After a prolonged wait, we are proud to finally bring you the first installment of 10 Questions. Back in January we received numerous questions for EA's CEO John Riccitiello and we passed on some of the more interesting ones.

We apologize if your question was not included, but it is called 10 Questions after all, so we can't include everyone's questions. Thanks to all who participated, and please stay tuned for our next invitation to submit questions for our next industry luminary (to be determined soon).

Without further ado, here is the Q&A:

1. What was your biggest professional mistake that you have ever made and what did you learn from it?

JR: I've made a few. My biggest mistake was probably the premature launch of ea.com in 1999. What I learned from that one is that sometimes you need to change your direction – admit a mistake and make a change – even when it's your baby.

2. The recent delays for games like Spore and Army of Two highlight the pitfalls of trying to bring to market new IP. With the addition of BioWare-Pandemic, EA has added a huge studio that focuses heavily on these types of projects. Has this forced you to change how EA approaches the need to give these ideas time to grow and develop with the desire to stay on schedule and on budget?

JR: There's a growing awareness that games that aren't great just don't sell. Gamers do a lot of research and demand the very best experiences for their money – they won't buy a mediocre game. Rushing a game out the door before it's polished isn't fair to the consumer or to the teams that make the games. But delaying a game to invest for quality can, at times, be just an excuse for bad planning. We all need to build in time for polish when we plan our games.

This isn't necessarily a new approach, but there is a clear recognition that new games (and great sequels) need time to develop properly. The games that we held back last year could have shipped, but doing that would have pissed off the consumer. And pissing off consumers is a very risky business proposition. You only get to do it once before they abandon the franchise.

Rushing an incomplete game into the market is just bad business.

3. What are your favorite hobbies outside of work with what little free time you have?

JR: I spend a lot of time with my family – we travel, ski, mountain bike, play tennis and hang out at the beach. I like to read. And, of course, I also play a lot of games.

4. Why does EA insist on hiring such a large number of contractors as opposed to employees? Wouldn't hiring people on fulltime in effect give them more motivation and incentive to go the extra mile to see the project succeed as opposed to somebody who knows that they are only going to be on the project for say 3- 6 months?

JR: Better check your facts. EA is the world's largest studio operation. We've got more permanent full-time developers on the payroll than any other company. We actually employ more creative people than any film studio in Hollywood. We also hire contractors – that's just a reality of the business today. But we're looking all over the world for talented people, and we pride ourselves on how people learn, grow and develop their careers at EA.

5. Is EA looking to leverage past games into current franchises; games like Strike Series, Alpha Centauri, Wing Commander, Mutant League Football, Road Rash, etc.?

JR: We think about those franchises a lot. Road Rash is one that keeps coming up in brainstorming sessions. EA has created so many great titles, it's tough to keep up with them all. I wish we could make those games but the truth is that there are more good ideas in this industry than there are skilled, experienced people to turn them into games.

6. Would EA be willing to collaborate with Sega on a Daytona USA game, since former Sega of America head Peter Moore is with EA now, and EA owns the Daytona USA license?

JR: That would be Peter's call, as President of EA SPORTS. Peter is a great addition to EA, and we're glad to have him. He's got a ton of ideas for expanding EA SPORTS – you'll be hearing about those soon.

7. Asia has been swept by a wave of free-to-play MMOGs, built around the in-game advertisement and real-money item shop based business model. This model has not quite infiltrated the Western market; do you think there is a future for non-subscription based games in this region? Why, or why not?

JR: Our DICE Studio in Stockholm has got a great game that is going to test that theory. Battlefield Heroes is a free-to-play, but the user pays for items in the game. It's an easy-access game that we think is going to have a lot of appeal in Western markets.

8. With the recent Activision / Blizzard merger, what is EA's plan to stay on top of the industry, especially in the robust Asian market?

JR: We've got a solid plan for growing our core business and expanding into online, Asia, casual and mobile. We're trusting our creative teams with more freedom and encouraging them to try new concepts. Regardless of the competitive landscape, I'm really excited about the growth potential at EA. We do consider acquisitions that fit our criteria, but not in response to Vivendi's investment in Activision.

9. What are the top three challenges the video game industry as a whole faces in the future?

JR: I'd like to highlight two. Challenge #1 is finding the best talent in the industry to make great games. Challenge #2 is the rising cost to make these games.

10. Do you foresee advertisers running ads in games becoming a new boom for the video game industry?

JR: We're already seeing dynamic, in-game advertising in the form of billboards and other unobtrusive formats that run in the game. There were some concerns when in-game ads first debuted, but it seems like most people don't think they detract from the experience.

I expect that someone is going to step over the line and get clobbered by irate gamers. But in the meantime, I think you're going to see in-game advertising grow quietly.