The new Electronic Arts building is a five-story office building built on a 1.8-acre parcel at the new Creative Village in downtown Orlando. The company is going to move its 700 employees to this $62 million, 180,000 square-foot facility. Creative Village is an urban innovation district near downtown Orlando that currently houses the UCF and Valencia college downtown campuses, new housing and retail options.
Forefront Architecture and Engineering assisted in the specialty engineering of the cold-formed steel design for the themed façade wall and the entire front of the building including: the roof, overhangs, and the 1st-floor exterior ceiling work.
Creative Village is a $1.5 billion development in downtown Orlando where UCF’s downtown campus opened in August. City leaders also want it to become a home for technology companies. Electronic Arts has been the highest-profile video game company in Central Florida since it acquired the small, 52-employee Tiburon studio in 1998 for an undisclosed sum. The California-based company builds its popular Madden NFL franchise and other games in Maitland.
EA Building 
EA Building
“Downtown [Orlando] is still a bit of blank slate in terms of what we can do,” said Daryl Holt, EA’s Orlando-based vice president and general manager. “And we can come in and be game-changing for this area. And it will be game-changing for us …. We will make great games and continue to innovate and hopefully bring in other companies.”
He said the company would continue to grow and add more staff before the move downtown. Holt made the comments after the mayor’s annual “state of the downtown” speech that was held on the unfinished 11th floor of the Seaside Plaza highrise building off Church Street. The event was attended by about 400 people, including politicians, business people, city officials and community leaders. Dyer touted the growth of downtown Orlando over the past five years. He pointed out how the large room was surrounded by windows that offered an open view of the city’s burgeoning downtown.
