Wild Ride: Take Two in Play... Stock Soars... Battle Lines Drawn

@Pominator:

EA buys games that it knows will be good, then it ruins the sequels. So the fact that it *published* some very good games says nothing really, other than that they are WAY better at spotting good games than they are at making them...

Please TT, don't give GTA to EA! Please!

In the end, it's up to Take 2. It's been explained above, but even in the case of a hostile takeover, EA still needs board approval. They won't sell...

I hope...

@say no to monopolies

how will objecting to the takeover or signing your petition DO anything? at most you can show it to EA's CEO and he can say "screw you I'm still doing it"

so will we be seeing a GTA 2009, 2010, 2011 etc? the yearly franchise with "all new" features each yar which make no difference whatsoever?

I don't know, EA have got some rocking games under their belt, NFS, Fight night, C&C, Sims, The Godfather, Black & White- etcetera, sure we hate their sports games with a passion, but they have got some of the most kickass games known to man out there!

FUCK EA! I was giving them the benefit of the doubt that they were looking to improve their development base. But it is clear that they have no interest in TT, and it is nothing more than a HOSTILE takeover attempt. FUCK them for claiming that this is in the best interest of both companies. If that was true, let that be your bargaining chip. FUCK EA! You had been making amends, and showing humility as of late, but this just set you back a decade in public relations. FUCK EA. Have I mentioned "FUCK EA" yet?

Right now EA has very few.. well "good" games that I would consider buying. The publishers have a pretty big impact on everything. Just look what bungie did. They felt breaking free from microsoft would help them because they could not really be in the environment that they wanted. And everything had to be passed through the big dogs first. Look at EA! Do you want stuff passed through them? I sure don't.

I have a feeling that many people will walk (or most likely get fired) if T2 is taken over. which might be better for the development teams. personally i would rather have GTAIV as the last GTA EVER, than have a shell of a game sitting on shelves year after year.

@Mike: Anything in an open market is worth exactly as much as someone is willing to pay for it. Someone is willing to pay $26 a share for TT stock right now, so if you think about it, it's not all that surprising that the price of stock is now around $26 a share. People will assume that EA is offering that price because they think that's how much the stock is worth.
Thinking of it another way - say you want to sell your TT stock. You know that EA will pay $26 a share. So why would you sell it to anyone else that's offering less than that?

It'll take place on April 1st? Haha I can picture it.


TT "EA we will allow you to buy us."

EA: "Really we can!!!!!"

TT: "APRIL FOOLS YOU CAN'T GTFO!!!!!!!!!"

Doesn't Jack Thompson has shares in Take Two? 'Claiming' it was so he can have influence at their shareholding meetings? Does anyone think he'll turn up to this one?

This is how its going to play out. EA is going to put some people in high places in Take 2 then give a better offer than $26 a share. Then Take 2 will take the deal. I see them offering $30 max $31

boycott ea..boycott! teach em a lesson for HTing (Hostile Takeover) T2

I don’t know, EA have got some rocking games under their belt, NFS, Fight night, C&C, Sims, The Godfather, Black & White- etcetera, sure we hate their sports games with a passion, but they have got some of the most kickass games known to man out there!

Umm, they buy Kickass games - then add all sorts of retarded 'copy protection', and then corner you into buying 15 expansion packs to get the 'whole' game.

See - Blizzard does a lot better. They release a good game and some expansions - but there's enough value in the expansions to not even blink twice when buying it.

EA's "tiered video game distribution" sucks. I have the Sims 2 - while it's a decent game, every other expansion pack, I have to reinstall the whole mess. I used to keep the images of the CD's *I BOUGHT* on my hard disk, but now they are mucking with the application, whining about CD-Emulators running.

Of course, I found all this out AFTER buying Bon Voyage, the latest expansion. Since - it's still sitting, in the case, never installed because it's saying 'The Sims 2 isn't installed' - yet, it runs just fine otherwise.

So the inability of me to use CD images for convenience along with yet another hour wasted reinstalling the whole damn thing... well, pushed me over the edge.

I deal with computer issues all day, I'm just not going to deal with problems created by their paranoia.

See - the restriction on CD images is a REAL PAIN when they can't get the installer to work properly. So now, I would have to dig them all out, and use the much slower CD-Rom drive to re-install, etc.

So.. piracy concerns aside - since I actually have purchased all of these... well, EA can stick it. It's the last time I waste effort, money, and time dealing with their piracy paranoia.

Too many games out there to hassle with just one like that.

Is this how EA comes up with original IP? They are so unoriginal that in order to fulfill their statements of working to create original IPs they simply buy the successful ones.

If this goes through, I honestly might give up on all EA games, whether I like them or not. I cannot, in good faith, continue to give my money to a company that buys up the competition and allows games to become moldy. If EA could develop their own IP and make successful games that are not 10-year running sequels I might feel different. I'm just so got damn tired of sequels.

EA will quite simply become another company I choose not to do business with.

For the love of games, don't do it! EA would ruin T2. Never mind the sports monopoly and the obvious negative impact that would have. T2's adult game business would be nerfed to no end under EA.

Maybe that's why the Aussies don't think they need an 18+ rating after all? Are they rooting for EA to squash T2?

Hold out, Zelnick! Hold out!

Given someone listed all the EA "goodness" already and that some question the validity of many gamers issues with EA it is worth a look at EA track record of M&As. Luckily for me and you, someone has already done the homework. So here is EA's score card.

== Note dont read anymore if you get sick easy ==

Studios Opened or Acquired^

* 1998: EA Tiburon in Maitland, Florida
* 1999: EA Canada in Burnaby, British Columbia
* 2000: EA Los Angeles in Los Angeles, California
* 2002: EA Black Box in Vancouver, British Columbia
* 2004: Criterion Software in Guildford, United Kingdom
* 2004: Digital Illusions CE in Stockholm, Sweden
* 2004: EA China in Shanghai, China
* 2004: EA Montreal in Montreal, Quebec
* 2005: EA Mobile
* 2005: EA Redwood Shores in Redwood City, California
* 2005: EA Singapore
* 2006: EA Mobile India, Hyderabad, India
* 2006: EA Mythic in Fairfax, Virginia
* 2006: EA Phenomic in Ingelheim, Germany
* 2006: EA Salt Lake in Bountiful, Utah (Formerly Headgate Studios)
* 2007: EA Casual Entertainment
* 2007: EIS (European Integration Studio) in Madrid, Spain
* 2007: BioWare Corp. in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada and Austin, Texas
* 2007: Pandemic Studios in Los Angeles, California and Brisbane, Queensland, Australia
* 2007: EA UK, relocated to Guildford from Chertsey
* 2008: EA Korea in Seoul, South Korea
* 2008: EA Studio in Bucharest, Romania


Studios Closed

* 1998: Original HQ in San Mateo, California - moved to Redwood City
* 2000: EA Baltimore in Baltimore, Maryland - established in 1996 as part of Origin
* 2001: Kesmai (known also as GameStorm); acquired in 1999
* 2001: Bullfrog Productions in Surrey, England - acquired in 1995
* 2002: EA Seattle in Seattle, Washington - formerly Manley & Associates, acquired in 1996
* 2003: Westwood Studios in Las Vegas, Nevada - acquired in 1998
* 2003: EA Pacific (known for a time as Westwood Pacific) in Irvine, California - formerly part of Virgin Interactive, acquired with Westwood in 1998
* 2004: Origin Systems in Austin, Texas - acquired in 1992
* 2004: Maxis in Walnut Creek, California - acquired in 1997, moved to Redwood City
* 2006: DICE Canada in London, Ontario (created Battlefield 2: Special Forces expansion, Battlefield Vietnam, and all BF2 patches). Acquired DICE fully October 2, 2006; closed DICE Canada studio hours later.
* 2007: EA Japan in Tokyo, Japan - closed due to consolidation; moved under EA Partners model
* 2007: EA UK in Chertsey, United Kingdom, relocated to Guildford
* 2007: EA Chicago in Chicago, Illinois. Closed due to failure to meet profit targets.

^From an article on Ars with source from CNG

Jonnyboy
2K is a BAD pub as bad as activision or EA..... look how long ti took them to get a patch for Bioshock PC and even then tis still not fixed.....
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how much with the TTwo stock jump when GTA4 hits I wonder.

Father Time
Wouldn't do any good when half of US companies are monopolies and some are sanctioned by the government and get kick backs from the regulatory fees(Comcast).

well i gotta say when the govenrment got involved in "michigan bell" its basically been screwed up ever since, so there might be a bit of "we dont know how to fix this best stay out of it"

@Benji: Sorry for the delay in replying, as this seems like a neat discussion to get a bit deeper into. I get what you were saying about it being worth what someone is willing to pay. That's a very good point. The stock price rising that quickly still seems extremely speculative to me, now that that particular offer is off the table. Granted, you can read desperation into EA's two bids and dire warnings of "you may never get a bid this good again", but if the acquisition doesn't materialize (as every rabid gamer seems to hope for), what happens then? Is the GTA release going to bring in enough money to justify that huge increase in stock value?

Or am I just reading this from an overly risk-averse perspective on investment?

Even though a hostile takeover might occur sign the follwoing petition,
object to the takeover!

http://www.petitiononline.com/t2ea000/petition.html

@Father Time

have online petitions EVER worked? since you can' spam them with dialup accounts.

EA is not a monopoly. In fact, Activision Blizzard's the bigger piece of the pie and they're in more hot water than EA is. Activision has a few lawsuits they're actively dealing with, as well as the Activision PR snafu with peripheral rights when EA offered a Rock Band patch for PS3.

But then again, people like to point fingers at what's familiar to them, despite all the good that's come out of EA the past year, as well as how well EA DICE and EA Mythic are faring after their full integration into the company.

Online petitions do work. Just look at DVD releases :D I helped get Titus on DVD :p.