I participated in the transition from the PS2/Xbox generation of consoles to the PS3/Xbox 360 generation we are in right now. It was a very tough transition for us. We pretty much threw out the old Madden engine and created a new one from scratch. There were some systems that stayed, but the whole art pipeline was completely changed, which included the animation system. The game play for modern 3D games are pretty much animation driven.
It is now 5 years since Xbox 360 debuted and there is no next generation of consoles in sight. However, there has been a lot of movement in mobile gaming. I remember when the nGage came out and everyone laughed. Now it seems they were just a little ahead of its time. The amount of games that are coming to the iPhone is staggering.
Now I’ve read this rumor on Gamespot that Apple might be planning TV-based gaming through their Apple TV product. Could Apple try and force their way into the space that has been pretty much dominated by Nintendo, Sony, and Microsoft? We’ll see, but it’s an intriguing thought.
Of coarse, our philosophy at EA is to build games for any platform. However, it does make it very difficult when the hardware is vastly different from one another.
Jason French 