I love where modern video gaming has taken us, but sometimes I miss aspects of older gaming generation. For instance, older games never lost a gameplay mode a year or two after release. The online era requires publishers to run specialized servers in order to support multiplayer via the Internet, and it would seem that those servers aren't exactly cost-efficient to run for very long. To that end, Electronic Arts has announced that twenty-five games under the EA Sports label will lose online multiplayer capabilities early next month. What's especially shocking is that we're not talking about ancient games here. Some titles released a little more than one year ago are on their way out already. Here's the list via Kombo:
February 2, 2010 Online Service Shutdown
- UEFA Champions League 07 PC and x360
- Facebreaker x360 and PS3
- Fantasy Football 09 x360 and PS3
- FIFA 07 PSP, PS2, PC
- Fight Night Round 3 PS2
- Madden 08 Wii
- Madden 08 PC
- Madden 09 Xbox1
- Madden 09 Wii and PSP
- March Madness 07 x360
- NBA 07 PSP, x360
- NBA 08 PS2, PSP, Wii
- NBA 09 Wii - Europe only
- NBA Street (2007) PS3 and x360
- NCAA Football 08 PS2
- NCAA Football 09 PS2
- NASCAR 08 PS2
- NASCAR 09 PS2
- NASCAR 09 PS3 and x360 - Europe Only
- NFL Tour PS3 and x360
- NHL 07 PSP and x360
- NHL 08 PC
- Tiger Woods 07 PC
- Madden 09 x360 and PS3
- Madden 07 Xbox 360
I can understand why games from the 2007 family are being discontinued, and maybe I can cut some slack to the decision to kill off the 2008 line as we begin 2010, but dropping the 2009 titles is inexcusable. The idea is that these games are not generating enough revenue for EA to justify leaving the light on for them, but if the 2009 games are already on their way out, then obviously they can't be profitable for very long, so why continue to include online multiplayer in them at all if they're just going to be neutered so quickly? I don't completely fault EA for the decision, but there has to be a better way to do this.
