's enough blame to go around on both sides. Seeing as this is Nintendo's console, it's still their responsibility to fix it.

Of course, there's the whole Origin thing even if it's only hearsay. Can anyone honestly say they wouldn't have been pissed if they were EA? Childish, but understandable.

It's quite obvious who is the abusive side in third-parties/Nintendo relationship.

Role reversal? It wasn't okay when Nintendo was abusive toward third parties, but how many Nintendo fans see it that way? You reap what you sow. Should Nintendo under a different president for over a decade have to continually pay for past mistakes? Maybe, maybe not. Nintendo has to prove that supporting Wii U is worth the effort to support. How they do that is a completely different discussion.

[ymeegod]

Sigh,

Frostbite 3 is not the same as Frostbite Go.  Go is supposed to bring "Frostbite" experience to the mobile devices but it's not going be the same caliber as the source. 

Kinda like Infinity Blade, sure it used UE3 but it's pretty limited in scope.  It's not like they were able to port over something like GoW to the Ipad.

[Adrock]

No one is saying it's the same thing. I think the issue people have is that EA went out of their way to do Frostbite Go yet put no effort into bringing Frostbite 3 to Wii U. They're acting like it isn't possible when it probably is and they just don't want to optimize it for Wii U.

[Ian Sane]

While I think that EA is acting unprofessional about the Origin thing, if they felt they could make money on the Wii U that would almost certainly trump personal feelings unless their CEO is a huge idiot.  EA doesn't really want to support the Wii U but the system is selling poorly enough that they can easily justify to themselves not putting in a full effort.

Nintendo just spent the last six years effectively chasing away the target market for damn near every third party developer.  This is frustrating but not that surprising.  "Hey your third party games didn't sell worth a **** on our last console and we scared off your target audience and have provided no reason for them to buy our new system, which isn't selling well at all with any audience, but we really would like you to support us."

While I was not happy that Epic didn't port the UE3 engine to the Wii I can see why they wouldn't bother.  Nintendo wasn't going to use it, Japanese devs wouldn't use it, and did Western devs need it for the Petz and Carnival Games bullshit they were making?  Nintendo (perhaps inadvertently) set the tone of the Wii as the casual system pretty early on and why do you need fancy graphics engines for that?  Epic themselves were certainly not going to make games for it.  That's a big part of it.  Epic made an IOS game so that's why they ported the engine.  Unreal Tournament 3 was released on the PC, PS3 and Xbox 360 so they had a reason to make sure their engine worked on all three platforms.

Is the priority to port the engine so you can sell it or is the priority to port the engine for your own games and then sell the engine on the side?  If the developer is not going to support the Wii U, likely because they figure their games won't sell to its perceived audience, why would they spend the time to port the engine just in case someone else wants to use it on that system?  If Epic was never going to make a Wii game and they spent time and money porting the engine, what if no one wanted to use it for Wii games?  All that money down the toilet.  At least if you make a game yourself you can justify the cost as part of the development of the game itself and then you know that some sort of consumer product is out there based on your effort.

[Fatty The Hutt]

Sigh,

Frostbite 3 is not the same as Frostbite Go.  Go is supposed to bring "Frostbite" experience to the mobile devices but it's not going be the same caliber as the source. 

Kinda like Infinity Blade, sure it used UE3 but it's pretty limited in scope.  It's not like they were able to port over something like GoW to the Ipad.

This.
Thank you!
Also, EA are still behaving like petulant children, but so are many other third parties that were supposedly "excited" about the WIi U in that 2011 E3 video. Right, Ken Levine?

[Fjurbanski]

I don't think we should treat this issue the same as Epic and Unreal, because as far as I know Epic never claimed to have a strong partnership with Nintendo.


EA has claimed, and continues to claim, that they have a strong partnership with Nintendo, so.... where is it?

[NWR_insanolord]

It's understandable that they might not want to put a lot of effort into developing for a system that has sold very poorly so far. They could do it, but they'd have to devote more resources to it than they feel is worth it. If they said that, I wouldn't be that mad. I might be upset that they weren't giving the system enough of a chance, or at least as much of one as I'd like, but I could see the logic.

But that's not what they did. They made comments that amount to slander toward the platform in what only makes any sense as an extension of some kind of vengeance against Nintendo

[Ian Sane]

It's understandable that they might not want to put a lot of effort into developing for a system that has sold very poorly so far. They could do it, but they'd have to devote more resources to it than they feel is worth it. If they said that, I wouldn't be that mad. I might be upset that they weren't giving the system enough of a chance, or at least as much of one as I'd like, but I could see the logic.

But that's not what they did. They made comments that amount to slander toward the platform in what only makes any sense as an extension of some kind of vengeance against Nintendo

Perhaps it's a rational business decision mixed with vengeful PR.  Like they could justify not porting the engine for business reasons but there are some personal reasons mixed in and their comments would let them take some cheap shots.  I don't think EA would do this entirely for personal reasons but if the business logic gives them leeway to be jerks, they're going to take it.

[NWR_insanolord]

I agree. With the state the company's in they can't afford to take actions just for spite, but they can throw some spite on top of a logical business decision.

[MagicCow64]

Aaaaand they've now confirmed that they have zero games in development for the WiiU.

[SixthAngel]

Aaaaand they've now confirmed that they have zero games in development for the WiiU.

This isn't something that happens in a couple of months. EA as obviously had plans to ditch WiiU for some time. It seems like the Origin fallout has to be pretty much all true now.

Now that I think about it did EA have any games that were successful on the Wii? Because both Activision and Ubisoft did. All I can think of is Dead Space: Terrible Railshooter and Yearly Sports Sequel: Gimped Addition.

[alegoicoe]

Its not like there are no other companies developing for Wii U. Once things turn around when Nintendo releases some caliber titles and sales pick up, am sure EA alone will swallow all the trash talking and start making games again. The problem is that EA is too full of themselves thinking that their software is must have and without it hardware manufactures are lost "in north America of course", and that is plain BS.

[pokepal148]

Its not like there are no other companies developing for Wii U.

yes it is...

[Adrock]

umm

Cool your jets, TJ.

[oohhboy]

I agree. With the state the company's in they can't afford to take actions just for spite, but they can throw some spite on top of a logical business decision.

I don't believe the assumption that because it's a "Business decision" means its logical. The "Business decision" thought process can easily lead to illogical conclusions. Releasing unfinished games early to fill revenue to meet an arbitrary point in time (Fiscal year or making the quarter). Company believing their own PR (Simcity "Vision", DRM). Purposefully creating dead traps by blindly following a balance sheet (Pinto). Over investing in a franchise (Final Fantasy, SWTOR).

In the end companies are driven by people and as far as I am aware, there are no real mechanisms in place in any company that prevent such emotional or personal decisions outside of company inertia or misconduct as long as you can hide it with whatever justification you can make up.The number of opportunities for the public to call them out are few and far between and almost always far too late since we usually only know about after the release.

[Fatty The Hutt]

Now that I think about it did EA have any games that were successful on the Wii? Because both Activision and Ubisoft did. All I can think of is Dead Space: Terrible Railshooter and Yearly Sports Sequel: Gimped Addition.

The Boom Blox games come to mind. I can't be arsed to look up any other titles but there were probably a couple more.