In the middle of all this, The Consumerist carried out its annual Worst Company in America poll and, for the second consecutive year, EA came out on top and claimed the not-very-coveted Golden Poo award. It could definitely be argued that there are far more morally reprehensible companies in America to choose from, but from a consumer standpoint EA had trodden on a lot of toes due to business moves like micro-transactions and online passes. Also, there was the controversy over the ending of Mass Effect 3 - that didn’t help matters.
The poll results ruffled a lot of feathers at EA, with CEO Peter Moore reaching out almost immediately to challenge the results in a blog post titled “The tallest trees catch the most wind.” You can probably guess the general tone of the response from that title alone. Moore began by pointing the finger at other companies who he felt deserved the title more and, while admitting that EA had perhaps made a few mistakes, dismissed a lot of the criticisms by way of ad populum defenses and straw man arguments.
Now that the wounds of harsh (too harsh?) criticism have had a little time to heal over, however, EA has apparently opened up a little to the idea that the people who voted in the poll may have had legitimate complaints. EA’s EVP Patrick Söderlund has described the company’s response to the poll in an interview with MCV:
That’s why they get paid the big bucks. In fairness to EA, however, the company has repeatedly pledged to do better and to try to avoid the practices that their customers find most aggravating, and it looks hopeful that some positive effects will come out of the two Golden Poos. Earlier this month, Söderlund said in an interview that the company had taken the second award “very seriously,” and that one of the ways it had attempted to change was through the removal of Online Passes. Söderlund isn’t ready to stop there, however:
It’s a very promising attitude, but gamers will probably need more than promises to go on before voting EA the best company in America (especially since The Consumerist doesn’t actually run that poll). Moore also promised to “do better” in the immediate wake of the last poll results, but seven months later Battlefield 4 launched with a host of glitches, errors, connection problems, freezes and crashes. It wasn’t as bad as SimCity’s launch, though, which is something.
Much of the remaining interview merely involves outlining the many ways in which running a video game company is difficult, but Söderlund does offer a couple of specifics regarding plans for the future. He says that he felt the last console generation went on too long and he expects the Xbox One and PS4 to have a cycle of around five to six years. He also says that one of the observations that can be gleaned from the customers’ response is, “gamers don’t want to play the same game every year.” Which is true, if a little surface level. From this Söderlund deduces, “We have to make sure we keep on innovating or people won’t give us their money.”
While it’s gratifying to see a company responding to consumer discontent, much of what has been said by EA’s executives (and a lot has been said) is very vague, and ultimately the company’s efforts to improve will be best reflected in the decisions made throughout this current generation of gaming. After all, actions speak louder than PR.
Source: MCV
