The fact is that both publishers gobble up independent studios to obtain the rights to their products. EA acquired Pandemic, then just shut it down, but still have the rights to their titles (see Rare and its continuing difficulties with Nintendo). They engaged in a hostile takeover of Ubisoft, acquiring 20%. And they attempted a hostile takeover of Take-Two Interactive. Wow, what great competition that would have been. 2k Sports and EA sports games being made by the same publisher.

And the developers that are under the umbrellas of EA and Activision have as much autonomy as pseudo-independent film makers that have their films released by mega-studios. These devs still have to crawl up the monster’s butt to get their products released. The barriers of entry have made this a grim reality.

And anyways, why would anyone be so eager to bestow praise on mega-corporations? These institutions are ruinous to the economy and need to be investigated under anti-trust laws. Don’t lose sight of the Monopolistic nature of these publishers.

I respectfully, but wholeheartedly, disagree with you in terms of “lack of development”.

Sport is one of the most innovative genres in the video game world today. FIFA 10 is one of the finest titles I have ever played, hands down. That’s not just sports games I’m talking about, that’s out of every game I’ve ever played. Starting with their original FIFA International Soccer, I’ve followed EA – and Konami, when they started their PES series – right the way through until now. While they may have a dud year every once in a while, the fact of the matter is that they are consistently pushing themselves to improve their product. And that shows with each annual release.

I agree with you that perhaps Madden needs another developer to come along and really challenge it for top spot, but, honestly, no sequel to a Madden game has ever felt like a dull carbon-copy to me.

I also don’t know where you are pulling the “greater barriers to access for game developers” spiel. We have seen some of the most incredible games released this year by no-name developers and publishers. Machinarium, A Boy and his Blob, and Torchlight, just to name a few.

Let’s also think about the developers who have been picked up by massive publishers, but still continue to pump out solid gold titles: BioWare (Dragon Age), Naughty Dog (Uncharted 2), and Chair Entertainment with Epic Games (Shadow Complex).

While I can understand where you are coming from, I think that claiming a small number of publishers will soon monopolize the industry and restrict developmental choices is simply nonsense. What we have seen in terms of unique games this year alone completely rubbishes that theory.

More specifically, we can look at sports games. Now we only have one football game (Madden) and one baseball game (2K) that are officially licensed and published on multiple platforms. And if we take a hard look, both have remained stagnant. Gamers have instead lowered their expectations and accepted incremental improvements year after year. This goes for other genres. We have gotten marginal improvements over the previous console generation. This is a product of consolidated publishing, which has created less competition and, therefore, less pressure on developers to really push genres and the art of game development.

I have been gaming for 17 years and am considering retirement because nothing new is coming out. And I point my finger directly at the mega-publishers. We should remain skeptical of, rather than embrace, such industry developments. Consolidation of media sure hasn’t fostered a healthy debate of issues in the U.S., and I believe it hasn’t aided in the advancement of the video game industry.

I’ve come to the point where I just deal with Activision and EA. As much as the gamer in me would like to hate them, the business man in me completely understands their logic. The VG industry is a business now, not some past time hobby.

However, I can’t get behind publishers like Activision because they have openly spoken out against taking said risks. Honestly, I don’t think Activision knows shit about video games. What they do know, is how to manage companies. If gaming wants to make it’s move into the same realm as film and music, Activision needs to create games that don’t have a number at the end of it.