EA's Soderlund: Dead Space, Mirror's Edge Will Be Seen As Successful

Electronic Arts' holiday portfolio underperformed, increasing the scrutiny in particular on new IP Mirror's Edge and Dead Space. But EA Games Europe senior VP Patrick Söderlund believes the titles' lifetime performance will prove them to be hits. Industry analysts have suggested that EA's disappointing Christmas means that the company's push to drive up quality and innovation wasn't useful, but Söderlund calls that "simplistic." "I think if you analyze games like Dead Space and Mirror's Edge for their lifetime performance, I bet you'll find them to be seen as successful," he says, as part of a new Gamasutra feature interview. "They're both new IPs; it's hard to break new ground with new IPs, especially in that Q3 window, when you have games like Gears of War 2, Call of Duty 5, and a bunch of other really strong products with a 2, or 3, or 4, or 5 on it," he says. "So, I think that we could have done a better job as far as ship timing on, probably, both of those." "I think that in the case of Dead Space, I think that we executed well on our quarter targets; probably better than we could have hoped for. I love the game; I think it's an awesome game, so kudos to the team for putting it together." Although on Mirror's Edge Söderlund says "we did a lot of things that we set ourselves up to do," he concedes: "Is it perfect? No. Are there things in there that we will address for future versions? Absolutely. Was it a good first attempt? Yes! That's kind of how I summarize it." "What I'm saying is that I think that as long as you learn from your previous product, and you learn from what worked and what didn't work, you're ultimately going to be okay."