<font color=red>*</font color=red><font color=white>*</font color=white><font color=blue>*</font color=blue>
... And I'm proud to be an American, where at least I know I'm free, and I won't forget the men who died, who gave that right to me.

I don't like this.  Why would a game developer burn a bridge like ATI?
 
<font color=red>GOD</font color=red> <font color=blue>BLESS</font color=blue> <font color=red>AMERICA</font color=red>

I dunno, but im hoping that it is just in the form of advertising, like at the beginning of UT2003 (which is amusing that it looks so well on my 9700 pro).
 
I really think its a shame, but lets just hope it is just words and logos, not restrictive code.
 
<font color=red>*</font color=red><font color=white>*</font color=white><font color=blue>*</font color=blue>
... And I'm proud to be an American, where at least I know I'm free, and I won't forget the men who died, who gave that right to me.

money money money
And PR

EA games blow most of the time anyways. Who care about them... So nVidia now have exclusive support from EA on Earth & Beyond and Motor City Online(dead)? Who gives a damn.

EA has been getting a few good games out, MOH:AA, Need For Speed HP2 (which was strangely better on PS2), SimCity 4, ect...  
 
<font color=red>*</font color=red><font color=white>*</font color=white><font color=blue>*</font color=blue>
... And I'm proud to be an American, where at least I know I'm free, and I won't forget the men who died, who gave that right to me.

I signed up for Earthviewer and Nvidia has there name all over it as well <A HREF="http://www.earthviewer.com/index.html" target="_new"> earthviewer</A>
 
***************************************
When you feel that reality does not suit you, live a fantasy life.

This news is all over other forums as well. It seems that Nvidia not only is supplying EA with GeForce FX video cards for their programmers, but there was a large sum of money that changed hands. The games ARE going to be coded using Nvidia's shader language, and we all know what that means...what a bunch of A Holes. This is what the gaming industry doesnt need...games that render on one type of technology better then the other. I would be just as pissed if it were ATI doing this. Nvidia continues to do damaging things to the community every chance they get, first they set the gaming world back one full year by releasing Direct X 7 cards posing as new technology, now they are trying to split the cross refrence programming community into two groups, forcing gamers to choose sides. When average Joe gamer goes into an electronics store and see's that all of the games are displaying an Nvidia logo, claiming that this is "The Way it's Meant to be Played"....what kind of video card do you think he's going to purchase when it's time for him to upgrade?...The blatant truth of the matter in my eyes is this...If the graphics card your making doesnt beat the competitors...simply buy out the games houses to coded specifically for your product. 3Dfx did the same thing back in the day. Most of the games back then had a 3Dfx symbol on the box, and it made them millions. The first board I ever bought was a VooDoo. I cant waite to see how far this is gonna go. If all of the games that I love to play, render faster and better on GeForce cards...I wont have a choice but to buy one.
 
My Score..<A HREF="http://service.futuremark.com/compare?2k1=6258104" target="_new">http://service.futuremark.com/compare?2k1=6258104</A>

EA has been neglecting their ATI users for a long time, I've had many games that took weeks or months for a patch to be issued curing a driver incompatabity.
 
<font color=blue>Watts mean squat if you don't have quality!</font color=blue>

I should also mention something else from EA's history: Need for Speed didn't properly support nVidia cards either, being configured primarily for VooDoo graphics!  So the company has a long history of only supporting one player in the industry.
 
<font color=blue>Watts mean squat if you don't have quality!</font color=blue>

I can see it now:
R450 gets 400000 marks in 3d mark 2003. Nv 40 gets 58.
R450 gets 45fps in Madden '04. NV 40 gets 400000.
If Nvidia is going to go down this route, then maby ATI should partner with John Carmack (Doom 3), blizzard (do I have to name 'em?), and valve (if there ever is a Half-Life 2). These games are way more popular than what EA could ever make.
This sort of thing I think is very bad for the gaming community as a whole.

Actually EA makes the most popular game in the PC world, and perhaps NVIDIA realizes this, and EA realizes that the NVIDIA cards are really only useful for this 'game';
 
The SIMS the PERFECT graphics load match for NVIDIA technology .  
 
Seiously I only know of 1 EA game thatrequires SERIOUS 3D power that would cause me concern and that's Medal of Honour, whereas I don't think that NHL 2003 and others would make THAT big a difference. Now things like F1 and Nascar MAY be affected but I'm not sure if the optimizations will make much difference, and seriously if they SUCK on one card over the others, then people WILL migrate to the other publishers like 989 and Sega.  
 
As I've said, we would be better served by a 3 (or more) way race for Graphics supremacy.
 
- You need a licence to buy a gun, but they'll sell anyone a stamp <i>(or internet account)</i> ! <font color=red>RED</font color=red> <font color=green>GREEN</font color=green>        GA to SK

Don't forget Battlefield 1942.
 
I hate EA because their games are usually really slick-looking, have good game-play, but are buggy as hell.  
 
As far as the deal with nVidia goes, I wonder what's in it for EA.  I can see why nVidia would want game developers optimizing for nVidia hardware, but how does it benefit EA to show preference to one hardware manufacturer?  I mean, you would think EA would stand to lose far more money by pi$$ing off the ATI users than nVidia could shell out to line their pockets.
 
Why do I smell a back-room deal where EA's Directors of marketing and R&D are now driving new Ferraris?  
 
 
<-----Insert witty sig line here.
 
 
<P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1><EM>Edited by Twitch on 04/12/03 03:35 PM.</EM></FONT></P>

Twitch...did you jump into the end of this post without reading the beginning?(laughing)..EA got lots of moola and FX boards for their programming.
 
My Score..<A HREF="http://service.futuremark.com/compare?2k1=6258104" target="_new">http://service.futuremark.com/compare?2k1=6258104</A>

I edited it...I KNEW someone was gonna say that.    
 
 
<-----Insert witty sig line here.

Why are you guys so mad? How can you call them "A holes". Its BUSINESS. They arent your brother who promised he'd do the most to help you over everyone else. This is a company trying to do business. If you dont like it, get an Nvidia card (which is the whole point of the whole thing.).
 
Dont get mad at people for doing WHAT YOU AS WELL AS EVERYONE WANTS TO DO IN REAL LIFE, and thats make as much money as possible.

You miss the whole point people who have supported EA for a long time (I have most EA NHL'XX) and helped build THEIR company get pissed like any loyal customer when they take it up the hoop, or basket.
 
Yeah it's business, and we shall see how much they loose if they screw their fans. Rememeber EA isn't the ONLY player in gaming and 989 and Sega would be more than happy to take all their disgruntled consumers. And we will see what the overall impact is, if people boycott EA, <b>NOT</b> buy Nvidia (you don't get it do you?) then you may see this deal crumble.
 
<b> I have Cup Fever and have been Quarantined for the duration. <font color=yellow> GO </font color=yellow> Bruins <font color=yellow> !!!! </font color=yellow></b>
 
- You need a licence to buy a gun, but they'll sell anyone a stamp <i>(or internet account)</i> ! <font color=red>RED</font color=red> <font color=green>GREEN</font color=green>        GA to SK

what are you talking about?  And why should I buy an inferior card just to play inferior games from a company with an inferior attitude?  Obviously you were one of those guys who screamed VooDoo 4 is better when the Geforce 256 DDR came out?  Because that was what EA decided for it's customers.  And we saw what happened to 3DFX.
 
<font color=blue>Watts mean squat if you don't have quality!</font color=blue>

This is extremely worrying. Surely most ppl cant afford 2 state of the art pc's for gaming purposes. You may think that just swapping the card will do but you will need the software on a diff hard drive/partition because we all know what a pain it can be going from ati to nvidea and vise versa. Besides if this nonsense does go through i would not buy any software optimised for the other card that i have at the time because im not spending another 300 quid on a top rate card to play the thing! Anyways if this does go through i think it will slowly kill off pc gaming. Ive been playin pc games for years, still play counter-strike but it seems i wont be gettin many new games from now on 0_o