EA Sports UFC Could Release Every Other Year

[fballturkey]

Re: EA Sports UFC Could Release Every Other Year

I've never really understood that either...

I mean, if someone doesn't think that the game improves enough from year to year, then why not just have some self control (something that I admittedly don't have) and skip it?

Either way it's still two years of dev time whether a game is released or not isn't it? Of course, they would save some time because they wouldn't have to work on patches and stuff, but since those can be rolled over into the next iteration, then how much time is really saved?

I'm not in the game development field so I could be off base, but I assume they take a sustantial amount of time every year to polish the game and get it ready (bug fixes, etc) for release. Additionally after release they have to spend time doing patches. Most of what gets patched will probably end up in the next game anyway, but it seems more effecient to do it every other year and only have one polishing/beta testing/patching cycle every two years. They can keep making money on the game with fighter DLC in the mean time, and possibly other DLC routes like PPV events with specialized commentary (just for example.)

Also, from a project planning perspective if you have an idea that is going to take two years to implement an annual release schedule means you have to get it to a releasable point in one year and then finish it the next one, so you end up with half-baked features all the time.

[p_rushing]

Re: EA Sports UFC Could Release Every Other Year

2 year cycle only works if this year's game can stand on its own. If it is missing features because it is the first game on a system blah, blah, blah, then EA is going to hurt themselves. Only if they say we will release a free update in 1 year to add additional features will this work. You can only release half finished games for so long before you lose all respect from consumers.

EA has already done that with Madden and NBA Live.