EA CEO John Riccitiello is known for his opinions, which are often controversial, and in his latest outburst, it’s no different. During EA’s Q1 conference call, Riccitiello stated that a price cut will move more hardware, and that they’ll like to see a cut later this year.

“We think pricing will move hardware,” he said. “We anticipate price cuts at some point and we’d like to see them later in the year.” However, so far, the Xbox 360 is the only system to see major price cuts. But, Nintendo hasn’t hinted at a price drop since the sales of its consoles have been going strong, and, recently, Sony has been in the spotlight about thier comments of a price drop for the PlayStation 3. We cant help, but think the comment may have been a clue to Sony to drop the price of its console soon.

Anyway, EA is a big player in the gaming industry and are convinicing enough to change minds of a console manufacturer like Sony. However, if you don’t remember. A few months back, Activision threatened Sony about the price of the PS3, and the lack of a price cut.

If you were wondering if Burnout and Need For Speed were going to merge to make one total new kind of video game, they aren’t, John Riccitiello told Kotaku during E3. However, he did say something about the Burnout developers working on a new Need for Speed title.

When being asked if EA is planning to merge Burnout and Need For Speed together, Riccitiello told Kotaku NO but he did confrim that the Burnout team at EA’s Criterion Games, led by Alex Ward, were working on the next Need for Speed title.

“Alex is one of the people in the industry I would analogize to the great filmmakers, etc..” Riccitiello said. “He is a true creative visionary. We had a great fight about what the next Need For Speed would be like. Of course, he gets to win because it’s his call. It’s not that I’m without an opinion on it.”

However, that still sounded like a possible merger NFS-Burnout.

“I don’t think you can fold Burnout into Need for Speed, because a lot of people like Burnout,” he said. “We don’t have a plan right now for a separate major launch on Burnout, because the team doing it is working on a revolutionary take on Need for Speed. I don’t know, if Paramount, in addition to owning Star Trek owned Star Wars, which isn’t the way it is, I don’t think you’d merge them.”

And you though YOU couldn’t wait unlit next week. Today, Electronic Arts revealed the games that it well be presenting at E3. Anyway, this year’s lineup features blockbuster franchises, new intellectual property as well as ten titles for the Wii. And thrust us when we say, “there’s more then you can shake a stick at.”

“This year at E3, we have an incredible slate of games for the Nintendo Wii, PS3, Xbox 360, PC, Mac and mobile devices,” said EA’s CEO John Riccitiello. “Our creative teams are developing some of the most innovative experiences on any platform. We couldn’t be more proud of the games we’re presenting this year.”

Featured at E3 will be:
Army of Two: The 40th Day
Battlefield 1943
Battlefield: Bad Company 2
Brutal Legend
Dante’s Inferno
Dead Space Extraction
Dragon Age: Origins
EA Sports Active
EA Sports Grand Slam Tennis
FIFA 10
Fight Night Round 4
G.I. JOE: The Rise of Cobra
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
Madden NFL 10
Mass Effect 2
MySims Agents
NCAA Football 10
NHL 10
Need for Speed NITRO
Need for Speed SHIFT
Spore Hero
Spore Hero Arena
The Saboteur
The Sims 3
Tiger Woods PGA Tour 10

Why EA, why? In a conference call earlier on today, it was revealed by EA CEO John Riccitiello that both Mass Effect 2 and a sequel to DICE’s Battlefield: Bad Company would be releasing within the first three months of 2010.

According to Shacknews, who originally reported the story, Riccitiello, during the conference call, said that Mass Effect 2 will arrive on multiple platforms, which means it could hit both PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360. But, however, when they asked about about specific platforms for Mass Effect 2, an Electronic Arts representative told Shacknews that no details were available at this time.

Any-how, both games will now be released during the fourth quarter of the publisher’s 2010 fiscal year, which runs from January 1 to March 31.

At the DICE ‘09 conference, John Riccitiello told the attendees at the conference that the current recession has been ‘a blessing in disguise [so that] we can clear away junk’. Stating that the overall goal from this is that the developers can ’stop sending pointless product to retail stores’. ‘Junk is hard to compete with,’ said Riccitiello. He felt that developers should shift their focus on quality and away from quantity.

‘We did get fat in too many places. It seemed like anyone who could draw a guy with a gun with a crayon could get funded. At least for EA, we got a little too fat, and a little too reliant on where things were,’ he continues. ‘I’m not pro-recession but to quote Rahm Emanuel: never waste a crisis.’

This is a great wake up call for developers atleast they can wake up before it  became too late.

After John Riccitiello revealed the games extents, it looks like EA is finally ready to reveal the game. Today,  Electronic Arts have announced  Dead Space Extraction, an all-new chapter from the studio that delivered the award-winning action-horror Dead Space game.

Built from the ground up and developed exclusively for the Wii, Dead Space Extraction is a prequel that reveals the events leading up to Isaac Clarke’s mission on the USG Ishimura in the original Dead Space game released in 2008.  Dead Space Extraction will marry the innovative motion controls of the Wii Remote with a frenetic first person perspective to create a new action-packed horror experience.

The game tells the story of a handful of space colonists desperately struggling to escape from a horrific infection on the Aegis VII mining colony deep in the furthest regions of space. The game introduces a new heroine to the fiction and as the crew fall victim to a mysterious contagion aboard the ship, it becomes clear that protecting her may be their only hope for survival. Dead Space Extraction introduces all new characters, weapons, enemies, puzzles and co-operative multiplayer gameplay.

“We could not be more excited to extend Dead Space into an experience exclusive to the Wii. Nintendo has a wonderful history in the horror genre and we are thrilled to build on that tradition with Dead Space Extraction,” said Glen Schofield, VP and General Manager of EA Redwood Shores studio.“As we were developing Dead Space, we realized that there was so much of the story going untold. Dead Space Extraction tells that story with all of the intensity, blood and gore that fans would expect.”

Well, this holiday season isn’t as white as it should of been for video game publisher and developer EA, but besides all of its problems they processed to try an fulfill the needs of their Mirror’s Edge fans.

Yesterday, EA confirmed that Mirror’s Edge will be seeing a follow-up, but on the downside, it’s sad to see the company announcing this in the face of a disappointing holiday sales rate.

“While we saw significant improvement in the overall quality of our key products this year, we are disappointed that our holiday slate is not meeting our sales expectations,” said EA CEO John Riccitiello to GI.biz. “Given this performance and the uncertain economic environment, we are taking steps to reduce our cost structure and improve the profitability of our business.”

However, despite slow sales the warm critical reception afforded to Mirror’s Edge will ensure a sequel.

“Many times with a new intellectual property, the first edition doesn’t generate the units that subsequent editions could generate,” Riccitiello continued, “Mirror’s Edge is one that was very strongly reviewed, that one’s going to go forward. We’re probably going to look into some issues around the design to make sure strong IP is married with strong business.”

Black Box studio has revealed some new details for their upcoming game, Need for Speed: Undercover, the details are as stated from the press release: Need for Speed: Undercover has players racing through speedways, dodging cops and chasing rivals as they go deep undercover to take down an International crime syndicate. The new game heralds the return of high-intensity police chases and introduces the all-new ‘Heroic Driving Engine’ — a unique technology that generates incredible high-performance moves at 180 miles per hour during breathtaking highway battles.

“Need for Speed Undercover puts you at the center of a big-budget Hollywood movie with all of the drama, action and dazzling chase scenes, right on your gaming console. The unique Heroic Driving Engine will give you ultimate control over the hottest cars and push you to use every ounce of skill to outrun the law and take down criminal adversaries,”-Executive Producer Bill Harrison

According to Electronic Arts CEO John Riccitiello, Redwood Shore’s, which is in parthership with EA, are planning to release their sequel to The Godfather Video Game, The Godfather 2, “a few months” after the November release of Valve Software’s Left 4 Dead. This was revealed during an annual investor’s conference, which was held today, when talking about the upcoming roster of mature-themed titles. If the game is planned to be released a few months after Left 4 Dead that means it could be released in early 09.

Absent from the recent E3 line-up, Electronic Arts announced that it’s upcoming game Tiberium, a FPS based in the universe of Command & Conquer, has been delayed until its 2010 fiscal year. That is provided that the basic plan for making the game goes well, Tiberuim is planned, as of now, for a April 2009 thought out March 2010 release date. The game is planned for a release on the PC, Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, there’s was no cited by Electronic Arts for the delay. The game was originally planned for a, well we don’t really think there was an official release date, but we do think it was planned for a early 09 release date.

“Games can sure make you rich,” I told my girlfriend that and guess what? When reports like this come in, it proves me right. E.A today released there first quarter results, which shows them bring in $804 million dollars. Which happens to be 50% more than last year’s earnings of $409 million. The games that played a very key role in their success were and still are Battlefield: Bad Company, UEFA EURO 2008 as well as Rock Band.

Heres what EA’s Chief Executive Officer John Riccitiello had this to say “We are now seeing the early returns of the change agenda we started last year,” Go figure… While this year acquisitions where made, E.A. has many Allstate Highlights this year (as seen below).

Highlights (comparisons are to the quarter ended June 30, 2007)

• Battlefield: Bad Company, Mass Effect™ for the PC, SPORE™ Creature Creator and the recently launched NCAA® Football 09 debuted with strong quality ratings from critics.
• The SPORE Creature Creator is in the hands of 2.5 million users. Over two million creatures have been uploaded into Sporepedia™ in just six weeks.
• EA is the number one publisher in North America, with 17 percent segment share and number two in Europe with 14 percent segment share calendar year-to-date.
• EA Mobile™ is the world’s leading publisher of games for phones – with revenue of $44 million – up 33 percent year-over-year.
• EA Partners signed a co-publishing deal with id Software to bring RAGE™ to consumers around the world.
• EA acquired Hands-On-Mobile™ Korea, a leading Korean mobile developer and publisher.
• EA purchased ThreeSF, developers of an online social network for gamers.
• Critics gave EA titles high marks for quality and innovation at the recent E3 industry summit in Los Angeles. Highlights included SPORE, Mirror’s Edge™, Dead Space™, Dragon Age™: Origins and Left 4 Dead™ from Valve.

[EA Reports First Quarter Fiscal Year 2009 Results]

According to Dark Zero, in the trailer for Need for Speed: Undercover Christina Milian makes an appearance, which pretty much confirms that she’ll be this years poster-girl for the game, also actress Maggie Q also appears in the trailer too. The trailer ends by confirming a release date for the game, Novemeber 18th, the release date was also shown on the game’s official website.

Electronic Arts CEO John Riccitiello stated that Undercover takes inspiration from action films such as The Transporter to tell the games story. John Doyle, from EA Black Box also hinted that the game will have a “Most Wanted-ish” sandbox style of gameplay.

While EA Redwood Shores is very busy making the upcoming Dead Space, they have also been working on a new game called The Godfather. EA’s CEO John Riccitiello was very nice to share some info on this game here’s what he had to say.

“You can play this game both at the street level, much like a GTA-style game, but you can also play it top-down, almost like you’re in an RTS, controlling the strategy of the boroughs so you can see what’s going on…

It’s a game that I think we’ll be talking a lot about this fall.”

While you may have to this fall,You can make up that time by finshing Grand Theft Auto 4.

EA games has revealed the next charter in the Need For Speed series entitled, Need for Speed: Undercover. By the sound of the game the first thing that may come to mind is that the games about a cop that goes “Undercover” to try and stop a underground racing circuit but, it’s not my place to give details about any games at this point.

Anyway, the game is being developed by one of EA Vancouver’s two Need of Speed teams. The Need for Speed team was split into two teams giving each team more time to give yearly updates for the franchise. Instead of having one team only 12 months to create the next installment, giving each team a full two years to work on the game.

It was hinted that the game could be inspired by movies, somewhat like “The Transporter.” With all these facts in mind this game may turn in to a worthy competitor for the Burnout series?

[Need for Speed: Undercover Coming via IGN]