Interview: Trip Hawkins

Already a PC powerhouse, Electronic Arts was among the first American companies to jump aboard the Genesis bandwagon. A slew of quality releases elevated them to the upper echelon of 3rd party developers, and they eventually went on to become the biggest of them all.

This week, Sega-16 sat for a spell to speak with the man responsible for the EA phenomenon. As its founder, Trip Hawkins brought his revolutionary vision of game design to the Genesis and played a major part in its success. From original series like Madden to excellent ports like Marble Madness and The Immortal, Electronic Arts brought a diverse range of excellent titles to Genesis gamers. Read our interview with Mr. Hawkins for more details!

Cool, the man himself the Tripster

i love the Genny EA sports, and the 3DO system of which i have every game released in the usa

It was nice of him to answer our questions and all, but I have to admit he seems a bit over-confident. I think he attributes too much of the Genesis' success to what EA did for them. Not that it isn't deserved, and the Genny certainly needed the help in those early days, but he makes it sound like the Japanese branch realized they couldn't live without EA.

I will never forgive trippy dick for the $700 3DO system. Talk about underdelivering.

OK, this has me intrested. Does anyone have any good high scans of Joe Montana Football before EA did some work on it? I realize that the orignal devlopers game was much different, like the SMS/GG version of the game that was 100x better.

I recall that sega gave the orginal devloper the boot and the orignal game was going to be like the SMS/GG versions.

I remember seeing a side-view version of it before it launched, but I don't know if that was Mediagenic's game or not. The game EA did was done entirely by them from scratch.

I think that was Megiagenic's version, the side view version. The SMS/GG version was, and it was superior to the Genesis version, IMO.

Pretty good interview, but you should've asked him more about 3DO. :P

Trip sure is into himself. And the fact that he thinks paper clamshells for boxes are tacky and chose the cheap-looking cardboard route instead shows that he is a retard. No wonder he didn't have the competance to make 3DO a success.

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Originally Posted by David J.

I think that was Megiagenic's version, the side view version. The SMS/GG version was, and it was superior to the Genesis version, IMO.

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According to http://www.skygames.com/Games.htm, both the Gen and SMS/GG versions were developed by BlueSky. I suppose that doesn't mean they designed them.

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Originally Posted by Joe Redifer

No wonder he didn't have the competance to make 3DO a success.

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In all fairness, I think the 3DO is still the most popular "American" system to be released in Japan.

I don't think that site's right. Both Michael Katz and Steven Kent's The Ultimate History of Video Games have Mediagenic (Activision) as the original developers of Joe Montana Football, which they never finished. The actual released product was done by Electronic Arts, unless it was programmed by BlueSky as part of EA or something.

Anyone have a copy of the game to see the credits?

man i hate the EA sports games i only like Fifa 94 or something,I like skitching an al the road rash games/Crue ball and burnout series that was about it,i still think Ea sucks overall.Man 3Dno what a crap machine i stil have it but i hate the bitch with al my hart.Ea was good back in the days but nowdays they suck overall so does Price of persia sands of time ugly Graphics and too slow gameplay.

BTW melf how can i email revieuws to you on the normal and simple way i have one made,in good english of skitching.

Joe Montana Football 1 for the Genesis was done by Park Place Productions. They also did John Madden Football (the good one).

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Originally Posted by Joe Redifer

Trip sure is into himself. And the fact that he thinks paper clamshells for boxes are tacky and chose the cheap-looking cardboard route instead shows that he is a retard.

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I dunno, I found that comment kind of weird. EA's usage of cardboard boxes didn't last very long -- The Immortal, Shadow of the Beast, and other 1991 releases are in plastic clamshell cases, albeit annoyingly different-sized ones from the standard (Might & Magic was in a regular-sized case, however). Then they switched to these giant mega-thick cases in 1993. And then eventually they went to using regular-sized plastic cases. EA was using plastic clamshell boxes when Sega had gone to cardboard.