Lionhead Studio head Peter Molyneux addressed EA CEO John Riccitiello's comments that EA "blew it" in managing Molyneux's former studio, Bullfrog, after the megapublisher acquired the renowned independent studio in 1995. "I was a bit of a prat back then, to be honest," he told 1UP. "To be fair, I think [EA] didn't do anything bad. I was just very immature, and I was coming to terms with not having 30 of my friends but instead having 200 strangers around me. That was difficult, and I made life difficult for them."
Riccitiello's comments at this year's DICE conference acknowledged that several of EA's big acquisitions had failed because the company had taken the wrong approach, using a "command and conquer" rather than a "city-state" management model.
"I think it was very nice what he said," said Molyneux, "but he's right. If you want people to carry on doing the thing that you acquired them for, then you should try and make an environment that is as close to what they excelled in before, and that's something that didn't happen in the Bullfrog days."
