Electronic Arts made an announcement in December that their sales aren’t doing as well as expected. Recently, they dropped the bombshell when they posted total revenue of $1.65 billion instead of the $1.9 billion expected. Hence, Earnings Per Share increased by only $0.56 instead of the expected $.088.

With the tough competition out there, EA seems to repeatedly churn out various versions of Need for Speed, Sims and the dozen other Command & Conquer games. Surely gamers are getting bored and moving on to other exciting games like Fallout 3, Fable 2 and so on.

So what does EA now do? Focuses on the Wii. After it’s plan to cut 1,100 people (11% of total staff), close down 12 studios and reduce the number of game titles it publishes, EA said it’s dedication is now on the Wii.

EA’s CEO John Riccitiello stated that his business has 3 different areas to fulfil - 

• Online
• PS3/Xbox 360 
• Wii

Combined PS3 & the Xbox 360? Hmmm… this is going to make it interesting for Microsoft and Sony given that they both like to have exclusive rights to certain games and if EA is going to combine these two categories, then console makes of the PS3 and Xbox360 will have to re-think their premium pricing (or go to another gaming developer)

Wii has great market share, and hence I can see why EA needs to capitalise on it. It can make games like Tiger Woods Golf, Tennis, various Need for Speed racing and so on. However, we’ll have to see how well EA integrates with the Wii – because unlike the Xbox360 and PS3, where some training time is needed before play, Wii should be a simple pick-up-and-play. Ideally you want your mother to pick up a Wii remote and start playing golf that easily.