News EA Games sign exclusive deal with the NFL

It appears that EA have bought the rights to all NFL video game rights from 2006 onwards, so if you are wanting to play an NFL-style video game, it will come from EA games.

Video game publisher Electronic Arts on Monday said it had signed an exclusive agreement with the National Football League and the marketing arm of its players' union, giving EA the sole rights to put NFL players, stadiums and teams in its games.

The exclusive license struck a blow for EA in its ongoing battle with the joint venture of Sega Sammy Holdings and Take-Two Interactive Software.

The terms of the five-year deal were not disclosed. EA shares, which touched an all-time high during regular trading, rose 5 percent after hours when the NFL deal was announced.

It will come as a shock to many of you, as we have been spoilt for choice with Sega and Take-Two's very good, and very cheap ESPN series games. Unfortunately for you, the consumer, these games will cease to exist from 2006. It's unfortunate, but money talks in this day and age - the consumer seems to mean very little to these companies now, when you compare the current situation to how it was a few years back.

You can read the full story on news.com.

 

that really sucks IMO. that is likely to get rid of the "NBA Jam" style of sports games for the NFL, which had become a thriving market

 

Sucks indeed.
We'll only be able to play A NFL game from EA, I don't think they'll do many versions/styles the same year.
It's good to be able to choose that kind of stuff.

Gotta love monopoly.

 

EA are evil tbh,

but the competitors could always go the pro evo route.....
where you can edit everything in the option file (including the team strips)

 

That's just smacktarded. Sure, EA is going to pitch this sort of thing, that's fine. But for the NFL to accept? What were they thinking? Are they worried that no-one is going to want to license NFL material for games in two or three years? I mean, I can't stand sports games myself, but it is a huge and thriving market. Giving one company exlusive rights for five years is just going to result in sub-standard games and developers caring less about how well they portray the league.

Nezuji

 

They must have been offered quite a bit of MOOLA for that to happen

 

MOOLA that should have been giving to the underpayed, overworked programmers of EA. Oh well, I guess we can't do much about it, other than not buying any EA games and hopeing it goes bankrupt.

 

NFL is boring anyway.
Only americans seem to play it and its always stop and start style of play that never has continued entertainment. And they are all wimps wearing bodypadding and stuff. they should try rugby, sort the men from the boys.

 

DriftCarl - Wtf does that have to do with EA Games and the topic of this thread?

Anyway it does suck that EA have managed this. Because it leads to me wonder what sport is safe? FIFA, NBA etc all might be looking to accept such a deal now. I'm no fan of EA (the last 2 EA games I have tried to play on my system haven't worked properly), but this may open the doors for other companies to try the same thing.