EA SPORTS

'EA Sports' is a brand name used by Electronic Arts since 1993 to distribute games based on sports. Formerly a gimmick inside Electronic Arts sports games, that tried to mimic real-life sports networks, calling themselves "EA Sports Network" (EASN) with pictures or endorsements of real commentators such as John Madden, it soon grew up to become a sub-label on its own, releasing game series such as FIFA, NHL, Madden NFL, and NASCAR. Most games under this brand are developed by EA Canada, the studio of ''Electronic Arts'' in Burnaby, British Columbia, as well as at EA Tiburon in Maitland, Florida.
EA Sports' early motto, 'If it's in the game, it's in the game', (later abbreviated to just 'It's in the game.') reflects the aim of the early games to portray reality as best as the technology would allow. Unlike some other companies, EA Sports has no special ties to a single platform, which means that all games are released for the best-selling active platforms, sometimes long after most other companies abandon them. For example, ''FIFA 98'', ''Madden NFL 98'', ''NBA Live 98'', and ''NHL 98'' were released for the Sega Genesis and the Super NES throughout 1997; Madden NFL 2005 and FIFA 2005 had PlayStation releases in 2004 (FIFA 2005 was also the last PlayStation title to be released); and NCAA Football 08 had an Xbox release in 2007. Madden NFL 08 also had Xbox and GameCube releases in 2007. Additionally, NASCAR Thunder 2003 and NASCAR Thunder 2004 were released not only for the PlayStation 2, but for the original PlayStation as well.

Contents

16 bit era

Series and games

Exclusivity deals

06 Games

07 Games

08 Games

Trivia

External links

16 bit era

After establishing with some highly regarded titles from 1987-1992, most notably ''Earl Weaver Baseball'' 1987, ''John Madden Football'' 1990 and ''NHL Hockey'' 1991, EA decided in 1992 to launch a sports-only label and EASN was born. ESPN took note of the similarities, and forced EA to come up with a new label to put their sports label under for the 1994 season. The first run of the 1994 season still donned the EASN brand, with a 'first run' logo on the lower right hand corner of the box (this was also done in 1993), while the rest of the production run was under the name EA Sports, with a new logo (whose design later would be also adopted by EA) and a uniform box design, all white with a live-action photo (), the exception being the Madden games, which featured Madden himself. All boxes would remain this way until 1997, when individual players starred alone, and although the ''99'' titles featured one unusual dark blue case, the all-white boxes returned the next year.
The first titles were released for both Sega's 16-bit console, the Genesis, and Nintendo's SNES (among other platforms, but only regularly for these two). In fact, some attribute the success of Sega's console partly on the strength of the sports catalog provided by EA Sports. On the other hand, the lack of them on the Dreamcast is believed to be one of the reasons it failed in the American market.
As the 16-bit era came to a close, and powerful 3D-capable consoles appeared, EA had to reinvent their franchises, and some of the earliest titles failed to live up to their 2D predecessors' reputation. However, in 1998 two games received very positive feedback - ''FIFA 98: Road to World Cup'' and ''NHL 98''. Later that year, ''World Cup 98'' broke the bad reputation of "official videogames" by receiving high marks almost unanimously. As fluidity in gameplay caught up to graphics, EA soon had to face another problem: the lack of improvement over previous titles, or as fans dubbed it, "sequelitis". The first years of the 21st century were problematic, with many fans left wondering why they should bother with the next release, when few new features were added, gameplay was not improved and their requests were ignored.
A new sublabel also appeared, dubbed 'EA Sports BIG', which specialized in extreme sports or unconventional takes on sports, such as Def Jam Vendetta, NFL Street, NBA Street, SSX, Sled Storm, FIFA Street and Freekstyle.

Series and games

Most EA Sports games are distinguished by year, as most games are released on a yearly basis. The trouble is, they do not have a clue about football. However, as EA Sports is the leading purchaser of official licenses, it's not uncommon that in a short span several games of the same sport but with different licenses are released: ''FIFA 98'' was shortly followed by ''World Cup 98'' (as EA has the license for the FIFA World Cup and the European Football Championship, it happens regularly in two-year intervals) and college football or basketball games based on both NBA Live and Madden NFL. The earlier titles released until 1996 are referred by fans as the ''classic'' series.

★ Madden NFL series, 1988 (games prior to 1993 did not have an NFL license)

★ NCAA Football series, 1996 (prior to 1996 the name of the franchise was ''Bill Walsh College Football'')

★ NBA Live series, 1994, preceded by ''The NBA Playoffs'' (1989-1993), and ''NBA Showdown'' (1993)

★ NCAA March Madness series, 2003

★ MVP Baseball series and MVP NCAA Baseball series, 2003, preceded by the ''Triple Play series'' (1996-2002)

★ NHL series, 1991
:Three Elitserien titles were also released in Sweden
:Three SM-liiga titles were released in Finland

★ FIFA series, 1993 (EA Sports also released several other games, most notably the games with World Cup and UEFA Champions League licenses)

★ PGA Tour series, 1990, renamed to ''Tiger Woods PGA Tour'' in 1999

★ NASCAR series (later renamed to NASCAR: Chase for the Cup, however, in the 2006 edition (released in 2005) the game was titled ) In the 2007 edition, (released in 2006), it is titled, NASCAR 07. In July of 2007, NASCAR 08 was released.

★ Knockout Kings, which was composed of five titles (between 1998 and 2002) and then discontinued when ''Fight Night 2004'' was released. In the past, ''Toughman Contest'' was also released.

★ Total Club Manager
:Preceded by ''FIFA Soccer Manager'' (1996) and the ''Premier League Manager'' series.

★ Rugby (rugby union) series
:Started at Rugby World Cup 1995 on Sega Mega Drive which went on to Rugby 2001 (A late version of Rugby World Cup 1999) PC only, Rugby, Rugby 2004, Rugby 2005, and Rugby 2006 all on Playstation 2 and XBOX as well as PC

★ Rugby League series
:Australian Rugby League was released on Sega Mega Drive as you play through the 1995 ARL season and the other ARL 96 was on PC depicting the 1996 ARL season.

★ Arena Football
:First version released in February 2006

★ Cricket Series
:Cricket started out with Ian Botham International Cricket 1996 (called Cricket 96 in Australia); Its sequel was Cricket 97 which was complemented with Cricket 97: Ashes Tour Edition. Following releases include Cricket Ashes Tour (1998), Cricket World Cup 99 (1999) and Cricket 2000. From then onwards, the series was a biennial one, with the releases of Cricket 2002 and 2004. It has returned to being an annual release with the releases of Cricket 2005 and Cricket 07.

★ There are other series, including ''F1 Championship'' (discontinued after Sony acquired the exclusive license for the Formula 1 championship), ''Superbike'' and others with a limited distribution such as ''AFL''

Exclusivity deals

In 2003 EA purchased the license to NASCAR for 6 years, ending competition from Papyrus and Infogrames.
On December 13, 2004, EA Sports signed an exclusive deal with the NFL and it's Player's Union for 5 years.
Less then a month after the NFL Exclusive deal, EA Sports signed a 4 year exclusive deal with the Arena Football League.
On April 11, 2005, the NCAA and EA Sports signed a deal to grant EA Sports the sole rights to produce college football games for six years.
In 2005, EA Sports and ESPN signed a massive 15 year deal for ESPN to be integrated into EA Sports video games. The only two games currently that do not feature ESPN integration in the games are Madden and NHL. NHL is not featured in the game because ESPN does not feature NHL game telecasts. In Madden NFL it is not featured in the game because John Madden does NBC Football. EA is looking to take Madden out of the title and make it have ESPN integration. ESPN also shows Major League Baseball telecasts however EA Sports does not produce MLB video games thanks in part to Take-Two Interactive's Deal to MLB for the 2K games to be the only third-party baseball video game. This deal was to strike back at the deal EA signed with the NFL.
EA's use of the ESPN license has steadily increased over the early life of the deal. EA's usage of the ESPN license began with ESPN Radio and a Sports ticker in titles like Madden NFL, NBA LIVE, Tiger Woods PGA Tour, and NCAA Baseball and Football. The ESPN integration now includes streaming podcasts, text articles (including content only available previously to ESPN Insider subscribers), and ESPN Motion video (including such programs as Pardon The Interruption).

06 Games

★ 2006 FIFA World Cup

★ Arena Football

★ FIFA Manager 06

★ FIFA 06

★ Fight Night Round 3

★ Madden NFL 06

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★ NBA Live 06

★ NCAA Football 06

★ NCAA 06 March Madness

★ NHL 06

★ Rugby 06

★ Tiger Woods PGA Tour 06

07 Games

★ Madden NFL 07

★ NASCAR 07

★ FIFA 07

★ FIFA Manager 07

★ NCAA Football 07

★ NBA Live 07

★ NFL Head Coach

★ Tiger Woods PGA Tour 07

★ NHL 07

★ NCAA 07 March Madness

★ Cricket 07

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★ UEFA Champions League 2006/2007

08 Games

★ Madden NFL 08

★ NCAA Football 08

★ NBA Live 08

★ NHL 08

★ Tiger Woods PGA Tour 08

★ Cricket 08

★ FIFA 08

★ NASCAR 08

★ RUGBY 08

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★ NCAA March Madness 08

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Trivia

★ The brand title 'EA Sports' inspired the name of Electronic Arts's non-sports game brand 'EA Games' with the same style of the 'EA Sports' logo in 2001.

★ EA Sports' official slogan says "EA Sports - It's in the Game!" voiced by Andrew Anthony, not David Hayter as some fans have previously suggested.

★ All EA Sports BIG games on the Gamecube in 2005 featured Mario, Luigi, and Princess Peach, from the Super Mario franchise, as playable characters. Example: SSX On Tour, NBA Street V3.

★ In the GameCube version of the Super NES game Super Punch-Out!! is playable. In addition, it is possible to unlock Little Mac as a playable character in the main game.

External links

★ EA Sports

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★ Voice of Madden NFL, Tony Bruno

★ news on the NFL exclusive

★ news on the NBA rejection of the exclusivity proposal

★ news on the AFL exclusive

★ news on the ESPN deal