[ctide]

Apples to oranges. Treyarch at the time was little more than a studio that handled farmed out jobs to translate existing games to other consoles. I don't think they made any original games other than Die by the Sword at the time of acquisition. Compare that to Popcap, who released multiple innovative and original games across a wide variety of platforms. Just because Treyarch is now busy cranking out Call of Duties doesn't mean that the team that was acquired was anywhere near the level of Popcap.

[malkia]

That's my point. We didn't do much at the beginning, yet succeeded later. In contrast, EA has bought lots of expensive studios lately and they did not succeed (and that's okay, as long as you haven't put much money into it).

Btw, singly.com looks awesome, and telehash seems very interesting!

[electromagnetic]

Popcap has games that are brandable. Simply look at the success of Plants Vs Zombies and how well Popcap managed to market it, and realise how much a company like EA could mine out of it.

Plus they have Bejeweled and Zuma that are being exploited well already, but Popcap really doesn't have the talents to market a game like Plants Vs Zombies that's seemingly universally acceptable (I hadn't bought a single popcap game until Plants Vs Zombies and I haven't touched another of their games since).

There's big money in intellectual property, especially when they have products that have yet to be even exploited.

[malkia]

I wish them all the best. Especially to all of the employees!

[gamble]

They shut down Pandemic, but Bioware has been doing pretty well. Mass Effect and Dragon Age have been very successful, and if Star Wars: The Old Republic finds an audience it will probably justify the investment several times over. EA wasn't going to get those properties for free.