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EA's Jens Uwe Intat

The European VP talks about the region's market, mature games on the Wii, and the iPhone's importance

GamesIndustry.biz You've got Dead Space Extraction coming up - mature content on the Wii hasn't really taken off yet, so do you expect that game to act as a turning point in people's perceptions of what the console can do?
Dr Jens Uwe Intat

We're trying - one of the explanations we have is that there's a lot of double ownership, so people having a Wii and a 360 and/or PS3. They're really playing different types of games on those two machines, and historically up to know we assume those people will have played the more mature content on the more high-tech machine.

Dead Space Extraction is going to be a very nice test of that hypothesis, because we're really building a game where the Wii version is very different to the Dead Space game on 360 and PS3, and we'll actually see whether we can reach more people with a) a great game and b) interesting content.

If that's not going to work, then obviously the whole proposal from our point of view at least of more mature games on the Wii just does not work.

GamesIndustry.biz So you'll know within six months if mature Wii games is a genre you want to follow up?
Dr Jens Uwe Intat

Yes, I agree.

GamesIndustry.biz Changing tack slightly, what do you feel are the opportunities for EA on the digital download platforms, the iPhone, and so on?
Dr Jens Uwe Intat

Well, we certainly see in our investment into the mobile division, with the acquisition of Jamdat, as a clear testament to our belief in the future of mobile gaming. We certainly see a lot of growth in that space, and we've certainly seen that mobile phones have a much, much higher development speed compared to anything else, including PC.

And they're becoming much more powerful in order to play games - one of the key challenges we're having is that they have some sort of base standard, there's still a lot of variety in terms of processing power, storage space, screen sizes even, which make it a bit more challenging.

The iPhone is actually a nice example, because there you've got a huge amount of one type of device on which you can programme, which is similar for the Nintendo DS, and for the videogames consoles - one of the biggest benefits is that you have one standard into which you build.

It's a very easy-to-use device too, so it will certainly be another future pillar of interactive entertainment.

GamesIndustry.biz How does iPhone penetration split out across Europe?
Dr Jens Uwe Intat

I would say that the penetration of the iPhone is still very much at the beginning. It's driven by some high prices in some markets, by some exclusive distribution agreements... in absolute terms it's a really nice number of gadgets out there, but in terms of the fraction of the total mobile phone market it's still marginal.

GamesIndustry.biz And are the key markets as you'd expect: UK, France, Germany?
Dr Jens Uwe Intat

And Italy - the Italians really love their mobile phones.

GamesIndustry.biz We talked last year about the emerging territories in Europe - how has that picture developed since then? Have Russia and the like begun to realise their potential in that time?
Dr Jens Uwe Intat

Candidly-speaking I'd say that Russia is still a growth market, it's still high up on our priority list to build it, but it has certainly been hit very hard by the financial crisis. We had expectations a year ago that everything would grow faster than it has done, and Russia has been particularly badly affected, but it's not going to put us off from any of the investment we're making there. It'll just take a little longer than we originally anticipated.

GamesIndustry.biz You mentioned the Brutal Legend legal battle in the EA press conference - how important was it for EA and Double Fine to move on from all that and get the game out the door?
Dr Jens Uwe Intat

We think Brutal Legend is a really cool and fun game, and Tim Schafer is a real icon of the industry. We're certainly very happy and proud that he's working with us. We were very happy that we will get the game out in time and allow people to have a lot of fun at Christmas.

GamesIndustry.biz You made a wry dig at the arch-enemy, referring to "slaying the monster" with respect to the legal battle between Double Fine and Activision...
Dr Jens Uwe Intat

We're the entertainment industry, right? If we can't make subtle jokes, I don't know in which industry you can make subtle jokes...

Dr Jens Uwe Intat is VP for Europe at EA. Interview by Phil Elliott.