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EA Has Forgotten And Neglected These 15 Game Franchises

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Ignacio Weil

Gaming - May 14th 2026, 23:59 GMT+2

Dead Space Director Retires — 1. Dead Space (2008)

Isaac Clarke received one immaculate second chance when Motive rebuilt the USG Ishimura, but EA soon left the franchise floating in zero gravity again. The remake sharpened strategic dismemberment, expanded exploration, and proved that premium survival horror still had plenty of oxygen. With Motive turning its attention to its *Iron Man* project and *Battlefield* and no follow-up announced, the revival now resembles a beautifully polished distress signal more than a lasting comeback. Necromorphs have survived worse; fans are the ones running low on med packs. | © Electronic Arts

Medal of honor above and beyond cropped processed by imagy — 2. Medal of Honor (1999)

*Medal of Honor* helped invent the cinematic military shooter, translating Steven Spielberg’s post-*Saving Private Ryan* fascination with World War II into a PlayStation landmark. Its identity blurred when the series abandoned historical combat to chase the modern-warfare boom, and the poorly received *Warfighter* sent it into retreat. Respawn eventually attempted a lavish VR comeback with *Above and Beyond*, which even contained the Oscar-winning documentary short *Colette*. That remarkable footnote could not return one of EA’s former flagship shooters to active duty. | © Electronic Arts

SSX 2012 — 3. SSX (2000)

*SSX* treated snowboarding less like a sport and more like an excuse to launch brightly dressed maniacs from mountains at irresponsible speeds. *Tricky* sharpened that attitude into arcade perfection, while *SSX 3* built an interconnected peak that still feels ambitious today. The grittier reboot proved its riding mechanics could survive a modern makeover, yet EA never followed it with another descent. With sports games becoming increasingly serious and standardized, this flamboyant mixture of racing, tricks, and impossible geography is overdue for fresh powder. | © Electronic Arts

Sim City 2013 cropped processed by imagy — 4. SimCity (1989)

EA has not misplaced *SimCity* completely—*BuildIt* still keeps the name busy on phones. What disappeared is the ambitious PC city builder that let players obsess over zoning, traffic, taxes, and whether one badly placed road had doomed an entire metropolis. The troubled reboot’s server failures and always-online requirement damaged trust, and Maxis Emeryville later closed while *Cities: Skylines* claimed the vacant territory. A proper desktop comeback could be enormous, yet EA continues treating one of gaming’s foundational simulation brands like a mobile-only address. | © Electronic Arts

Syndicate 2012 cropped processed by imagy — 5. Syndicate (1993)

Nothing suits *Syndicate*’s dystopian satire quite like a giant corporation owning it and deciding the numbers no longer work. Bullfrog’s original transformed cyberpunk boardrooms into tactical battlefields, letting players augment disposable agents and conduct brutally efficient missions across hostile cities. The later Starbreeze reboot delivered slick gunplay and excellent cooperative action, but replacing isometric strategy with a first-person shooter alienated the audience most eager for its return. EA has ignored the property ever since, apparently allowing real-world corporate inertia to defeat EuroCorp. | © Electronic Arts

Alice Madness Returns — 6. Alice: Madness Returns (2011)

*Alice: Madness Returns* turned psychological trauma into level design, filling Wonderland with porcelain faces, ruined dollhouses, and creatures imported from a particularly vindictive bedtime story. Its combat and platforming could grow repetitive, yet Spicy Horse created such a singular visual identity that the game only became more beloved after release. American McGee later completed an extensive proposal for *Alice: Asylum*, but EA declined to fund it or license the rights. Keeping Wonderland locked while refusing to revisit it feels suitably absurd, just without the charming nonsense. | © Electronic Arts

Overlord Fellowship of Evil cropped processed by imagy — 7. Overlord (2007)

EA did not bury *Overlord* itself; it inherited the shovel when it acquired Codemasters. Triumph Studios’ mainline games made villainy wonderfully practical, placing hordes of dim-witted minions under the player’s command and turning fantasy clichés into targets for slapstick destruction. The co-op spin-off *Fellowship of Evil* discarded much of that identity and received a spectacularly hostile response, after which the series vanished. A genuine third adventure could still occupy the empty space between action RPG and dark comedy—assuming someone at EA remembers what was included in the Codemasters purchase. | © Codemasters

Command Conquer 4 cropped processed by imagy — 8. Command & Conquer (1995)

Westwood’s *Command & Conquer* made base building feel like warfare and military briefings feel like gloriously cheap television, complete with scenery-chewing villains and unforgettable full-motion video. Later releases steadily lost that confidence, culminating in *Tiberian Twilight*, which stripped away traditional resource gathering and gave the main saga an ending almost nobody wanted. EA deserves credit for the excellent *Remastered Collection* and for releasing classic source code to modders. Preservation is not resurrection, however, and fans are still awaiting a new core RTS worthy of “Welcome back, Commander.” | © Electronic Arts

Cropped SPORE — 9. Spore (2008)

*Spore* attempted to squeeze the history of life into one game, moving from a hungry cell to a spacefaring civilization while giving players tools to design every questionable creature in between. The individual stages were uneven, but its procedural animation, online sharing, and wonderfully accessible editors were years ahead of the creator-driven boom. Instead of expanding that extraordinary foundation, EA followed it with scattered spin-offs and the now-unplayable *Darkspore*. With user-generated content more valuable than ever, leaving *Spore* without a true successor looks less cautious and more baffling every day. | © Electronic Arts

Ultima IX Ascension cropped processed by imagy — 10. Ultima (1981)

Pick a celebrated RPG feature—moral choices, persistent worlds, NPC schedules, environmental interaction—and *Ultima* probably experimented with it before the industry had settled on the vocabulary. Richard Garriott’s series helped define computer role-playing, while *Ultima Online* demonstrated how convincing a shared virtual world could be and remains active today. The single-player saga, however, ended with the troubled *Ascension*, and the short-lived mobile revival *Ultima Forever* hardly honored that legacy. EA owns a piece of gaming history but mostly treats it like an artifact too valuable to sell and too inconvenient to use. | © Electronic Arts

Burnout Paradise Remastered — 11. Burnout (2001)

*Burnout* understood that racing games become much more exciting once traffic, grudges, and catastrophic insurance claims enter the equation. *Takedown* and *Revenge* turned aggressive driving into an art form, while *Paradise* successfully opened the series into a seamless city without sanding away its appetite for wreckage. EA later remastered *Paradise* and stopped there, as Criterion moved through *Need for Speed* and into the wider *Battlefield* operation. Arcade racing has rarely felt more cautious, which makes the absence of gaming’s finest crash simulator particularly painful. | © Electronic Arts

Mercenaries 2 World in Flames cropped processed by imagy — 12. Mercenaries (2005)

*Mercenaries: Playground of Destruction* handed players a Deck of 52 targets, several competing factions, and the liberating knowledge that an airstrike could solve most navigation problems. Its destructible warzone encouraged improvisation long before open-world games routinely advertised systemic chaos. The sequel was bigger but rougher, and a follow-up called *Mercs Inc.* entered early development before disappearing along with EA’s appetite for the series. Modern hardware could finally deliver the fully destructible sandbox Pandemic imagined; instead, one of gaming’s best troublemaking premises remains under corporate occupation. | © Electronic Arts

Army of two the 40th day cropped processed by imagy — 13. Army of Two (2008)

*Army of Two* recognized that cooperative play should involve more than placing a second gun beside the first. Its aggro system let one mercenary draw fire while the other flanked, and ridiculous back-to-back shootouts gave couch co-op its own buddy-action movie. The series lost personality with *The Devil’s Cartel*, which pushed Salem and Rios aside just as competition in the shooter market became brutal. EA responded to that disappointment by shelving the brand, even though tightly designed two-player campaigns have become rarer—and therefore more distinctive—since its disappearance. | © Electronic Arts

Populous The Beginning — 14. Populous (1989)

Before “god game” became a genre label, *Populous* handed players divine power and asked them to express it through landscaping, miracles, and the occasional biblical catastrophe. Its deformable terrain turned geography itself into strategy, influencing decades of simulations that let players rule indirectly rather than swing a sword. *The Beginning* boldly shifted into three dimensions and put a shaman on the battlefield, then EA simply stopped the experiment. Re-releasing the classics on modern storefronts is welcome housekeeping, but one of Bullfrog’s most important creations deserves more than a freshly dusted shelf. | © Electronic Arts

Dungeon keeper 2 cropped processed by imagy — 15. Dungeon Keeper (1997)

Most strategy games ask players to defeat the villain; *Dungeon Keeper* asked them to build the villain a pleasant office with torture chambers nearby. Bullfrog’s mix of base management, creature psychology, possession, and malicious comedy remains astonishingly distinctive. EA canceled a proper third installment, eventually revived the name as an aggressively monetized mobile game, and later retired that version too. Spiritual successors have spent years proving that people still enjoy designing underground lairs, yet the original keeper remains asleep—presumably because nobody has paid enough gems to finish excavating its room. | © Electronic Arts

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EA’s vault must be getting crowded. The publisher controls a remarkable collection of video game franchises that once sold millions, shaped entire genres, or turned friendly multiplayer sessions into lifelong grudges—yet many have spent years gathering dust. Some were sidelined after disappointing releases, while others vanished despite fans repeatedly asking for their return. These 15 neglected EA franchises deserve far more than the occasional anniversary post and another decade in storage.

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EA’s vault must be getting crowded. The publisher controls a remarkable collection of video game franchises that once sold millions, shaped entire genres, or turned friendly multiplayer sessions into lifelong grudges—yet many have spent years gathering dust. Some were sidelined after disappointing releases, while others vanished despite fans repeatedly asking for their return. These 15 neglected EA franchises deserve far more than the occasional anniversary post and another decade in storage.