The decisions that made it
The Pricing Play · Business Model
EA Stopped Selling You a Game. The $70 Box Is Now a Door, Not a Destination.
Everyone thinks EA's pricing story is greed — a sports license to lock out rivals, then loot boxes to bleed you dry. It misses the real shift: in FY2024, $5.55B of EA's $7.56B revenue came from live services, not boxes. The price on the shelf became a customer-acquisition cost.
8 min
The Adjacency Expansion · Moat & Competition
EA Walked Away From the FIFA Name. It Kept Everything That Mattered.
Everyone read the 2022 FIFA split as the end of EA's biggest franchise. It was the opposite - EA shed a ~$150M/year logo fee and kept its 300+ league, club, and player rights. FC 24 lost the name and almost nothing else.
8 min
The Money Machine · Business Model
Three Countries Tried to Ban EA's Loot Boxes. The Revenue Went Up.
A criminal ban in Belgium, a €10M fine in the Netherlands, and a record 683,000-downvote revolt all aimed at EA's loot boxes. Belgium didn't enforce it, the fine was overturned, and Ultimate Team's share of EA revenue rose from 23% to 29% straight through the storm.
7 min
The Counterfactual · Decision Forks
EA Doesn't Kill Studios for Sport. It Buys the Orchard for the Trees.
EA has acquired and then closed Maxis, Bullfrog, Origin, Westwood, Pandemic, and Mythic. The 'studio killer' story misses the design: EA was never buying the studio. It was buying the franchise, and the studio was the wrapper it threw away.
7 min