Head of labels at publisher acknowledges rough start to current generation, claims firm is better equipped to handle upcoming next-gen transition because of Frostbite engine.

Frank Gibeau, who heads up EA Labels, has admitted the publisher got off to a tough start with the current generation. In an interview with Bloomberg, the executive pinned the struggle down to technology, saying EA did not have a powerful enough engine to build games at the time. This problem, he claims, has been remedied for the upcoming generation of hardware, thanks to its proprietary Frostbite engine.

EA is better suited for the upcoming console transition, Gibeau says.

"Frankly, we made a couple of mistakes in how we built our technology that was going to build all these games," Gibeau said. "Fortunately, we have a very different approach to technology now with an engine called Frostbite“that's tailor-made for next-gen hardware. So we're in really good shape from a technology standpoint, which is where we had our misstep last time."

Gibeau went on to note that EA has a "much richer and broader" set of franchises that it plans to launch with the upcoming generation, another thing that was missing during the previous transition. Gibeau also revealed that EA has three to five new intellectual properties that will launch during the first 24 months of the next generation. None of these were revealed.

As for when next-generation consoles from Microsoft and Sony will arrive, Gibeau said these new platforms will debut in about a year's time. This estimate falls in line with analysts' belief that new consoles from these companies will arrive in 2013.

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