News

NASCAR victim of "tough trade-offs" at EA, has "no plans" to go on
Posted: 04.09.2009 05:01 by Technet2k Comments: 4
EA Sports boss Peter Moore has revealed they've parked up NASCAR in favour of the new mixed martial arts franchise they started. Need for Speed to fill the void?

Moore "thoroughly enjoyed" the relationship with NASCAR when he first arrived, but EA Sports MMA looks too good to pass up. EA "had to redeploy" the racer devs to the MMA project.

"There are no plans right now for NASCAR from EA," Moore told GameSpot. "We had a great relationship over the years that I thoroughly enjoyed when I first got here. Unfortunately…we had to make some tough trade-offs. We've had to redeploy some of those folks."

"A number of the NASCAR team has moved over now to EA Sports MMA, which will be shipping next year," he continued, but EA still remains "a huge fan of NASCAR, but no plans right now to develop any further games for NASCAR from EA Sports."

While NASCAR may be ditched, EA have been investing heavily in Need For Speed's revival with NFS: Shift and NFS: Nitro. It could be the last chance the publisher has to prove the aging franchise still has something new and fresh to offer. Does no NASCAR get you down?

NASCAR, the one where they drive around in a big oval...
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User Comments

By SwiftFire87 (SI Veteran Member) on Sep 04, 2009
SwiftFire87
So happy to hear this news!!!!!!!!!!

no more EA crap. Now Nascar wants an Online Racing series and they have gone back to the experts of PC Racing games. iRacing.com is making the new Online Racing Series for PC and maybe consoles at some point. They are former Papyrus and Sierra employees that worked on Nascar games on PC before EA took Nascar away. PC version is to come in 2010 and likely any other release would come after that. They plan for it to work kinda like a MMO, but with prizes and things for winning races and maybe even sponsorships and broadcasting the races online or on TV. Sounds amazing. I think something like this could work well for something like OnLive. Thousands of people can watch games that people are playing and racing is an attractive sport to watch to some people.

Can't forget about GT 5 also picking up Nascar for their game. I don't know to what extent though and its not like GT series comes out every year. So the game has some potential, but nothing has really been said about it.
By Orv (SI Core) on Sep 05, 2009
Orv
I am very heartened to hear that Nascar is moving away from EA and being picked up by Papyrus\Sierra people.
I loved Nascar Racing PC under the Papyrus banner.
By fredyzg (SI Core Member) on Sep 05, 2009
fredyzg
yes!!!good news,all EA fans sorry but i dislike €A
By BoneArc (SI Core Veteran) on Sep 06, 2009
BoneArc
i aint much of a nascar fan too care alot about its moving , no offence