EA outlines PS3 launch plans, talks Wii

EA has said it expects to have four to five games out for PS3 between the console's launch and the end of the year, confirming at this stage three of the titles: Need for Speed Carbon; Madden NFL 07; and Tiger Woods PGA Tour 07.

Discussing its launch games line-up for Sony's next-gen console - during a conference call held with media and analysts yesterday - the company also admitted, while fielding a question on Xbox 360 versus PS3 technical capabilities, that it's extremely unlikely that the initial wave of titles will do PS3's hardware justice.

"This Christmas, it's going to be difficult to harness the full power of the PS3 on first generation software versus what will be second generation 360 games, so they're going to be more alike than different, is our opinion at this time," an EA exec commented.

They continued: "As those machines develop over time [...] there's a lot of horsepower inside the PS3 that we'll be able to unlock over years two, three, and four that we're very excited about."

EA additionally took the opportunity to touch on Wii and DS during the conference call, revealing plans to boost focus on both machines. "We're definitely going after those platforms", the publisher revealed, "...we have ramped up [game] production for the Wii and DS Lite". It added: "In terms of relative investment on the Wii and the DS, we are moving resources against those platforms to increase SKU count."

The publisher went on to say, however, that it only expects to have a couple of titles out for Wii's launch period - Need for Speed Carbon and Madden NFL 07 - and a total of five released by the end of the company's fiscal year - March 2007. It's possible that EA's Wii games will retail at $49.99 in the US (apparently, Nintendo has indicated that first-party Wii games will not retail for more than this amount over the pond), but that remains to be confirmed.

Reportedly, EA didn't have an awful lot to say about Xbox 360 during the conference call, chairman and CEO Larry Probst simply stating, "We're pleased to be the leading publisher on the Xbox 360".