« Missouri battles youngsters in cage fighting | Home | Bob Arum: Our next great hope… Dubai »
UFC fighter Jason MacDonald talks about Jon Fitch/Dana White situation
By Zach Arnold | December 2, 2008
From his column today on Sportsnet (Canada):
As for Jon Fitch, I’m glad to see he finally did sign the exclusive video-game agreement, which could have cost him his spot in the UFC had he not. I didn’t have any problem with signing it, even if it was exclusive. From my standpoint, why wouldn’t I want the UFC to use my name and my likeness in a video game for my lifetime? It’s not like there are other opportunities like that out there. Is Affliction going to be putting out a video game down the road? I doubt it.
The counter-argument from Ivan Trembow:
It’s also interesting to note how the UFC is preying on fighters’ lack of knowledge about other potential video game deals. We’ve seen multiple fighters, including Fitch, say something to the effect of, “Come on, who else is going to be want to put ME in a video game?” This demonstrates that they are completely unaware of the fact that the biggest video game publisher in the world, Electronic Arts, also has a mixed martial arts game in the pipeline, and unlike Zuffa/THQ, they are willing to pay fighters to be a part of it. It’s not like it would be a huge amount of money, but it shows the fighters not being aware of what they’re signing away.
Meanwhile, Jonathan Snowden has an interview with Georges St. Pierre.
Update: Nicholas Bailey rips apart Dan Lambert of American Top Team for recent comments Mr. Lambert made about UFC contracts in relation to fighters signing away the rights to their image & likeness.
Topics: Canada, Media, MMA, UFC, Zach Arnold | 56 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
Jason MacDonald, who I like as a fighter, isn’t seeing the big picture.
A fighter like MacDonald or Fitch signing this contract probably isn’t a big deal. Neither is it for a guy like GSP or Couture, who from multiple accounts got a variation of the contract.
The big issue is that young fighter who is about to sign with the UFC. The next fighter who can sell tickets like a Tito Ortiz. They are getting that fighter before he made a name for himself. And when that fighter does become big, Zuffa has his likeness forever.
Of course, this contract likely wouldn’t stand up in court. But that is besides the point. As we have seen with Couture, having contract issues with a big company that has a large bank roll, isn’t in the interest of most fighters.
Exactly. The UFC is counting on the fact that fighters will not fight contractual clauses in court even if those contractual clauses are legally ridiculous and would be thrown out of court by any judge in the United States.
Zuffa is likely well aware of the shaky legal ground on which some of their contractual clauses stand (signing away the rights to your own name and likeness for the rest of your life and beyond; being locked into what is essentially a lifetime no-compete clause if you happen to be a UFC champion, etc).
Zuffa likely knows that they would lose in court if some of these contractual clauses were challenged by fighters and if it actually went to trial. So, how are they going to prevent that from ever happening? The same way they often do: Fear, intimidation, and making examples out of people.
Regarding EA’s MMA game, Dave Meltzer wrote this in the Wrestling Observer:
And Sam Caplan wrote this on Five Ounces of Pain:
Ivan you seem to be forgetting one simple fact, The UFC brand is the only thing that has a proven record of success in MMA.
EA can sign all the fighters it wants but they will fail just like when other companies go against the UFC brand.
Dana and company have gotten their hooks into the mainstream that regardless of the fighter even Randy Couture no one is bigger than the name brand.
The idea that EA or anyother video game company can just jump into MMA and be successful by going against the UFC is silly and has been proven to be simply stupid.
Jason Macdonals gets it and so do most other fighters they’ve seen what happens to the competition when they fight the UFC.
There is a graveyard filled with corpses of all those who have tried to take some of the MMA pie and EA if they go through with this game will join them.
Ivan, didn’t the courts already shoot down the champion’s clause in the BJ Penn case where he left for K-1? BJ had no fights left on his deal but Zuffa argued that he was obligated to stay because of the champion’s clause right? So why does the UFC continue to put champion’s clauses in their contracts if the courts deemed them invalid in the B.J Penn case?
I’d imagine that if a fighter took this exclusive videogame likeness and name rights in perpetuity clause to court, they would throw the clause out of court just like the champions clause when BJ Penn won against Zuffa and the unreasonable multiple year no-compete clause when Brock Lesnar won against WWE.
Game buyers don’t care if its a UFC game or not. They will buy the game that doesn’t suck. EA has way more cred in making quality games than THQ. I don’t care if the EA game has to make up names for fighters like Soda Popinsky from Mike Tyson’s punchout it will still more than likely be the higher quality game. And thats what i’ll be buying.
Also ZUFFA continues to put illegal clauses in peoples contracts because the court case will be held in Nevada and a venue change will be prevented because money talks in a corrupt state. ZUFFA will get every chance to lock the case up in court for years there and the fighter will eventually have to resign.
PS. The old UFC game sucked ass and the PRIDE FC game was fucking epic. History repeats itself.
This isn’t the first time Jason has come off as a Zuffa puppet. He was also one of the guys publicly going around saying “Fedor hasn’t fought anyone.”
how much is a fighter worth to EA if they aren’t in the UFC? not much. Fitch is not long for the UFC, he’ll be gone mid 2009.
Will the MMA game made by EA sell without the UFC’s name? We see what happens to other organizations, regardless of who they have signed. Just makes you wonder if the video game market will be the same. Personally, I don’t think it will sell well, especially when you have a UFC game coming out.
The notion that the public isn’t interested in MMA in general if it’s not the UFC has already been clearly disproven twice this year.
EliteXC’s events on CBS didn’t have the benefit of having the UFC brand name attached to them, and yet the public watched two out of those three events in numbers larger than they’ve ever watched any single UFC television broadcast.
The fact that EliteXC was losing huge amounts of money doesn’t change the fact that the public was very interested in MMA outside of the UFC.
Affliction’s PPV event in July didn’t have the benefit of having the UFC brand name attached to it, and yet the event approached 100,000 buys on PPV. Even Zuffa couldn’t do that until the first Tito Ortiz-Ken Shamrock fight.
The fact that Affliction is losing huge amounts of money doesn’t change the fact that the public was very interested in MMA outside of the UFC.
There is no longer any credibility in the argument that non-UFC MMA automatically doesn’t sell just because it’s not the UFC.
As for the sales of EA’s MMA game, it will depend largely on the names that they’re able to sign to appear in the game. If the names attached to the game are big enough, it will sell whether it has “UFC” attached to it or not.
Ask yourself: If St. Pierre vs. Pen was on a non-UFC PPV, would it fail just because it wasn’t in the UFC? Of course not. It also wouldn’t do as well outside of the UFC as it’s going to do with the pre-event hype exposure that it’s going to get on Spike TV, but it wouldn’t be a failure.
The same applies to EA’s MMA game: It depends on how much appeal its biggest names have with casual MMA fans.
As for the sales of the UFC game, I don’t think THQ actually believes that it’s going to be one of the highest-grossing video games ever, but is it going to be a huge seller? Absolutely. If it’s on every major platform (as expected), it could easily sell one or two million units when you combine all of the platforms and when you factor in international sales. Is it going to generate tens of millions of dollars for both Zuffa and THQ? Absolutely.
And how much of that money are the fighters going to see? Nothing. Heck, even WWE pays royalties to its talent from video games and DVD sales.
Also, in response to Dave2, the “champions’ clause” did not exist when BJ Penn left the UFC in the way that it exists now with the language that it uses now. Zuffa would have likely lost that case in court, but they kept it quiet and negotiated an out-of-court settlement.
And yes, any fighter who challenged the champions’ clause in court would almost certainly win. There is not a judge in America who is going to enforce a no-compete clause for life, and that’s what the champions’ clause essentially is. Heck, very few courts in the country are likely to enforce a multi-year no-compete clause, even if both parties signed it voluntarily. If that weren’t true, Zuffa would have had to sign Brock Lesnar in July 2010 instead of late 2007, because the WWE no-compete clause that Lesnar voluntarily signed didn’t expire until June 30, 2010. WWE got humiliated in court with that one, not only failing to get its no-compete clause upheld, but also having Lesnar blatantly violate the no-compete clause by wrestling in Japan and not having any consequences for doing so.
So of course a lifetime no-compete clause would be laughed out of court… but to get that far, it takes a lot of waiting. In Couture’s case, he was going to have a 2009 trial date, so that would have been like a year and a half of waiting.
Not to mention the fact that in the atmosphere that exists now where the UFC can do whatever it wants, you could get yourself and your entire team on the UFC’s crap-list if you refuse to sign ANYTHING that they tell you sign, much less if you actually challenge their ridiculous contractual clauses in court.
Outside the UFC, it would likely max out at 150,000 buys, whereas inside it has the potential to do 800,000. Given their salary demands, the show would be a failure outside of the UFC.
Congratulations to Affliction spending millions and millions to lose their ass on 100,000 PPV buys. The show proved exactly the opposite of what you say. There is no way to get a decent return on your money on a national stage for a non-UFC promotion.
One last thing: The fighters will make way, way more money off this game than any other game. The UFC is allowing them to sell sponsorship spots on their characters, and companies are offering fighters significant amounts of money for it. This isn’t to say the contracts are fair, but they’ll make way more money off this than they will off any other game the rest of their lives.
When Elite XC draws a relatively small audience on free TV, they haven’t “sold” anything. It was a free show on television that cost more than it brought in by an order of a magnitude.
While Affliction sold 90,000 PPVs, they did so with a cost prohibitive card that they can’t duplicate.
Why are those examples proof that people can compete successfully and sell MMA to the masses? They were dismal failures that lost millions.
I guess, by the same logic, a successful video game to Ivan Trembow is one that costs three times as much as THQ’s, but sells 1/3 the copies! Huzzah for success!
“They are getting that fighter before he made a name for himself. And when that fighter does become big, Zuffa has his likeness forever.”
This is correct, since you have to sign the likeness agreement to get on TUF.
Ivan, 5 million viewers on a network like CBS is nothing. Iirc, the last EXC show was beat by a rerun of Law and Order. CBS came in last or close to last out of the major networks that night.
If it wesn’t for Kimbo, EXC on CBS would have been dead in the water, just like the second show. There’s no demand for MMA outside of the UFC. It’s just not there.
The argument that I made in my previous post wasn’t that other MMA companies have been able to run major shows in the U.S. and still be profitable (because other than Strikeforce, they haven’t, and I noted in my previous post that the Affliction and EliteXC shows lost large amounts of money).
That had nothing to do with the point at hand that I was debating, which was whether EA’s MMA game will automatically be a failure just because it’s MMA without the UFC brand name attached to it.
My point was that other MMA companies have been able to run major shows that have garnered a large amount of interest, even without the UFC brand name, and this demonstrates that the potential is there for an MMA product that is not the UFC to draw interest, whether it’s an MMA video game that is not a UFC video game, or anything else. The potential is there.
Just because it’s an MMA video game that is not a UFC game does not automatically mean that it will be a failure. That was the general argument that I was disagreeing with. It’s not going to out-sell the UFC game from THQ, but it’s not necessarily going to be a failure, either. It’s going to depend on the names that EA can get for their game.
PS: Yes, EliteXC’s total viewership levels on CBS were small by network TV standards based on the overall rating, but huge by MMA TV standards. In addition, CBS was still pleased by EliteXC’s ratings for the first and third shows because of the very strong ratings in the key demographics.
Actually despite EA being a big company, the company has a completely shitty reputation. The whole issues with DRM on their PC games (Spore), the ea_spouse incident, how they tried to edit a Wikipedia article to shine a better light on themselves and erased the ea_spouse incident, not to mention the games they have been releasing recently have been HORRIBLE. Especially the Madden series. Only way people will buy the game is if it’s actually good. Good controls, good (but not cheap) AI, good graphics and features and modes. Cause right now, a lot of people are avoiding EA’s products, particulary the PC ones.
Ivan, I see where you’re coming from but I don’t think your examples prove interest in MMA as much as they do interest in Kimbo (at the time). The two out of three shows you mentioned did well because of him, not MMA. That third MMA show that didn’t do well, had no Kimbo. It was all MMA, no Kimbo. Will the EA game use Kimbo? If so, does the general public still have interest in him after that last embarrassment? And in todays economy, which game would they choose? A UFC game with lots of named fighters or an “MMA” game with some? I bet they pick the UFC game. Most of them probably thought they were watching the “UFC” on CBS anyways… just like video games are all “nintendos”.
EA are very corrupt indeed Pizza. As a gamer, I can’t stand them. Though I don’t have a favorable opinion of THQ either considering that they demanded exclusive lifetime rights of UFC fighters for their game to ensure that their competition is crushed. You don’t see EA doing that with their boxers on Fight Night. There is a lot of overlap of boxers between Don King Prizefighter and Fight Night 3/4. I wouldn’t say that THQ is all that different from EA on the evil meter.
Imagine if Tony Hawk signed an exclusive deal. The UFC tries to control too much. Just on principal I’d buy a Couture Video game before the UFC game to prove a point.
Uhhhh last time I checked, Tony Hawk did sign a exclusive deal and his game started the whole boom of skateboarding games. Oh and if you guys are talking about principals and such. Just pirate the games and see if you like them. If you do, buy it. 😛
I wonder why Sega didn’t continue with their superior 2K NFL game when they lost the NFL license? The audience for th NFL is like at least 10 times (I’m being charitable here) what the audience for MMA is. When they lost their license, the NFL 2K games were declared the superior NFL game by most game reviewers. Yet, Sega shut down their NFL game after they lost their license.
There will be NO EA games. The exclusive THQ deal means there will no competing MMA game just as there are NO competing NFL games.
Did anyone bother to call up EA and ask if they’re making an MMA game? If the game is in its planning phase, trademarks would already have been registered. It doesn’t take much detective work to prove the existence of the game. C’mon Ivan. Prove its existence!
If EA is doing an MMA game that doesn’t include a promotion license, it will go over even worse than the last 2k football game.
THQ isn’t long for this world, and even if they are, they probably can’t afford an exclusive license for UFC in the next round if EA decides to bid against them. Either the next UFC license will be non-exclusive, or EA will own it if it has any value to them (and if they have an MMA game “in the pipeline” then it does).
SEGA doesn’t own Visual Concepts (2k) anymore (haven’t since 2005, roughly coinciding with the time when EA acquired the exclusive NFL license.), VC changed their name to 2k and are part of Take-2 along with Rockstar, Firaxis, and what used to be known as Irrational (now it’s just 2k Boston and 2k Australia and they just formed a new studio out in California, Marin I think).
Take-2 has also been rumored for a long time (along with THQ) to be not long for this world. EA keeps trying to buy them out, but they keep releasing titles that are keeping them afloat. I think that the current economy is going to be good for games, but it’s not going to be good for companies because of the credit market problems, so you’re likely to see yet more consolidation as whoever has cash acquires whoever doesn’t.
Comparing 2K not having an NFL license to EA not having a UFC license is pretty hilarious, especially if the rumors are true and EA has signed a number of star UFC fighters.
No one cares about the initials, as long as there are fighters they recognize they’ll do it. Further the EA Sports brand name is much larger than UFC will ever be. No reason to count this game out if it’s coming.
SEGA sold 2K NFL and Visual Concept shortly after they lost the NFL license. I don’t want into a history lesson, but SEGA owned 2K NFL at that time. A license is paramount to any sport franchise.
The rumor of the game stopped right after 1UP first reported. It is unheard of for a new game to have no leaks for a whole 10 months after it was first reported to be going in production. THQ should be upset that their exclusive license is not exclusive. Exclusivity guarantees there would be no competition.
Leslie,
Don’t you get it? The UFC license includes all the fighters. And Blitz the League II has legends of the NFL as its roster and it doesn’t sell.
Speaking of video game company buy-outs and mergers, Tecmo and Koei have merged or are going to soon. Why though? it makes little sense, considering that Square Enix (they were two different companies, Square Soft and Enix, and they bought out Taito) tried to buy out Koei. Koei doesn’t have a great track record of making good games. All they do is Dynasty Warriors and Samurai Warriors games.
Just because a game is being done by EA doesn’t mean it will be good. I tend to agree with bitching about the way UFC treats fighters and their stance against other companies (trying to be a monopoly) but siding with Electronic Arts is fucking hilarious. If you look up the history of EA, they are the biggest offenders when it comes to shitty treatment and hostile take overs of other game companies. Quite a few quality developers were snatched up by EA. And EA was trying to do a hostile takeover (that was the EXACT term many reporters used) of Take Two Interactive just a few months ago.
If EA is doing an MMA game let’s wait and see if it actually goes off the ground (just because a game is in planning stages and the company got copyrights doesn’t mean the game will happen) and see if it will actually be a good game.
Saying you will support an EA made MMA game out of principle makes you look like a God-damned fool. Now if a company like Treasure or SNK-Playmore made an MMA game, THEN you got a point.
I’m sorry, I meant to say SquareEnix tried to buy-out Tecmo, not Koei. My apologies.
WWE aren’t very happy that THQ is making the UFC game. When their license deal expires next year it’s very likely that EA will snap up the WWE rights. And you can be sure that this time around WWE will be smart enough to ensure exclusitivity so EA cannot produce another MMA game.
I would totally buy a Kimbo game where you just walk into people’s backyards and beat them up.
a hostile takeover has absolutely no bearing on how a company treats it’s employees or the legitamacy of it’s business dealings. It just means it’s buying out controlling interest in a company that doesn’t wanna be bought out.
“It just means it’s buying out controlling interest in a company that doesn’t wanna be bought out.”
Exactly my point. As I said before, if you want to buy an MMA game being developed by EA out of principle to speak out against the UFC, then you are a God-damned fool.
And about EA treating it’s employees wrongly, just look up “EA Spouse” and you tell me EA is some wonderful, cuddly company. They are more ruthless than Zuffa can ever imagine to be.
Chris:
And the EA games will be like their WCW games Mayhem and Backstage Assault which FUCKING SUCKED.
1. Fighters are a special kind of employee who have a very limited number of work years. Programmers do not. You are a complete retard to make any comparison between the two.
2. Zuffa owns everything about the Nevada court system from the lawyers to the judges to the guards at the door. If Station Casinos is one of the only major moneymakers for the state then the state, a notoriously corrupt one in favor of it’s favorite son, the casinos, does little favors for that moneymaker. Like helping them keep contracts that would be laughed out of court anywhere else, and preventing venue changes so that can happen. EA doesn’t have the same legal pull anywhere in the world that Zuffa does in Nevada to get away with the bullshit they pull on their employees.
I agree that buying a EA MMA game out of principle to make a statement against Zuffa would be ridiculous. Electronic Arts is probably the most evil corporation in gaming. You know what I suggest people do out of principle? Pirate all of EA’s games, UFC’s PPVs, UFC’s game, etc.
Though it must be said that THQ went too far by demanding that they have exclusive lifetime rights to UFC’s fighters. Can you imagine if Kurt Angle was disallowed to be in TNA Wrestling’s Impact! video game if Kurt back in his WWE days was forced to sign away his exclusive lifetime likeness rights to WWE and THQ during the making of the WWE Smackdown! games? That would be crazy. Exclusive Lifetime Clause = Free Market for me but not for my competitors.
An unknown fighter trying to fight Zuffa in Nevada to change their contracts would not work.
It would take the following:
1. A popular fighter.
2. The power of the press. The fighter would have to get his story out there to major publications about the “unfair” contracts Zuffa has.
3. When this happens, even with a corrupt Nevada Court, if enough press is on the topic, it would be impossible for Zuffa to win. Courts can make unfair rulings when nobody is watching. When there are enough powerful watchdogs on the case, they typically rule properly.
Another way for it to go down is if a guy had the backing of Golden Boy promotions. That will likely never happen, but Golden Boy is a powerful enough entity in Vegas that the courts would at least give a fair court case.
Either way, people are looking at this contract issue the wrong way. I really don’t care about EA Sports. I care about the fighter in high school who has yet to make his MMA Debut. And when he becomes a powerful enough MMA entity on his own, he can’t branch out and have his own game made.
That’s not to say that other sports aren’t unfair to their athletes. Baseball’s rules rip off young stars for the first few years of their professional career. Nothing is perfect.
The court in Nevada is not corrupt, regardless of what some tool here writes. All the judgments in favor of Zuffa in the Couture case actually came in Texas (maybe it is the long reach of the mob!!111).
“I would totally buy a Kimbo game where you just walk into people’s backyards and beat them up.”
Dude, while that would make all the MMA purists explode, ITS F’ING BRILLIANT. Seriosly that game could sell like noting else. It would not be constrained by all the MMA BS, plus you could throw in all kinds of various street references into it ala Grand Theft.
“kimbo Slice: Miami Throwdown. Pure Gold.
People have mentioned the brand name of the UFC selling their game. EA Sports in itself is a brand name with selling power. For years we have had annual updates with few improvements, sometimes inferior to the previous year’s installment…yet they still sell and they sell well.
EA’s ProStreet sold well, despite being a different to previous editions and being universally slated.
That said, MMA is a different beast entirely. EA brand name or not, they will need stars and who is out there that could really make a difference? Randy (if he doesnt end up becoming UFC exclusive) Fedor, Sylvia, Kimbo, Tito, the Shamrocks, Bobby Lashley…those are the household names, but do they really stand up to Liddel, Lesnar, Franklin, Griffin, Rampage, Hughes, St.Pierre, Anderson Silva, Wanderlei Silva and the TUF crew, not forgetting the ‘UFC name’ in terms of selling power?
Putting something on free TV and getting viewers is one thing, getting people to part with thier cash is another. Fedor, Sylvia, Barnett, Lindland, Arlovski, Rizzo etc didn’t sell, despite the card itself looking awesome on paper and delivering on the night.
EA’s only hope is that they have a REALLY good first game…with the position they are in and the world economy, they might not get a second chance.
“The court in Nevada is not corrupt, regardless of what some tool here writes. All the judgments in favor of Zuffa in the Couture case actually came in Texas (maybe it is the long reach of the mob!!111).”
Considering Frank Fertitta I ran the gambling business down in Galveston with the Maceo crime family until the federal government stepped in and shut them down, its possible. You walked right into that one Rome. And the courts in Nevada are corrupt as shit when it comes to regulating on the sides of the Casinos. Nobody wins judgements against them. If people actually won in court against the casinos then Station might actually pay its employees the amount of time they work instead of stiffing them on overtime and rounding their hours. As it is they’ll probably end up settling the class action suit to keep it quiet and the employees will take it because they know they have no chance.
Thank you Ivan. The ignorance being displayed by certain fighters on this isssue is amazing.
And here I spent all this time talking about the PRIDE yakuza scandal and not many people cared much online, yet years later it’s the allegations against the Fertittas that somehow interest people.
I actually did care Zach though I found this website and your articles long after the fact. I also care about the fact that K-1 was founded by a guy that just got out of prison… My question regarding the PRIDE Yakuza scandal is: Did it go all the way to the top? Was Sakakibara knowingly proceeding with it, or were the underbosses who were mentioned by QJ in the loss by KO bonus scandal as far as it went.
The Fertittas likely have their hands clean, except for their dirty as hell business practices.
Ed. — The whole PRIDE operation in terms of DSE management… well… think of PRIDE as a giant toy that many powerful people in Japan fought to try to control over when it started making money. How could such a cash-rich company have no reserves left to run on once they lost their TV deal? The money passed through many hands, and since the shell of the company was heavily leveraged to Fuji TV and the TV contract, once the TV went away so did the ‘easy’ cash despite the fact that there were plenty who stuck around who made a fortune.
Even if a game is “in the pipeline” at EA, that doesn’t mean that there’s anything like an imminent release there.
THQ was showing off their UFC game at E3 2007 with Rampage (this was in the wake of Rampage beating Chuck). It’s rather nebulously dated for Spring 2009. So almost two years from when they showed off early footage to release, and it would have been in development for some time before that just to get to that stage.
THQ’s deal runs five years assuming that they last that long as a company. I assume that means mid-year 2011. It wouldn’t be crazy for EA to be working now on a game with the intention of bidding on the license in 2010 for release in mid-2011, especially if they could be doing it with a small team (which you would be right up until around the time they would have bidding open for the license again, at which point you would be wanting to ramp up artists for the last push).
I really don’t see EA releasing a “legends of MMA” game without any kind of established MMA brand behind it. Zuffa owns Pride and UFC, and Pride is useless as a game brand now. EliteXC is for all intents and purposes gone, and no one else is high enough profile and established enough to make their brand worthwhile for a game.
just on an aside: I for one like the Kimbo video game idea… Like GTA but with (mostly standup) fight game mechanics. You get bread for powerups and you earn street cred and new grills and gold chains for fights won. You start off living in a car but when you hustle your fight winnings you can eventually buy a new home. If you lose however the hood turns on you and the media publicly humiliates you.
And the game ends with you dying in the ring against Badr Hari…
Seriously I hope Kimbo’s management doesn’t execute him that way.
The Fertitta family back in the day was involved with the mafia but not anymore. Or at least I hope not. If the Nevada Gaming Commission or FBI even suspect that the Fertittas have ties with the mob, they would take the matter very seriously. They don’t fool around with the mob now. It would be suicide to run a gaming empire having ties to the mob these days.
“1. Fighters are a special kind of employee who have a very limited number of work years. Programmers do not. You are a complete retard to make any comparison between the two.”
OH! Now video game programmers don’t mean shit? My bad, you are right…..until you made this comment;
“EA doesn’t have the same legal pull anywhere in the world that Zuffa does in Nevada to get away with the bullshit they pull on their employees.”
Again, look up “EA Spouse”. It’s on wikipedia if you care to check there. There was a lawsuit and everything (hint, EA lost that one).
And let me make this clear, I think Dana White and the Fertittas are douchebags. I agree with you on this. But your fanboy-like loving of EA because they MIGHT make an MMA game just so you can take it to Zuffa’s face when buying said EA-made MMA game is ridiculous and makes you look like a hypocrite.
I heard that EA Spouse’s husband was working 85 hours a week and the overtime was unpaid. Absolutely crazy. That’s well over half of your life gone. EA isn’t the only guilty party. It’s very common in the gaming industry for developers to be exploited and not paid overtime. How are you supposed to have a life like that? Whats worse are the corporate shills who have defended EA and gaming companies for these practices. I remember seeing programmers on the Pro-EA side saying that people who are truly passionate and hard working wouldn’t mind working all that unpaid overtime. Apparently you don’t have passion if your life doesn’t revolve around being a corporate tool with no life outside of work.
Game companies are also douchebags when it comes to rushing games out the door before they are ready to be on retail. You ever wonder why so many videogames based off of movies, TV shows and the like are crappy about 80% of the time? Because they are rushed out the door to coincide with the release of the movie or whatever else, making a half-baked game. And that also goes back to developers being rushed to finish the product (look up the E.T. game on the Atari 2600 for a good story about that. How can you make a good videogame in five weeks?) and videogame testers being forced to overlook glitches and the like just so game companies can rush games out the door, AND so they don’t have to spend more money fixing glitches (instead the popular thing to do is release patches. But the problem is that not every gamer has their systems hooked to the internet to get the patches. I have all the current systems, and the only system of mine connected to the internet is my Playstation 3).
Oh, and don’t get me started on videogame companies bullying and strong-arming reviewers to give reviewers into giving videogames better scores than what they deserve, and threatening to pull advertising money from these websites and magazines. I believe EA is a pretty big offender here. Eidos definitely is (look up the name Jeff Gerstmann. He got fired from gamespot.com for giving Kane And Lynch a lowish score).
Trust me, these game companies are more corrupt and evil than Zuffa can ever imagine to be.