EA Canada

Last updated
EA Vancouver
Division of Electronic Arts
Industry Computer and video games
Interactive entertainment
Predecessor Distinctive Software Inc.
Founded January 1983;35 years ago (1983-01)
Headquarters Burnaby, British Columbia , Canada
Products NHL series (1991-present)
FIFA series (1993-present)
SSX series (2000-present)
Need for Speed series (1994-2000, see EA Black Box)
Skate series (2007-2010, see EA Black Box)
Number of employees
 1,300
Parent Electronic Arts (1991–present)
Website eacanada.ea.com

EA Vancouver (formerly known as EA Canada & also known as EA Burnaby) is a video game developer located in Burnaby, British Columbia. The development studio opened as Distinctive Software in January 1983 and is Electronic Arts's largest and oldest studio. EA Canada employs approximately 1,300 people and houses the world's largest video game test operation. [1]

A video game developer is a software developer that specializes in video game development – the process and related disciplines of creating video games. A game developer can range from one person who undertakes all tasks to a large business with employee responsibilities split between individual disciplines, such as programming, design, art, testing, etc. Most game development companies have video game publisher financial and usually marketing support. Self-funded developers are known as independent or indie developers and usually make indie games.

Burnaby City in British Columbia, Canada

Burnaby is a city in British Columbia, Canada, located immediately to the east of Vancouver. It is the third-largest city in British Columbia by population, surpassed only by nearby Surrey and Vancouver.

British Columbia Province of Canada

British Columbia is the westernmost province of Canada, located between the Pacific Ocean and the Rocky Mountains. With an estimated population of 5.016 million as of 2018, it is Canada's third-most populous province.

Contents

Premises

The campus consists of a motion-capture studio, twenty-two rooms for composing, fourteen video editing suites, three production studios, a wing for audio compositions, and a quality assurance department. There are also facilities such as fitness rooms, two theatres, a cafeteria called EAt, coffee bars, a soccer field, and several arcades. The building is situated next to Discovery Park.

Quality assurance (QA) is a way of preventing mistakes and defects in manufactured products and avoiding problems when delivering products or services to customers; which ISO 9000 defines as "part of quality management focused on providing confidence that quality requirements will be fulfilled". This defect prevention in quality assurance differs subtly from defect detection and rejection in quality control, and has been referred to as a shift left as it focuses on quality earlier in the process i.e. to the left of a linear process diagram reading left to right.

Movie theater venue, usually a building, for viewing films

A movie theater, cinema, or cinema hall, also known as a picture house or the pictures, is a building that contains an auditorium for viewing films for entertainment. Most, but not all, theaters are commercial operations catering to the general public, who attend by purchasing a ticket. Some movie theaters, however, are operated by non-profit organizations or societies that charge members a membership fee to view films.

Cafeteria food service location in which there is little or no waiting staff table service

A cafeteria, sometimes called a canteen outside the US, is a type of food service location in which there is little or no waiting staff table service, whether a restaurant or within an institution such as a large office building or school; a school dining location is also referred to as a dining hall or canteen. Cafeterias are different from coffeehouses, although the English term came from Latin American Spanish, where it had and still has the meaning "coffeehouse".

History

EA Vancouver is a major studio of the American gaming software giant Electronic Arts (EA), which has many studios around the globe. EA, based in Redwood City, California, acquired Distinctive Software in 1991 for $11 million and renamed them EA Canada. At the time of the business acquisition, Distinctive Software was noted for developing a number of racing and sporting games published under the Accolade brand. Since becoming EA Canada, it has developed many EA Games, EA Sports, and EA Sports BIG games.

Electronic Arts American interactive entertainment company

Electronic Arts Inc. (EA) is an American video game company headquartered in Redwood City, California. It is the second-largest gaming company in the Americas and Europe by revenue and market capitalization after Activision Blizzard and ahead of Take-Two Interactive and Ubisoft as of March 2018.

Distinctive Software Canadian video game developer

Distinctive Software Inc. (DSI) was a Canadian video game developer established in Burnaby, British Columbia, by Don Mattrick and Jeff Sember after their success with the game Evolution. Mattrick and Jeff Sember approached Sydney Development Corporation, who agreed to publish Evolution in 1982. Distinctive Software was the predecessor to EA Canada.

Infogrames North America, Inc. was an American video game developer and publisher based in San Jose, California. The company was founded as Accolade in November 1984 by Alan Miller and Bob Whitehead, who had previously co-founded Activision in October 1979.

EA acquired Black Box Games in 2002 and it became part of EA Canada under name EA Black Box. It later became an independent EA studio in 2005. Since its acquisition, EA Black Box has been home to the Need for Speed franchise, among others.

EA Black Box was a video game developer based in Burnaby, British Columbia, Canada, founded in 1998 by former employees of Radical Entertainment and later acquired by Electronic Arts (EA). The developers are primarily known for the Need for Speed and Skate series. It was renamed Quicklime Games during the development of Need for Speed: World, but after a series of restructures it was shut down in April 2013.

Need for Speed (NFS) is a racing video game franchise published by Electronic Arts and currently developed by Ghost Games. The series centers around illicit street racing and in general tasks players to complete various types of races while evading the local law enforcement in police pursuits. The series released its first title, The Need for Speed in 1994. The most recent game, Need for Speed Payback, was released on November 10, 2017.

Games developed

Electronic Arts

Games developed/being developed for publishing by Electronic Arts

GameRelease datePlatform(s)
Need for Speed: High Stakes 1999-05-04 Windows, PlayStation
Def Jam: Fight for NY 2004-09-20 PlayStation 2, Xbox, GameCube
Marvel Nemesis: Rise of the Imperfects 2005-09-20PlayStation 2, Xbox, GameCube, PlayStation Portable, Nintendo DS
EA Replay 2006-11-14PlayStation Portable
EA Playground 2007-10-23 Wii, Nintendo DS
Medal of Honor: Heroes 2 2007-11-13Wii
Untitled Star Wars gameTBATBA

EA Graphics Library

EA Graphics Library or EAGL is a game engine which was created and developed by EA Canada. It is the main engine used in some of EA's games, notably the Need for Speed series, but was also used in a few sports titles from EA Sports.

Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit 2 and Need for Speed: Underground use the first version of the EAGL engine (EAGL 1), Need for Speed: Underground 2 uses EAGL 2, Need for Speed: Most Wanted and Need for Speed: Carbon use EAGL 3, Need for Speed: ProStreet and Need for Speed Undercover use EAGL 4 (the latter using a modified version, with the Heroic Driving Engine).

Need for Speed: World uses a modified EAGL 3 engine with the physics of the earlier games with an external GUI programmed in Adobe Flash.

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References

  1. ↑ "Electronic Arts". EA. 2013-05-09. Archived from the original on 2013-06-22.

Coordinates: 49°14′52″N123°0′38″W / 49.24778°N 123.01056°W / 49.24778; -123.01056

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