Game Developers Conference: EA steps into the mobile world

We have the passes and we're hitting some sessions today. It's early here in CA, so not much going on except a lot of donut eating. You can look forward to Vlad blogging a session about developing for the Playstation 3 later today.

The sense here is that there won't be too much in the way of breaking news. But once the floor is open (and the keynotes are given) we'll see about that. The Unreal 3 peek and the possible Zelda clip are on the tips of everyone's tongues.

The EA address by John Batter was interesting. A lot of mobile game developers I've spoken with are wary of the company's entry into the space. Why would EA get into a market that barely makes enough money to register on their financial reports? Sure, it's growing but it's nowhere near the size that would usually interest a company as large as EA. Do they know something the rest of us don't know? Perhaps new streaming media services like Verizon's VCast are an indication that the tech is about to arrive. Maybe the 3D hardware for mobile is almost "there". Perhaps EA sees that most of the content in mobile is sorely lacking from a non-casual gamer's perspective. And perhaps not...

Most likely, EA is just going to make a bunch of licensed titles. Batter said as much in the address, though we hope for more. Cheap to make, fast to play and readily available is a pretty potent strategy. It's too bad it probably doesn't mean better quality games. "It's not about genre," Batter said, "but about building a community around a franchise consumers are passionate about." The pessimist in me interprets that as "It's not about the game, it's about the franchise."