EA's Origin - Right move or epic fail for gamers?

[Kayden]

This is something that has been bugging me for a while now. I am sounding off on it because I want to hear some other opinions from a community that I have come to respect.

The view point I have is, I do not have problem with Origin directly but rather with they only want to sell digital titles exclusively with their service, this limits my choice of purchase for a digital copy. I do not have a problem with signing it with their service or using their service for my multiplayer, that isn't the problem. It's the freedom of choice, they want to push Steam out of the top spot by making their titles exclusive to their service and it's wrong.

I like Steam's service I can download what game I have purchased in the past at anytime with out any extra fee's unlike EA's previous attempts at online digital service. There were others that did this as well and fell apart because they nickle and dimmed every one to death and they could get a better deal elsewhere, they have no one to blame but themselves. I hate to think that this sort of situation might happen again, true I don't know if it will but it still is a risky proposition considering their track record.

Another question on my mind is how reliable will this new service be? I am not just wondering up time but download speeds and etc, I know for a fact that EA's servers have horrible upload speed and Steam has been reasonably reliable to provide excellent download speed for even new release titles. Now is EA going to bite the bullet and pony up the cash to make it possible for their new baby to able to run when these new games come out or are we going to see it crawl?

This is something only time will tell and not something I am for one sold on and willing to take a chance on. Unfortunately I will have to take a step backwards when it comes to BF3 and ME3 releases and get them through Amazon through DVD media to ensure I'm not getting bit by the EA snake here. I know it's too soon to tell, I will get a game on sale or something to try it out but right now that isn't an option considering my upgrade plans.

What does the TG community think, right move for EA or is this going to ruin gaming for PC gamers that enjoy EA titles?

 

[Rob Williams]

From a business perspective, EA's position on this makes total sense. On a consumer-level, though, it's not fair at all. Valve has worked hard to establish itself as the premier game distribution service, and as a result, millions of gamers call Steam home. So when a company like EA denies their latest title for Steam release, in lieu of providing it on their own service, it sucks. It's legal and fair, but it sucks.

In reading gaming sites and other forums, I've noticed an interesting trend with Steam. The number of people who are tied to it and own a lot of games through it, are beginning to write off other services entirely. I have read comments from people who stated that they simply do not purchase a game if it's not available through Steam. And it's no wonder, either. The only game I can recall in the past two or three years that I've played that hasn't been made available through Steam was StarCraft II.

The fact is, gamers are faithful to their Steam accounts like narcissists are to their Facebook.

The interesting thing, though, is that EA holding games back from a Steam launch is not new. With the exception of SHIFT 2, other recent Need for Speed games have not been launched on Steam at the official release date. With Hot Pursuit, it came about one month after-the-fact if I recall. This might play out the same way with Battlefield 3, but there's a major difference here. Need for Speed is not Battlefield 3.

With a game like Need for Speed, it might be easier for the non-diehard racing fans to ignore the fact that the game isn't on Steam and just get it when it is. But who's going to ignore the launch of Battlefield 3? Or Mass Effect 3 for that matter? It's for this reason that I agree with your concern. EA's strategy here is clear... to lure people over to Origin and begin building that platform up. Again, this is brilliant as a business decision, and best of all, legal.

If those who disliked Origin did not purchase BF3 at its launch, EA would be forced to sell it on Steam. But, obviously that's not going to happen. Where a game like BF3 (or Call of Duty) is concerned, I tend to let my hypocritical guard down and give in. Trying to Ignore the launch of such games is like going to the Playboy mansion and pretending that there isn't one hot woman per square meter of property.

Regardless, I lean towards the "epic fail" camp, because it's just a low-blow. EA's platform is not proven, and so far, I haven't found it to be reliable. I used the program briefly at its launch and found it clunky (and it was difficult to find my login information), and Jamie had an issue where once Alice was purchased, it took nearly a day for it to actually show up in his list. To be fair, that could have been a limited issue, but it's still a bizarre issue nonetheless.

Years and years ago, I don't think many people would have expected Steam to become what it has. We all used to be fine installing games off of a DVD and running them as normal. Today, who even keeps a game icon on their desktop? It's much easier to just run things straight through Steam. It's no surprise that EA nor other companies are too fond of it.

To be a realist though, EA isn't exactly 'wrong' here, either. By selling a game like BF3 as an exclusive through Origin, it's not doing anything wrong, morally or legally. The company is allowed to do it, and even with that implementation, it's not exactly setting any gamer back from playing. The only thing it does is force gamers to use a non-Steam platform, which, at the end of the day, isn't the end of the world.

I'm hoping that once the game does come to Steam, EA will allow people to port their games over. It could happen... a lot of other games have this ability.

I'd also like to say that this exclusivity spreads to other things as well. Whenever I load up a game that requires Games for Windows Live, I about have a seizure.