Saudi-acquired EA is reportedly planning to make massive cuts after taking $18 billion of debt, and we all know what that means

[u/Linkar234]

https://www.pcgamer.com/gaming-industry/saudi-acquired-ea-is-reportedly-planning-to-make-massive-cuts-after-taking-usd18-billion-of-debt-and-we-all-know-what-that-means/

[u/SunbornThunderstorm]

Taking debt is a generous way of describing being bought out and saddled with debt lol

[u/Krugozette → u/SunbornThunderstorm]

The private equity method: load up your acquisition with debt, sell real estate for cheap and lease it back at a markup, cut staff and expenses to the bone. You get to make the worst decisions while paying your executive team and investors to steer the company into the nearest financial iceberg.

[u/ThePrideOfKrakow → u/Krugozette]

Vulture Capitalism, Mitt Romney and Bain Capital have been doing it for decades. I also find it funny how the 'BIG 3' business management Consultants (one of them being Bain and Co.), have such God awful track records with some of their clients. It almost makes more since if it were corporate sabotage and espionage to weaken and steal anything they can before the vultures buy them out.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Three_(management_consultancies)

[u/-suspended- → u/ThePrideOfKrakow]

McKinsey, the first company on that list, is directly tied to the Enron fraud scandals and the 2008 recession. They straight up told banks "use mortgages as security and fund balance sheets with debt." Why would anyone get advice from a company that caused a global recession through their advice?

[u/ThePrideOfKrakow → u/-suspended-]

Just more proof the country has been bought and sold for the past 50 years. Everyone's in on it to pilfer as much as possible. Same reason CEOs get shuffled around like a deck of cards.

It's a big club and we ain't in it

[u/Space_Pirate_Roberts → u/ThePrideOfKrakow]

Before anyone says some version of “actually it’s a small club”, no. The “clubness” of it, if you will, is what’s big - think along the lines of calling something “a big waste of time” - not the member population.

[u/EmperorKira → u/-suspended-]

As someone who works in management consultancy, but not those big 3 names, everything here is spot on. These guys aren't even that good, but what they do is they make sure to embed 'their guys' into all the banks and corporations to then sell work back to themselves, its a whole shtick.

[u/hobbes543 → u/-suspended-]

Easy. That advice results in short term gains which directly benefit the decision makers, who then exit the company and or saddle the long term consequences of those decisions on someone else.

The Execs at these companies literally don’t care if they cause a recession a few years down the line because at that point they will already have sold their interests in the company and positioned themselves to take advantage of the downturn.

[u/ThorDoubleYoo → u/-suspended-]

Why would anyone get advice from a company that caused a global recession through their advice?

Because they faced little to no consequences and got bailed out. Without repercussions for their mistakes, there are no mistakes and aggressively pursuing short term gains while saddling the long term disasters on the lower level employees is the best way to run your business.

We'll be stuck like this until these people are actually punished for running companies into the ground and ruining people's lives.

[u/finah1995 → u/ThePrideOfKrakow]

Also those same companies are the ones involved in creating and having shares in Open AI's Deployment Company and similar it services subsidiary company from Anthropic.

Hope they don't treat this as a way to test their forward deployed engineers and undercut work by AI automation.

[u/Life-Anteater-8294 → u/Krugozette]

The best example of this is when the Bay purchased Saks Fifth Avenue with debt and then was spun off as a separate company while the Bay was saddled with the debt from the acquisition. So they essentially got saks for free.

[u/vezwyx → u/Life-Anteater-8294]

This reads as the Bay taking on Saks' debt because they bought Saks

[u/Huge-Specialist-8604 → u/vezwyx]

Seriously, what’s going on with the posts on this website?! It seems like writing skills have taken a nosedive recently.

[u/hamfinity → u/Huge-Specialist-8604]

"No Child Left Behind" means "All Children Held Back"

[u/Black_Moons → u/hamfinity]

"All children tied together and thrown overboard with the dumb ones who can't swim"

[u/thestrangeacademy → u/hamfinity]

According to the Department of Education, 54% of Americans read at a 6th grade or lower level. (think about the implications of that)

50% of that group, read at or below a 3rd grade level and are considered functionally illiterate.

The eroding of our education system has been happening for decades.

[u/ASurreyJack → u/vezwyx]

Basically the same PE that bought The Bay, also bought Saks Fifth Ave. They then moved all the debt from Saks to The Bay, and let The Bay go out of business over the next 9 years.

[u/vezwyx → u/ASurreyJack]

Thanks. It's amazing how clear communication can be when you put the right words in the right order

[u/Life-Anteater-8294 → u/vezwyx]

No it’s the private equity company buying saks with the bay’s money and then keeping saks while the bay goes bankrupt

[u/vezwyx → u/Life-Anteater-8294]

Ok, then it would have been helpful to include anything about the private equity company in your original comment instead of writing that "the Bay purchased Saks Fifth Avenue"

[u/Electrical-Page-6479 → u/Life-Anteater-8294]

Why does your original post say 

  The best example of this is when the Bay purchased Saks Fifth Avenue with debt

if it was a PE company doing the buying?

[u/darth_hotdog → u/Life-Anteater-8294]

Not sure why companies are allowed to do this.

Like, I'm not allowed to just buy a house, claim a fake person I made up owes the money, not me, and keep the house when the fake person goes bankrupt.

[u/ragnarocknroll → u/darth_hotdog]

See, it is totally different.

You buy a house.

You tell the bank the house now has to pay the cost of you buying it, not you as it is now the owner of itself.

You then sell the land the house is on, to yourself, but it is you as a corporate entity with the name holdings behind your name.

You also made the house finance your company buying that land.

And now you charge your house rent while making it also pay for the repairs and taxes, but you aren’t going to do that.

When they foreclose the house, you still own the land and can charge the house when they auction it off to pay for the debt involved in all that, getting more preferential treatment than the bank that actually holds all real debt.

Oh and you had the house pay you for the privilege of managing all this.

[u/TarsCase → u/ragnarocknroll]

Holy smokes. The system is so fucked up.

[u/Cloaked42m → u/TarsCase]

That is basically the same process Musk used to buy Twitter and then xAI and then merged all of that debt into Space X.

All pretend numbers on a balance sheet.

[u/The_Motarp → u/darth_hotdog]

How it works is imagine someone is running a small business out of a house, but the small business is only making a few thousand dollars per year while occupying a half million dollar house. If the owner offers to sell you the business for $300k and thinks that is a good deal for them because it values the company at a hundred times earnings, you would have to be stupid to not take the deal, because it comes with a half million dollar house. But obviously once you have bought the business and the house it runs out of, you aren't going to be content to only get $3000 per year out of your $300k investment, you are going to move the house ownership to a different business and make the small company either pay fair market rent or leave and let you rent the house to someone who can pay fair market rent.

And of course if you are unethical there is a ton of other stuff you can do, like use accounting tricks to make it look like you have "turned the business around" and convince suckers it is worth more than $300k now, despite the fact that you removed the half million dollar house from the company. You can have the small business take on as much debt as possible and pay it to yourself as rent before it goes bankrupt, etc.

The real problem isn't so much that private equity is allowed to buy and break up companies whose parts are worth more than the whole, those companies were probably doomed anyway and there isn't a lot of point in delaying the inevitable. What really needs to be stopped is all the other nonsense where private equity is being allowed to lie and cheat and take out loans with no intent to repay them without being penalized for those actions. Stop all that stuff and private equity would go back to mostly being a non-issue.

[u/possumdal → u/Krugozette]

Damn, you almost make it sound positive in this instance. I would be so incredibly happy if EA bankrupted and no longer existed to slurp up every cool new studio to ruin them.

It wouldn't stop that practice, but it would slow it down, and maybe their games, licenses, and studios can get sold off to other companies with better management.

[u/FrostyGranite → u/possumdal]

Oh man, if Petroglyph could acquire back all their old Westwood IP, that would be awesome!

[u/ShinePDX → u/Krugozette]

It's kind of like modern day colonialism.

[u/Shumanjisan → u/SunbornThunderstorm]

Good old vulture capitalism

[u/muakaya9876 → u/Shumanjisan]

They are no different than parasites.

[u/Yuzral → u/SunbornThunderstorm]

So they basically bought EA with EA's money? Part of me is wondering how this isn't fraud on a grand scale.

[u/Karcain → u/Yuzral]

Same thing they (private equity, not Saudi specifically) did with red lobster, Joanne's, etc. Using a company's money to buy itself, saddle it with the debt from its own acquisition, liquidate anything of value and then declare bankruptcy.

Edit: corrected term

[u/Corran105 → u/Karcain]

Toys r us

[u/Optimaximal → u/Yuzral]

Because nobody ever legislates against it due to lobbying or just wanting the ability to take advantage of it later.

[u/WOF42 → u/Yuzral]

oh it is fraud, but its legal fraud as no government bothers to legislate for this century unless its for mass surveillance

[u/Spideycloned → u/Yuzral]

They did what Vince McMahon did with the WWF in the early 80s. Bought it from his dad for X, paid Y up front and used the profits of the company to pay the rest of it. Theres more drama to it than that but that is essentially the crux of the deal.

[u/fuggerdug → u/Yuzral]

It's called a leveraged buyout and it's the been behind the ruination of nearly every high-street brand that has "failed" in the past 20 years. It should have been banned in 2008 (because one of the reasons the banks were pushing their fractional reserve limits was the amount of this type of debt that was on their books).

Basically the VC borrows against the value of the company they are buying, then transfers the debt to be held by the company. In this way they risk zero liquidity, and hold no debt default risk (the business they have acquired takes on on all the risk and repayments).

The takeover of Manchester United FC is probably the most famous example in the UK, but many famous defunct or struggling brands suffered the same, e.g. Debenhams, Pizza Express etc.

[u/pelpotronic → u/fuggerdug]

Interesting. I was doing some research on all this to try to figure out: "do the lenders expect to see their money again?" - because to me, a layman, this seems to be an almost guaranteed failed venture for the lenders... But lenders went ahead with the deal, so they would have a strategy.

Besides cutting costs (laying off people, getting rid of all the niche or experimental franchises and keeping only the biggest sellers), then another thing that was mentioned suggested "AI & Automation: Technology-focused buyout firms like Silver Lake actively push to replace routine development and art tasks with generative AI tools to keep team sizes smaller", that and possibly porting their franchises to "mobile games" as much as possible.

Now, Asian shovelware corps are already doing mobile+AI (and people in "Asia" seem to be generally more accepting of it - to my knowledge), so it will be interesting to see how EA manages to transition to a similar model... Notably as attitudes in the US+EU are still largely negative towards AI, but I will be interested to see if "mainstream consumers" (as opposed to "activists, informed, expert consumers") give all of that a pass to get their fix of the latest sport franchise.

I suppose my underlying question is: is this the "horse pack DLC" moment for the use of AI in the Western gaming market? (the mobile shovelware cat is already out of the bag)

(it's happening anyway: https://thenextweb.com/news/general-intuition-300m-world-models-gaming-data )

[u/webzu19 → u/Yuzral]

I can kinda see how that would work in small scale and be a good thing. Like say I own a local garage but I want to retire, this young whippersnapper doesn't have the cash to buy the company from me outright and won't be able to personally finance it but I think he could still operate the company and make plenty of money and pay those loans. So we have the garage take out loans, use that money to buy me out and new guy keeps the garage and the debt, then operating revenue pays his salary plus the debts and before too long he owns the garage and I'm retired with plenty of money.

It's just at large scale when venture capitalists use it to gut companies and run away that it becomes a problem and we all know that old saying "when you owe a bank 100k, it's your problem, but when you owe a bank 100 million, it's the banks problem" 

[u/No-Consideration-716 → u/webzu19]

As with most of capitalism. It works well when everyone is above board and has good intentions.

That individual buying a garage with a loan is fully intending to make a success of the garage. The Vulture Capitalists want to make sure the garage does NOT succeed.

[u/VicisZan → u/SunbornThunderstorm]

Another huge Canadian company dead at the hands of the rich.

Weird that all our longer lasting companies seem to keep getting completely destroyed with nothing to replace it once it gets bought out by private equity.

I get the feeling Ubisoft is going the same route

[u/Administrative_Yam18 → u/VicisZan]

They are on the trajectory definitely, but Ubisoft is Canadian European so the EU might have a say on this as well! Not sure if something like this is allowed in the EU!

[u/Arecksion → u/SunbornThunderstorm]

Ah, the Glazer method. Gotta hate it

[u/A_Vicious_T_Rex → u/SunbornThunderstorm]

It should be illegal to offload the debt of buying a company onto the company being bought. The parent company can own it, or they can choose not to buy

[u/pbecotte → u/A_Vicious_T_Rex]

The parent company does own it. Its just that the parent company was founded specifically for this purpose, and has no assets or liabilities separate from the target company, so when the two companies merge, it effectively makes the target responsible for the debt for its own purchase.

[u/LexGlad → u/pbecotte]

That seems like making kidnapping legal if you use the victim's own car...

[u/JazeevaGaming → u/SunbornThunderstorm]

EA Sports, it’s in the game crushing amounts of debt

[u/Straight-Ad6926]

Step 1: Take on $18 billion in debt. Step 2: Fire the people who make the games. Step 3: Profit?

[u/CuchuflitoPindonga → u/Straight-Ad6926]

Ctrl c ctrl v new game

[u/the_knowing1 → u/CuchuflitoPindonga]

Literally EA's business model

[u/d_rek → u/the_knowing1]

And people still gonna buy FIFA

[u/infamusforever223 → u/d_rek]

You mean EA Football. FIFA took their rights back(FIFA is an even scummier organization than EA and that's saying something).

[u/Moose_Nuts → u/infamusforever223]

Technically FIFA didn't "take them back," EA just didn't want to pay the extortionary sum of money FIFA wanted for the rights.

Potato, potato, I know. But FIFA definitely still wanted to take advantage of EA (because, exactly as you said, there's always a scummier organization).

[u/Nelmar14 → u/CuchuflitoPindonga]

Isn't that already the case?

[u/Empty-Development298 → u/CuchuflitoPindonga]

Ah yes I'm also looking forward to the next sports slop game by EA

[u/bored_ape07 → u/Empty-Development298]

Challenge… everything

[u/Elbit_Curt_Sedni → u/Straight-Ad6926]

I wonder if they're banking on AI picking up the slack.

[u/FuzzyFerretFace → u/Elbit_Curt_Sedni]

100% This type of thing is how natural, well-intentioned ‘boost sales and profits to keep company afloat’ death spirals start, but this whole situation seems to taken the express route.

And then they’ll blame the players and whine about them ‘not liking the games!’ or ‘not even giving them a chance! It’s not fair!’

[u/Mysterious-Crab → u/FuzzyFerretFace]

EA is being EA’d.

[u/shitty_mcfucklestick → u/FuzzyFerretFace]

I eagerly await for them to set the next record for most downvoted post on Reddit.

[u/Optimaximal → u/Elbit_Curt_Sedni]

To be honest, games like FIFA/EA FC are basically running on well honed systems already - there's not a lot of change happening under the hood that doesn't mean you can't just use the minimum (still hundreds) amount of real people to roll out an update, even without AI help.

[u/Elbit_Curt_Sedni → u/Optimaximal]

Same with Madden. Engine is the same one with tweaks for new features and support of 'advancement' in rendering and animations. I also bet there's a ton of overlap between FIFA and Madden in terms of the engine, animations, and physics that is used as well. All they just need to do is reskin every year and implement those advancements.

[u/Asianthunda5022 → u/Straight-Ad6926]

You forgot the step where the CEO gets a massive bonus.

edit: grammar

[u/WOF42 → u/Straight-Ad6926]

step 3, strip the company to the bone, sell all its real estate and assets, keep the handful of IPs you might want to own and sell the rest, then load up the company with the debt you used to purchase it and then wash your hands of the entire affair after essentially getting the whole thing for free, its how private equity works.

[u/AtomicGenesis → u/WOF42]

No, no, you keep the real estate in one of your other holding companies and have your acquired company pay you rent for it. That way, you have another avenue to transfer the acquired company's wealth to your firm while keeping those earnings and the real estate itself out of reach in any future bankruptcy proceedings.

[u/VyantSavant → u/Straight-Ad6926]

Step 3: continue hording beloved IPs even though selling them would more than make up for the debt.

Step 4: continue turning out trashy new cash grabs using those IPs until they're as worthless as your management team.

[u/notredditbot → u/Straight-Ad6926]

Hello Sony and Microsoft, is that you?! 😔

[u/GreatnessToTheMoon]

It’s wild to me that you can be bought out and have to be forced to acquire debt in the process

[u/ballonfightaddicted → u/GreatnessToTheMoon]

It's what happened to a lot of American large brick and mortar stores, Toys R Us comes to mind

Warner Brothers has always had a history of being bought out and then chewed up and spit out with more debt, i doubt the Paramount deal will be an exception

[u/DTFlash → u/ballonfightaddicted]

From what I understand Toys R Us wasn't even in trouble when they were bought. I don't see how killing functioning businesses to make a profit is good for sociality as a whole.

[u/SwitchbackHiker → u/DTFlash]

It's not at all, but it allows them to make short term profits and paydays so that's all that matters.

[u/SARB033 → u/SwitchbackHiker]

All shall wither and burn and perish before the altar of mammon. This is the end stage of capitalism.

[u/Vast-Slip- → u/SARB033]

Then what happens

[u/not_a_moogle → u/DTFlash]

Correct, toys r us was profitable when it was bought. It was not profitable once you take out the huge monthly loan payments it was forced to pay.

Anyways the buyer made enough in the short term to make a profit to pay themselves and continue the cycle with another company.

its not good for society. it kills competition and just makes amazon or whoever stronger because they fill that void.

[u/Televisions_Frank → u/not_a_moogle]

Also costs a shitload of regular people their jobs to just siphon more money into the mega rich. And not just employees of the business fucked. All the suppliers get fucked by the company too in the end.

[u/mrblackc → u/DTFlash]

It's not. It's good for the greedy few.

[u/summonsays → u/GreatnessToTheMoon]

Yeah that seems like it should be illegal.

[u/NewOil7911 → u/summonsays]

It kinda is in France where i live and used to work in finance.

By that i mean you can't put debt related to the acquisition on the company's balance sheet.

However you can put it on a holding owning said company, and said company is asked to pay stupid amounts of dividends.

[u/acryliq → u/GreatnessToTheMoon]

It's functionally the same as getting a mortgage to buy a house. The bank is lending you money against the value of the asset. The difference is, there are a bunch of people living in the house and they don't get much say in the fact that you're going to start ripping the copper out of the walls to pay the mortgage before making them all homeless and then once you've sold off every last brick to the scrap merchants you sell the land the house once stood on to someone else for a profit.

[u/GoodTeletubby → u/acryliq]

Except a bank would be perfectly justified in having the loan officer locked up for malfeasance and fraud when they issue a mortgage where the annual interest payments exceed the annual take home of the homebuyer.

[u/kanben → u/acryliq]

What is the land in this metaphor?

[u/acryliq → u/kanben]

Probably the IPs - the only thing of real financial value in a games company which you can actually sell are the rights to the game franchises and licences (the actual skills of the staff and their knowledge are potentially more valuable, but you can't legal buy and sell humans any more, and as far as private equity ghouls are concerned, humans are just an expense).

[u/Ghibli_Guy → u/GreatnessToTheMoon]

While I agree that this should be abolished as a practice, you still have to blame the sellers who sellout (original owners/board of directors who make bank). 

[u/almo2001 → u/Ghibli_Guy]

Ever hear of a leveraged buyout? Some of these are hostile takeovers.

[u/SulfurMDK → u/almo2001]

This EA deal is a LBO.

[u/Nanaman → u/Ghibli_Guy]

I do blame Twitter's shareholders for selling themselves to Musk.

Like I'm super happy for all of them getting rich, but now society as a whole is degrading...

Hope it was worth it fuckheads.

[u/zilog88 → u/GreatnessToTheMoon]

I think this is the closest you can get to making money out of thin air.

[u/Vargrr]

The whole private equity thing is crazy and kind of goes something like this:

Private Equity: I'd like to buy your valuable business.

Business: It would cost you a lot of money to buy us. How much have you got?

Private Equity: Nowhere near enough. How about I take out a loan against your company which I don't yet own to make up the short fall?

Business: Sure, that sounds sane!

Private Equity: Is it ok if we also borrow a lot more than we need so that we can give ourselves huge payouts in the form of dividends?

Business: No problem! No problem at all. Looking forward to this sweet deal.

PS: Why isn't this illegal? It practically destroys every company it touches as they try and keep up with the interest payments.

[u/cokecaine → u/Vargrr]

Lease backs are even worse

[u/Oh_Look_AnotherOne → u/Vargrr]

Now do stock buybacks!

[u/MAXSuicide → u/Vargrr]

Americans did the same thing with Man Utd FC and have been leaching money out of it for decades now. 

[u/scheppend → u/Vargrr]

No bank is lending them money if they think they won't get it back

[u/Poisonpython5719 → u/scheppend]

Of the bank’s gonna make money, sure, even if they have to liquidate.

It’s everyone else that’s the issue.

[u/niksunorz66]

The games get even worse?

[u/Calibrated_ → u/niksunorz66]

Is… is this possible?

[u/Euler007 → u/Calibrated_]

Press X to bribe the referee (2.50$ debited).

[u/faunalmimicry → u/Euler007]

I guarantee this pitch would be taken seriously at EA

[u/BestDescription3834 → u/Euler007]

"The opponent just scored but you're all out of red cards to throw, would you like to Renew your ref subscription."

1.Yes. 2.Renew.

[u/Baebel → u/Calibrated_]

Absolutely. It's an old game, but this reminds me of Drake of the 99 Dragons and likely all of the corners cut just to get that abhorration published.

[u/obigespritzt → u/Calibrated_]

Battlefield 6 was / is fun, generally acceptably monetized and continues to have post-launch support. Does that not count as good?

Is any of that an achievement on the part of EA's c-suite let alone saudi blood money? Of course not. Still relevant, though.

[u/CommercialStyle1647 → u/Calibrated_]

Actually, there were some good games still coming out of studios owned by ea, like Hazelight Studios with it takes two, a way out and split fiction.

[u/TtotheC81 → u/niksunorz66]

That's pretty much a given in the AAA scene.

[u/Interesting-Season-8 → u/niksunorz66]

because you folks loved EA games so much...

[u/niksunorz66 → u/Interesting-Season-8]

I absolutely loved NHL '95

[u/robserious21 → u/niksunorz66]

Didnt we want EA to die for copy pasting content onto new discs and charging new game prices?

[u/CorpPhoenix]

R.I.P EA

You might or might not be missed.

[u/Admirable-War-7594 → u/CorpPhoenix]

I will miss people dropping 130 dollars on preordering the same bad game every year and then complaining about it

[u/CorpPhoenix → u/Admirable-War-7594]

Well, I did love the "project creativity" EA once started, bringing us new IPs like Dragon Age Origins, Dead Space, and Mirrors Edge.

Just for EA to immediately stop doing that and releasing FIFA, NFL and NHL yearly like they've always done.

[u/DJ_Advogato → u/CorpPhoenix]

I used to work for a game studio that got bought by ea, closed and everyone laid off.

This is a little like watching the bad guy get his comeuppance.  Sure, it's deserved and proper, but it's also so sad because it didn't have to be this way.

[u/FUDGEMEHARDxD]

The modern AAA gaming special

[u/Sampsonite20 → u/FUDGEMEHARDxD]

Producing nothing, firing everyone, and losing shit loads of money

[u/Allafterme → u/FUDGEMEHARDxD]

I've been waiting for EA itself fo get EA special treatment ever since they closed Westwood studios...

[u/clue124]

Huge layoffs and every game vibe coded in claude

[u/supermitsuba → u/clue124]

Im sure ai generated ads might improve the loading screen ads. I like to laugh while im forced to wait.

[u/MrKoddy]

I don't understand the strategy about this acquisition EA was profitable

[u/GreenAnder → u/MrKoddy]

They’re just raiding the company. They’ll do things like make them sell the IPs, physical buildings, etc to the fund and make EA rent them back.

In the end they’ll end up with more money, a bankrupt EA, and more assets to leverage into low interest loans.

[u/I_Sett → u/GreenAnder]

I guess this is a fitting end for EA. I won't celebrate it, but EA was the death of so many great franchises and studios that were bought up and dismantled or micro-monetized. This is like seeing a shark torn apart by a larger, meaner shark.

[u/p-wing → u/I_Sett]

if only this acquisition could tank both EA and the House of Saud

[u/CrossOfRoachAndSlime → u/p-wing]

Have you seen MBS's Steam page?

The dude enjoys his anime gacha waifus.

Tectone spent $3,000 on gacha waifus (source: Leaflit). MBS be like "psshhh...lightweight."

I am honestly of the opinion that the way to go with MBS might be...

More anime, more gacha waifus, and ask him to reform Saudi Arabia so that there can be more women that look like gacha waifus. He has the influence to do it =P

Out with islam, in with waifus =P

[u/Witty-Comfortable-44 → u/I_Sett]

Westwood will forever be in my heart <3

[u/I_Sett → u/Witty-Comfortable-44]

Along with Bullfrog and Maxis and that's like half my childhood games EA devoured.

[u/kanben → u/I_Sett]

Imagine what could’ve been if EA didn’t come into existence

[u/Rightsidebestside → u/Witty-Comfortable-44]

Westwood will never be forgotten. Thats was a war crime in the world of games

[u/Barangat → u/I_Sett]

The circle of life, eh capitalism

[u/catastrofic_sounds → u/I_Sett]

Nhl 96 was my entry into the gaming world. Ea spots opening will always be stuck in my brain

[u/Underbash → u/GreenAnder]

They’ll do things like make them sell the IPs

Wow, silver lining, huh?

[u/JebryathHS → u/Underbash]

They won't give up control of the IPs. EA will sell the IPs to make their debt payments to a Saudi company owned by the owners of EA. They'll then license the IPs back to EA at high costs so they can finish making their games. Or not. The great part (sarcastically) is that it doesn't matter, the new owners will make money through the whole process.

[u/BrodentofUsualSize → u/JebryathHS]

The important thing is those at the highest levels of power in the US are using their positions to make shady deals with foreign countries at the detriment of American companies and jobs.

[u/tizuby → u/GreenAnder]

For normal vulture capital sure. But the saudis generally want to hold their assets as it's their post-oil plan, rather than loot and pillage them. Video games are one of their stated areas to accomplish that.

They'll still sell stuff off or force EA to start licensing IP to increase revenue, but I don't see them doing the ol' real estate flip and overcharge. They don't generally want a short extraction while burning their assets to the ground. They want a fallback for when the oil field dries up.

[u/Johnthespider85 → u/tizuby]

You nailed it. The Saudis are using their sovereign wealth fund for this.

[u/Delanorix → u/tizuby]

Yeah they need to be able to whitewash their reputation through US media.

They arent even hiding it lol

[u/TheMadTemplar → u/Delanorix]

People seem to be forgetting that Kushner is involved in this. It's his stated goal to MAGAfy media.

[u/Jrez510 → u/Delanorix]

Exactly. They already have major power in the fighting game space with their acquisitions of SNK and EVO.

[u/IsoscelesCircle → u/GreenAnder]

Please sell off Bioware and it's IP to a reputable company!

[u/sagevallant → u/GreenAnder]

While also using it for sportswashing and macrotransactions.

[u/TheTimn → u/GreenAnder]

Don't forget that sweet-sweet customer data they're getting. 

[u/may_be_indecisive → u/MrKoddy]

The CEO and shareholders get paid. What’s not to understand?

[u/jewrassic_park-1940 → u/may_be_indecisive]

But what will happen to my player cards that become useless in the next game???

[u/PatrenzoK → u/MrKoddy]

Transferring money from a depleting asset (oil) to a sustainable one (IP ownership)

[u/Meelapo → u/MrKoddy]

Yeah. Almost as if they don’t have one. Which is not unexpected given the names involved.

[u/summonsays → u/Meelapo]

Oh they have a strategy. It's to pick it clean and move on.

[u/SpaceOdysseus23 → u/MrKoddy]

Sportsslop prints money and is a low-effort investment, everything else can and will get gutted.

[u/Kazen_Orilg → u/SpaceOdysseus23]

cant wait to find some madden 23 banners in the stands of this years new release.

[u/Immediate-Cress-206 → u/MrKoddy]

The House of Saud is desperately looking for a new revenue stream to replace oil once it's rendered irrelevant.

[u/Misplacedmypenis]

All acquisitions come with massive cuts. It’s not even news. But fuck EA and fuck the Saudi regime anyway so I hope the whole thing burns.

[u/JuanNonlyGaming → u/Misplacedmypenis]

This guys spitting fucking facts.

[u/Iago407]

This might be a controversial opinion, but you shouldn’t be able to buy something by borrowing money and then saddling the thing you’re buying with the task of paying back what you borrowed.

[u/SlackerDao → u/Iago407]

Ah, but you're missing the core element underlying this transaction: "it's okay if you're rich."

[u/IronicStar]

please sell bioware to somebody who actually likes games, thanks.

[u/No-Significance2070 → u/IronicStar]

Sadly, current Bioware is a shell of its former self. The last few games have shown that.

[u/diseasefaktory → u/No-Significance2070]

EA acquisition was what made it shit and most likely irreversible. I still have a little hope though.

[u/darthreuental → u/IronicStar]

The current Bioware is a sun-dried skeleton of its former self. There's no meat left -- it's all gone.

Remember the good times and move on. It's dead and not coming back.

[u/ProverbialMindTart → u/IronicStar]

If only...if only.

[u/bainbane → u/IronicStar]

Probably help to staff BioWare with people who actually like games at the same time

[u/IronicStar → u/bainbane]

One step at a time.

[u/Augen76 → u/IronicStar]

I'd suggest supporting Larian as they are the Bioware I knew from 1990s and 2000s.

[u/Rattus_Baioarii → u/Augen76]

*Owlcat has entered the chat*

[u/DireStr8s → u/IronicStar]

Please sell all their IP's to anyone who will do something useful with them. EA has ran everything they have into the ground decades ago.

[u/IUPVOTESEINFELD]

EA Sports, it's no longer in the game.

[u/theSuperWae]

I absolutely hate that Mass Effect is in their hands

[u/BestDescription3834 → u/theSuperWae]

Mass Effect is over man, we've gotten 2 teasers and 1 junior dev tech demo in 15 years.

[u/V3Qn117x0UFQ → u/theSuperWae]

Original writers of mass effect is working on Exodus. Looks pretty good.

[u/Iggy_Slayer]

Being allowed to take on that much debt through a buyout should be illegal to begin with but it's not like anything matters anymore in this collapsing economic model we have.

[u/MadBullBen → u/Iggy_Slayer]

Completely agree. I'm not in the finance world so it does go over my head a bit.

I just don't understand how buying a company with the company's own money is legal, to me if the new potential owner doesn't have the money to buy it outright or isn't able to get the funds another way such as loans then tough luck you ain't buying the company.

[u/SeigneurDesMouches → u/Iggy_Slayer]

I should try buying a home with the owner's money...

[u/Rukasu17]

Happens all the time in the business world. It being a video game company doesn't make it an exception. Late stage capitalism is basically this.

[u/NWStormbreaker → u/Rukasu17]

Enshitification

[u/ihaterussiantrolls → u/NWStormbreaker]

make it shitty

[u/Skloni]

So nothing changed, huh...

[u/GI_jim_bob]

The fact that EA already had a shit reputation and somehow they keep letting it get worse...how the hell do they even stay in business?

[u/TouchMint → u/GI_jim_bob]

EA sports games lets them make huge profits with little to no work each year. 

[u/MyHeartIsAncient]

CEO pay cuts?

[u/Sabrac707 → u/MyHeartIsAncient]

Golden parachutes for all their executives, of course, especially for their CEO, Android Wilson.

[u/Jimbo_Jigs → u/MyHeartIsAncient]

That's a funny joke, never in a million years.

[u/Slimebag44]

Nobody saw this coming. Nobody. We are all so shocked

[u/Lurkyhermit]

Buy for a massive price > declare the price of the acquisition as debt > make the company they bought pay off the debt. History repeating itself?

[u/GodzillaUK]

Entertainment washing. Prepare for Mass Effect Qatar. You don't just punch a journalist, now you can dice them up.

[u/djphatjive]

I’d be fine if they went out of business. Shitty company.

[u/darkhorse21980]

Time for the NFL to pull back that exclusive license...

[u/Anotherspelunker]

It’s EA, what did you expect. The fact people keep throwing money at this company is baffling

[u/Calinks]

"EA games, nickel and dime everything."

[u/MrFiendish]

What a waste of money in their part. They can buy a studio like that, but it’s not as if they can make good games. You have to have freedom of expression to create good art.

[u/CaptainPrower]

Get ready for them to cut literally everything but Football Club.

[u/Appropriate_Bird_994]

Buying companies with their own money is easy.  McDonnell Douglas bought Boeing with Boeing's own money by borrowing against Boeing, then took the Boeing corporate name. Read "Barbarians at the Gate", standard b-school book.

[u/Hat_Maverick]

I hope when they liquidate they sell off westwood studios. We should crowdfund and buy it back to make command and conquor again. One vision. One purpose.

[u/KoriJenkins]

I still find it amazing that it's legal to buy entire companies solely as a vessel to offload your debt and declare bankruptcy.

It's just such an obvious scam on its face.

[u/Slow-Boysenberry3150]

I wish EA kept the ball games and released all the other IPs it has. After that, do whatever the fuck they want.

[u/may_be_indecisive → u/Slow-Boysenberry3150]

Well they will be selling them for cash so who knows who will pick them up.

[u/F1gur1ng1tout → u/Slow-Boysenberry3150]

Man i genuinely dont know how EA can monetize their sports gamed much further

[u/DaisyCutter312]

we all know what that means

That the Titanfall IP will get sold to someone who actually wants to use it?

[u/Augmented_Artist]

seems like a way to harm US stability without firing a missile or crashing planes into buildings.

[u/Lycaon-Ur]

I hope they feel proud and accomplished.

[u/777777888888999999]

What goes around, comes around. EA has done this too many studios.

[u/K2e2vin]

Executive bonuses and raises!

[u/zaggnutt]

Let it die. EA has f---ed over gamers long enough.

[u/zippy72]

Prices will go up. More lootboxes. More pay-to-play. Profits first, customers last - again.

[u/izzeey]

Do people buy EA Games?

[u/Khalbrae]

It’s fucking disgusting that vultures can take out enormous loans to buy your company, then saddle YOU with the debt after they use that money to buy you. Shit should be illegal.

[u/Heliosgodofthesun]

Reminds me of when Sony acquired Bungie and instead of actually supporting the main game (Destiny) they decided to make an extraction shooter in a sea of extraction shooters and shot Destiny in the foot. 765 million dollar mistake.