EA Says Single Player Games Are a 'Really, Really Important' Part Of Its Portfolio After Controversy

It looks as though EA is still trying to make amends for that joke about single-player games, with CEO Andrew Wilson calling them "really, really important."

During a recent earnings call, EA CEO Andrew Wilson reassured investors that single-player games are still a major part of the company's output… despite what it may say on Twitter.

“As we think about single-player games, we think it's a really, really important part of the overall portfolio that we deliver in fulfillment of those core motivations.”

Roast well deserved. We’ll take this L cause playing single player games actually makes them an 11. https://t.co/PNg4FKOgfB

— Electronic Arts (@EA) July 1, 2022

EA recently came under fire after making a controversial tweet that mocked single-player games. The tweet itself was a poorly-executed response to a recent meme, but soon had gamers and industry figureheads alike wondering why EA had posted it. After all, the company has published plenty of critically-acclaimed single player games including Mass Effect: Legendary Edition, Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order, and The Sims 4.

Now, the company is clearly trying to play it down:

“The way we think about this is really less about which game, and more about which motivations these games fulfill,” said Wilson. “So, we know that our players, they have these core motivations; inspiration, escape, social connection, competition, self-improvement, creation; these things that bring us together as players of games and the creation of worlds and the building of characters. And the telling of stories is really important in the fulfillment of some of those motivations.”

Even worse than being torn apart on social media, EA also came under fire from its own employees about the joke. According to USA Today, EA employees disliked the tweet, largely because the company’s social media is managed by a team that sits outside of the games industry.

“They’re all new and most of them, to my knowledge, aren’t really game industry people,” explained one of USA Today's sources. “The person who posted that tweet didn’t know and wasn’t supported properly to ensure something like this didn’t happen.”

However, EA still made clear that live service games are the dominant force when it comes to business:

“As we think about the model impact and the financial impact of that, the first thing to always keep in mind is that live services still encompass ... over 70% of our business, and that has been a proven, very reliable, highly recurring revenue stream and that will still be the predominant driver in our P&L (profit and loss) long-term," sad EA CFO Chris Suh.

Ryan Leston is an entertainment journalist and film critic for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter.