Apple Aiming to Take a Big Bite of EA? *Rumor*

[nemowolf]

From Game Politics:

A brief item on TheStreet.com mentions that there are rumors afoot that Apple may be fueling a major move into gaming by attempting to acquire publishing giant Electronic Arts.

No i added Rumor because nothing even closesly backs this up and EA, although a major player, doesnt seem like the company that Apple would want to buy. Very different ideals and inner political workings to make a good combo without some serious changes on both sides.

Commenting on the speculation, Edge Online notes that Apple has recently hired some execs with game biz background.

Now for me, this tells me that they are either 1) looking for a different/varied background to bring new prospective to the business or 2) getting people who actually know the business of games to help build up their App store with games.

[thephilosophizer]

Apple... Gaming... ?
Seems like a pretty big move for apple to acquire EA, granted as I understand EA develops multi-platform games, but a lot of those games are made for windows and xbox.
I could see apple maybe partnering up with EA for future game development, compatibility and controls and stuff for older games.
But apple buying EA, the largest video gaming maker in the world... seems a bit far fetched.
Not to mention, why the hell would EA want to sell themselves.

[nemowolf]

Large cash payout. Sell the company, get a huge check for your thanks in a smooth sale, and then your chunk of the change as a shareholder and bam! retire.

[GroundZero3]

Apple has already started to implement nvidia cards into their latest desktops/laptops. The lowest end macbook sports a 9400m that is sort of decent. With ability to install bootcamp and other programs like crossover/vmware fusion gaming is becoming a reality in the OSX world now. As for buying EA? Meh for some reason I dont think so but I hope. EA GAMES ARE HORRIBLE!

[thephilosophizer]

Apple has already started to implement nvidia cards into their latest desktops/laptops. The lowest end macbook sports a 9400m that is sort of decent. With ability to install bootcamp and other programs like crossover/vmware fusion gaming is becoming a reality in the OSX world now. As for buying EA? Meh for some reason I dont think so but I hope. EA GAMES ARE HORRIBLE!

True that the virtualization and bootcamp make a difference on the mac, though because of the 9400m only being sorta decent, and that they only come with 2gb ram, and 2ghz processors, virtualization is a bit of a stretch because resources are a bit scarce.
Bootcamp works in that all the resources are available for games, but apple still has a little way to go in getting all the drivers right.
And in the end, the cheapest laptop apple makes that can support games in the $1300 macbook, the mbp starts at $2,000, which actually has a discrete gfx card.
I suppose what I am trying to stay is that macs really just aren't very good for games. The $2500 mac pro comes with a gt 120, not exactly high end for gaming.
I suppose in the end for me this is a need to see it to believe it sort of thing (which is exacerbated by the fact that apple always plays their cards close to their chest). If apple wants to get into gaming, the best place to start would be with compatibility, considering that there are essentially no games that run on osx (granted though that osx is much less preformance drawing than vista, so theoretical it might actually be able to run some things better).

Oh, and to EA games being terrible. I remember a few years ago when EA bought westwood (command and conquer), it was a sad day.

[KarmaKiller]

Side note, Apple is picking up the GTX 285's now too, so you could actually game on one.

That said, I think this isn't going to be a good thing. I can see the prices of the already crappy EA games shooting up to say, $80 per game, just cause apple has something to do with it.

But we'll see I guess..