Electronic Arts in Talks to Go Private in Nearly $50 Billion Deal

[Beebo Brink]

If The Sims 4 ends up being owned by Jared Kuchner, I'm not spending a single goddamn dime more on the game.

Electronic Arts in Talks to Go Private: $50 Billion Deal

As first reported by the Wall Street Journal Friday, a group of investors, including private-equity firms Silver Lake, Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund and Jared Kushner’s Affinity Partners are in talks with the maker of “The Sims,” “Battlefield” and “Madden” franchises to take the company private. If the deal goes through, it would like be the biggest leveraged buyout in history based on EA’s current $48.38 billion market cap.

 

[Noodles]

I read the headline and thought "Neat".

Then the article....

Gross.

I wonder if they want to try to push "non woke" games or some nonsense.

 

[GoblinCampFollower]

Yeah..... To me EA has long been a black hole that sucks in good gaming companies to turn them into garbage. I really don't like publicly traded gaming companies since Wall Street can't even be bothered to pretend to care about the games. They just churn out transparent money grabs. But in this case, going private is likely just going to make it worse.

I will continue to hope my favorite gaming studios stay private and not too big.

 

[Beebo Brink]

I will continue to hope my favorite gaming studios stay private and not too big.

I'm going with Paralives as my best bet for a Sims-replacement. I won't stop playing the Sims any time soon, mind you, but I do think I'm done with adding DLC. I've worked out what storylines bring me joy, and I'm doubtful that any new packs will add mechanisms that enhance how I play the game. And if Kushner's group succeeds, forgoing DLC is all that much easier.

 

[Cristiano]

Well, it is official:



This is not good. Jared Kushner and Saudi Arabia are huge investors now.

 

[Katheryne Helendale]

I'm with Beebs, no more EA purchases for me.

 

[Beebo Brink]

The EA buyout is the lead story at the front of this video, and the financial analyst interviewed for this segment considers the deal "a headscratcher" because the investment return is unlikely to be significant. It's not a bad buy, but it's not a bargain at that price. He also mentioned the "strange timing" of the deal. Makes me wonder just what is going on behind-the-scenes.

 

[Veritable Quandry]

Bioware has included a lot of content that is explicitly LGBTQ+ like male and female romance options for both sexes, gender fluid characters, and trans characters (you can romance a literal bear in Baulders Gate 3). Hopefully that studio will get spun off, because if it continues under Saudi ownership it will have to undo their work at increased representation in gaming.