Summary
- EA shares dropped 16%, losing $6 billion, signaling a tough time for the company.
- Major titles like Dragon Age: The Veilguard and EA Sports FC 25 underperformed by up to 50% in sales.
- Despite underperforming, EA Sports FC 25 was the eighth best-selling game of 2024.
The shares of Electronic Arts have lost over 16% of their value this week, incurring losses of around $6 billion in the company’s overall value. The decline in EA’s value indicates a bad time for the company and the gaming industry as a whole, as publishers are struggling to achieve enough sales with their new releases.
Earlier this week, a new report made by Bloomberg revealed that two major EA titles underperformed in sales recently: Dragon Age: The Veilguard and EA Sports FC 2025. In Dragon Age’s case, the game underperformed by around 50%, reaching only around 1.5 million players since its release. Both games were major holiday titles for EA and had the names of strong franchises attached to them, so it was somewhat surprising to see both of them failing to achieve their goals.
7 Forgotten Electronic Arts Franchises
EA is notorious for sitting on franchises, leaving a once-popular series dormant for far too long, where only nostalgia remains for some players.
Now, new reports from Reuters indicate that EA’s shares went down by 16% this week, and the company lost $6 billion from its previous value of $37.3 billion. According to Reuters, EA Sports FC games generate around $2 billion annually, and the insufficient results in the series certainly put some pressure on the publisher. Back in May 2022, EA Sports lost the FIFA license, but it’s unclear how much this event has affected the sales of the latest FC games.
EA Recently Lost $6 Billion In Market Value
Despite underperforming, EA Sports FC 25 still appeared as one of the best-selling games of 2024. According to a recent Circana report by analyst Mat Piscatella, EA Sports FC 25 was the eighth best-selling game of the year, behind other EA games such as the incredibly successful EA Sports College Football 25, NBA 2K25, and Madden NFL 25.
In Dragon Age’s case, it was already clear some time ago that Dragon Age The Veilguard sold less than Inquisition at launch. The game managed to score positive critical reviews, achieving an overall score of 79 on OpenCritic, but it was very divisive among fans. While some loved Veilguard, others complained about the new visual style, more action-oriented gameplay, and some issues with lore and the game’s writing. However, the actual number of Veilguard sales is likely very disappointing for EA, and it will put additional pressure on BioWare’s upcoming Mass Effect game, which still does not have an official release date. It’s unclear, however, how EA will deal with these issues moving forward. EA Sports FC is an annual franchise, so it’s likely that fans will see more changes soon.
- Date Founded
- May 27, 1982
- Headquarters
- Redwood City, California, United States
- CEO
- Andrew Wilson
- Subsidiaries
- EA Sports, Respawn Entertainment, BioWare, EA Vancouver, DICE, Codemasters, EA Mobile
- Known For
- FIFA, EA Sports UFC, Battlefield, Dragon Age, The Sims