Posted on Thursday, March 10 2011 @ 6:00 CET by Thomas De Maesschalck
EA Games label president Frank Gibeau
was interviewed by Gamasutra about PC gaming and he sounds optimistic about the future of the platform and claims PCs may become EA's largest platform. PC retail sales may be a big problem, he says, but digital distribution is booming:
Part of the plan to continue the turnaround is a renewed focus on the PC. Facebook games certainly are a part of this, but the looming release of Star Wars: The Old Republic is an even bigger leap of faith.
"The user base is gigantic," he says. "PC retail may be a big problem, but PC downloads are awesome. … The margins are much better and we don’t have any rules in terms of first party approvals. From our perspective, it's an extremely healthy platform. … It's totally conceivable it will become our biggest platform."
Gibeau says EA is also increasingly dabbling in the freemium business model on the PC, given how successful it has been in China.
"If you look at the way people play in Asia, PC is the model," he says. "I think that free to play model is coming to the west in a big way."
