EA has inadvertently shot itself in the foot after attempting to bring some levity to the current lockdown affecting millions of people worldwide.
Video games, it turns out, have proven to be an invaluable form of entertainment for folks stuck indoors due to the COVID-19 pandemic, with companies like Valve recording record numbers of concurrent players on platforms like Steam over the last several weeks. The trend has prompted major publishers to kickstart various initiatives meant to keep people connected and playing together during strict social distancing measures, including EA with its Stay Home and Play Together campaign.
As it often has in the past, however, the company has misjudged the general sentiment gamers have towards its business practices with a move that has colossally backfired. Replying to an earlier post on Twitter by Ice-T – in which the musician describes how he’s staying home and playing video games – EA rhetorically poses the question: “WHY CAN’T YOU ALL BE MORE LIKE ICE T?”, to which critics had a few choice questions of their own to ask in response.
Check them out for yourselves below.
Why can’t y’all fix your servers ?
— 𝐌𝐀𝐑𝐂𝐎𝐒 Ⅱ ✪
(@NihilVident) April 21, 2020
Why can’t you not a) release a game without nickel and diming your required audience? B) Destroy once respectable studios by closing them, forcing them to make shoddy games, or apple picking their best workers and moving them away from what they know?
— Jettorix Woodard (@Jettorix) April 21, 2020
Because Ice T has plenty of pocket change for surprise mechanics.
— HT
(@HylianTicipated) April 21, 2020
We can’t buy enough packs to keep up.
— Aaron et politica ingenio
(@peekaso) April 21, 2020
Taking the tirade of criticisms in its stride, EA later replied to its original post acknowledging the, er, ‘passionate’ display, simply stating “ok im (sic) getting a lot of reasons why.”
ok im getting a lot of reasons why
— Electronic Arts #stayandplay (@EA) April 22, 2020
The takeaway from this latest blunder, if indeed there’s any, is that EA clearly has a long way to go until it regains the trust of consumers lost over the years due to controversial practices often considered extremely anti-consumer. One thing’s for sure: it’ll certainly think twice about what it chooses to put on social media in the future.
Is this just the latest instance of EA getting its just desserts, or is it time to forgive and forget? Let us know what you think in the usual place below!
from We Got This Covered https://ift.tt/3bsmvXS
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