Dan Greenawalt is the brilliant mind behind the Forza Motorsport franchise, and a legend among racing game fans. At Gamescom DualShockers took the chance to have a chat with him about Forza Horizon 2 and the future of the Forza franchise.
This video explains why we think Electronic Arts didn't see a future in the sim racing title Project CARS and promptly cancelled the fourth instalment.
After the last installment I’d say most hardcore fans left. It’s just not that good anymore so I can’t really blame EA this time.
It makes perfect sense. It's obviously a play on the title. Jesus christ you must be a blast at parties.
Ask Bullfrog or Black Box or Tiburon or Studio 33 or Criterion or any of the previously acquired developers who made racing games as competition, or as developers of EA games, then eventually dissolved into oblivion or reassigned. Just ask them. They'll tell you why.
Oh. I forgot. Even Code Masters were absorbed into Criterion. Another racing developer EA took over.
Every racing developer either absorbed by EA or eventually destroyed by them. They either kill competition or have them in the end make Need 4 Speed for them.
Not when it's because it didn't meet some crazy margin. It's like if something doesn't make EA a billion dollars on day one (I'm exaggerating that figure of course), they swiftly put it out to pasture.
Much like if you're spending money on what's a bad investment for your desired goals, you'd do away with it, if you're wise. We should try to get away from thinking we know more about business than individuals that have been doing it for decades. Perhaps you could benefit from going into business instead of wasting all of your talents in comment sections. It's clear that you're the missing piece that EA's been looking for.
I've made a good amount of money betting on underdog investments over the years.
EA sets unrealistic expectations of their more niche developers, yet continue to fund absolute blunders like DICE and the Battlefield series year after year.
Ian Bell, the founder of Slightly Mad Studios, is aiming to hire former Project CARS employees to work on his upcoming GTR Revival project.
If it's just going to be another sim-cade that doesn't do either one correctly then no thanks.
Project CARS 2 was a step in the right direction but the physics still aren't where they should have been, so what did they do for PC3? Go completely arcade. That killed the franchise.
From GI.biz: "EA is dropping Project CARS, GamesIndustry.biz can reveal.
The Slightly Mad Studios-developed series was launched in 2015, with EA confirming today that it has made the decision to "stop further development and investment" in the franchise.
The announcement was made internally and it's unclear at this stage to which extent staff could be affected. EA said that employees working on Project CARS will be moved into "suitable" roles "wherever [they] can.""
Typical for EA. They buy studios that created nice games..and are sooner or later destroying them and move the people to work on the old same 5+ EA series.
They will put the developers on the 1000th Need for Speed for the rest of their entire careers, just like Criterion.
To be fair, it's not EAs fault it falls directly on the consumer. Everytime these companies choose to drop a series they're met with backlash though the gamers didn't support said series enough to justify its continuation. Attempting to paint every company as evil all because they're in it to succeed is ridiculous. They have to make money just like each of us typing in this section. If a job wasn't supporting you well you'd quit and find a new one, this is the same mentality concerning series.
@SurgicalMenace
No it is their fault. They don't listen to fans and burn the franchise to the ground by introducing elements that nobody wanted instead of increasing support for said respected franchises.
I order a steak, they make a steak. 1st sale
I order a steak again, they vomit on my steak and charge me more for it. No sale.
EA in a nutshell.
@TheColbinator Well how do you think they make the billions then?
Their fans ARE buying their games. You are just not their focus group, and I can guarantee their customer insights team is more thorough and detailed in their reaearch than any N4G commentors’ opinion on the matter. Otherwise EA would not exist as a company, and they’d be bankrupt.
The one that still hurts the most though was Criterion w the Burnout series. Acquired Criterion's tech for their own existing IP, then shut em down. It's basically parasitic. I sure do miss Burnout's crash mode!
Sounds eerily similar to another large unnamed corporation hey. I believe some EA bigwigs shifted to that company back in the day, would explain the similarities.
and instead they come out with that piece of shit of Need for Speed which looks like an Anna & Barbera cartoon. C'mon .... PC2 was my go to game for VR racing and the first one i played for tens of hours. i was so lookiing forward to PC4 after that failure of PC3 ... what a shame EA, they are bombing all the good games and stick to the garbage ones. EA when you think you have reached maximum of disappointment they top it off with style .... screw them!
Need for Speed continues to sell so why would they get rid of what's producing what they need to maintain stability?
What they did to this series was idiotic. The premise was great -- a sim/simcade game that GENUINELY got developed in line with its community. There is a huge gap in the market for this...I mean, PD hasn't listened to fans at all over the last year with regard to simple Gran Turismo 7 tweaks. Sim racing fans are screaming for a title where they actually give a shit about their users.
Project Cars 2 was genuinely on to something, it just needed some refinement. But instead they followed up by selling off to EA with a braindead GRID clone with Project Cars 3. Again...idiotic.
Well since you're the authority on properly managing a million dollar company, why don't you just call them to let them know of your divine wisdom?
Hardcore sim racers are the ones who are competing acrossed the globe, no company in their right mind would focus on a forever moving casual market. They have to focus on those dedicated to supporting their efforts. Notice how you're speaking from a perspective of self opposed to the collective. Perhaps they sold out because they, like us, needed the money knowing that they could reinvest it into something new. PC was a decent racer but very few people mainlined it over GT or Forza.
I'm not a divine authority but I notice a pattern where these huge corporations turn completely tone deaf of what the "average fan" wants.
Hate to break it to you but project cars 3 was published by Bandai in 2020. EA didn't buy codemasters, which owned slightly mad studios, until 2021. Either way the sales were super poor for the game and it's not surprising EA would just drop the game. BUT it still sucks because it's one less sim racing game on the market. Especially because the first 2 were really good.
I think the Forza Horizon franchise is moving in the right direction with the weather system been added in from the last game I just hope to see Forza Motorsport 6 get the same treatment big fan of the game I just feel it needs a significant change rather than the small but great changes of Forza 5.
i Wish they could add real weather time if its raining in italy, it is in the game (in italy dah)... i wish this too in Sports Games
Started the original horizon again last night and man for the day it looks great, I really like music it gets me pumped. Weird thing this friggin 30fps deal I've become sensitive to it and it nags at me while I play. Kinda wish I was ignorant to it. Also since playin a lot of pc resolution is noticeable, not as bad in horizon cause aliasing is not bad. After I play last gen consoles awhile it goes away, but put grid2 in 4k in and hang it up.
come'on Dan, just say it...
"yes I would love to have weather in Forza 6, lets just wait and see if we can achieve it."
Gotta love those evasive answers :)
I am really looking forward to cruising around Europe!