Often when you see or hear EA brought up into a conversation in gaming its met with an audible sigh. Over the years the publisher has garnered a reputation of making many wrong decisions, going with cookie cutter sequels and minimal upgrades beyond rosters for all their EA Sports titles. I actually think they’ve gotten much better at that in general of late if I’m being honest, but one thing they have absolutely smashed out the park is their EA Originals publishing arm and we don’t give them enough credit for it. That needs to change.

For those not completely familiar with EA Originals, it is essentially a publishing arm of EA that is focused on bringing ambitious indie games out to the market. Typically these are a bit bigger than normal indie games, and some might even have the look and feel of a AAA game. EA handles most of the marketing and distribution of these games and helps fund them. I’ve often wondered what EA actually gets out of these partnerships as it almost sounds too good to be true for developers.

Over the years EA Originals has grown bigger and bigger. The early days of the publisher were smaller games that packed a punch. Games such as Unravel, Fe and Sea Of Solitude were great titles in their own right, but much more what you’d expect when you think of the term “indie”. A Way Out from Hazelight Studio’s was the publishing arm’s first break out success in a more commercial way. It was a bit on the pricier side for an indie and actually received a physical release, so you could tell things were picking up at EA Originals.

Then came Rocket Arena which wasn’t quite the success I’m sure everyone was hoping for. A 3 v 3 multiplayer game that tried to carve its way into a very competitive space had a rather rocky launch and never really recovered. I remember buying the physical release for this game when it launched. Anyone that knows me knows I simply love supporting physical and I love supporting these indie/AA type games. I paid $54 (Canadian) at launch and just a few days after launch they significantly dropped the price down to about $25 in order to get more players. About a month after release they had permanently dropped the price to $5. It was a great example of price meaning a lot for a game and unfortunately it was probably doomed from the get go. But hey you can’t bat 1000 forever right?

Since Rocket Arena however, the EA Originals program has been pumping out a lot of quality, not to mention many bigger titles. Hands up if you played the 2021 Game Awards Game Of The Year It Takes Two. There should be a lot of hands up since Hazelight announced the game had sold 16 million copies. It’s phenomenal right? Well you guessed it, it’s actually an indie game published by EA Originals. Lost In Random also dropped in 2021, and while not a huge commercial success was also another relatively well received game by both critics and player alike.

The last few years have really seen the program take off from a scale perspective. Games like Wild Heart and Immortals Of Aveum (you really should check Immortals of Aveum out if you haven’t) have crossed blurred the lines between indie and AAA, and while they may not have been great commercial successes either they showed that EA is willing to take risks and push big new IP’s and give them a chance to shine, which considering the perceived reputation of EA these days is a huge step in the right direction.

Last, but certainly not least EA Originals recently released the excellent debut game from Surgent Studio, Tales Of Kenzera: Zau. While I’m not sure Tales Of Kenzera will be winning the Game Of The Year like It Takes Two did, it certainly deserves to be in the conversation. From it’s fantastic art style, fun gameplay and excellent story and voice acting it has been one of the better games of the year. And on top of that it is a unique game that was a passion project for the team and has shown many gamers a culture they are not used to seeing in gaming, especially from EA.

I always say you have to give credit where credit is due and for EA Originals, you most certainly should give EA theirs.