Way, Way Back in 2011
One of the many companies EA has acquired is a little outfit called PopCap. They are responsible for Plants vs Zombies, which you may have heard of. A story is making the rounds that EA fired the game’s designer over a difference of opinion regarding pay-to-win practices being implemented in the sequel.
If this happened, it would have been several years ago, around 2011. Edmund McMillen brought up the story on a recent podcast. Apparently the designer, George Fan, expressed his disagreement about whether or not pay-to-win should be implemented in Plants vs Zombies 2. In McMillen’s own words, Fan stated “that’s not really a good idea and I don’t want to do that with my game.” He was more or less immediately fired over these objections, according to McMillen.
Now, Fan is back to making indie games following his departure from EA. McMillen expressed resentment over the lack of coverage this story got originally, though this is surely not the case anymore. With EA plastered all over the gaming news network for their mishandling of Battlefront II, any information which corroborates people’s anger will likely make a huge splash. George Fan is set to make a statement on the story later today.