Blogs Why We Need Origin

And yours is thought provoking I suppose? I thought it's just another pro EA site, sorry my fault really.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0POAnWAmV0w it would seem that even those who have a strong voice distastes Battlelog. And BFBC2 might have been glitchy, BF2, 2142, and 1942 all havee amazing browsers.

Everything should be done to better suit the current market.

 

You know the only issue i have with battle log is that because the game is not open / launched yet i feel i would 'lose' my space after i click join on server and by the time the game is loaded it will say 'server full'. But I have NEVER once had that happen!

Battlelog works and it works better than the BC2 in game server browser, cause I can actually add friends no problem and vice versa (had big issues in BC2), also means I can browse a favourite server without loading the game to find out its full - or offline.

People need to get over that its different. It works.

 

It can only be competition if EA is selling the same games as steam, therefore creating a "price war" which is great for consumers. What we will have instead is a need for 2 separate programs. To be a rival of steam, Origin must sell the same games. I agree that competition is great, but what EA is doing is not creating competition, it is creating an add-on that people will have to get if they want to play new EA releases.

 

Other online distribution systems except Steam don't sell BF3 ? It comes down to a disagreement between Valve and EA what a Steam distributed app can and cannot have - in my opinion Valve in this case wants more than it can get from EA.

 

EA actually need to have the system up and running and be able to show it works before they can hope to convince other publishers to sell games through Origin. You can't expect them to have a comparable catalogue to Steam at this point in time, it's simply not feasible for that to be the case.

 

Man f ORGIN! STEAM all the waay! Will not but BF3 if this keeps up.

 

Well sure - but what Steam's doing at the moment is saying that if you want to have DLC in your game, you must sell the DLC through Steam or not use Steam at all - which is forcing developers to use Steam. Competition is good.

 

Nobody should agree with an EULA like that. Steam does however have a clause which seems similar (section 7 of the Steam EULA) stating:

"Subject to the Valve privacy policy referenced in Section 1 above, as applicable, you expressly grant Valve the complete and irrevocable right to use, reproduce, modify, create derivative works from, distribute, transmit, broadcast, and otherwise communicate, and publicly display and perform the User Generated Information and derivative works thereof in any form, anywhere, with or without attribution to you, and without any notice or compensation to you of any kind."

Hmm...I'd suggest your comments about EA could apply to Valve also - they've disabled thousands of Steam accounts (resulting in owners losing access to all Steam games) and have as much incentive (and more opportunity given their larger userbase) to exploit their T&C's.

Good point about EA having a UK presence and therefore subject to UK/EU legislation. Whatever EA call their product ("licence", "entitlement", whatever) it is still either a good or a service and subject to the Sale and Supply of Goods Act 1994.

With Valve, your options in the event of a dispute are to request a chargeback on your credit card (if you paid using CC and this will result in an account ban if it isn't already) or hire a US lawyer to seek compensation in a Washington court (likely to be an expensive option, win or lose, for European consumers).

Section C2 of the Steam EULA states that Valve might provide DRM-free copies at their discretion - no obligation though:

"In the case of a one-time purchase of a product license (e.g., purchase of a single game) from Valve, Valve may choose to terminate or cancel your Subscription in its entirety or may terminate or cancel only a portion of the Subscription (e.g., access to the software via Steam) and Valve may, but is not obligated to, provide access (for a limited period of time) to the download of a stand-alone version of the software and content associated with such one-time purchas"

Backups would be of no use unless Steam was prepared to validate them (due to their activate-on-play DRM), i.e. if the servers shut down, all Steam users would lose access to all their Steam games.

The article is half-right in saying that Steam needs competition - but another DRM-strangled consumer-hostile product-limited and overpriced service like Origin isn't likely to be the solution.

 

The dispute from what I understand was entirely over add-on content, and where to get it. Valve I believe made it mandatory all add-on content has to be sold through Steam if the main copy of the game was sold on Steam.

 

Steam will always have at least one competitor: piracy. Even if Steam was to get a monopoly on the market AND start abusing it by bloating prices artificially or something, I think many potential customers would then just opt for pirating their games - or simply not get them at all.

Still, I'm not saying that Origin can't be good for the market.

 

I'll probably never buy games direct from EA because of the max prices they ask for, same with most games on steam on day 1, I just go wherever it's cheapest & it's always cheapest at retail from online stores other than when steam or origin have nice sales, just some games like ubisoft & other publishers games I prefer to get digital because I don't think you can input the cd key to get the digi version from any service so the more game publishers use steamworks the better I say .

 

Thats the weirdest way of looking at it ive ever seen

What influences pricing mainly is costs and demand (irrelevent in this case).
The costs between EA selling a game to a physical store, shipping/transportation, storage/rent, and store taking a profit on the sale, versus an online DD store, bandwidth & general hosting costs. Its vastly cheaper for EA to sell it via digital means, and cut out your Amazons, Tescos, GAME etc who buy at say £15 to sell to you at £25. EA could probably sell it at £16 and make the same profit.
So theoretically EA could sell to retailers at £15, by their DD at £16, but instead as we know they charge way more, the RRP, say £30, and it becomes the more expensive option despite it being more profitable for them at say £20, and makes it the cheapest place to buy.

The ACTUAL reason why EA, Steam or any other DD company dont give you the product at the £16/£20 price and make a good profit while making themselves the cheapest and most attractive option for customers is simple. Those physical stores would turn their backs on them.
If BF3 was sold for £25, becoming the cheapest option for customers, nobody would buy it from the high street or online stores. If they know they'll get undercut by the distributer they wont stock the product, why would they? Sink hundreds of thousands of pounds into stock for something they'll get killed on? no chance.
You shaft a retailer, or all retailers, and they'll happilly close the door on you.
Thats the reason why Steam & Origin are a complete rip-off, they're not doing it because of greed, and its got nothing to do with paying a premium for the convenience (Heck, its cheaper to have GAME post an new games to you then go buy in-store!), they're doing it because otherwise nobody would purchase these games from them and put them on their shelves, advertise their release, and thats where their money comes from, DD may be becoming a big market, but its still nothing compared to buying physical goods and that will take a long time to change.
Its a great deal for the likes of Origin & Steam though, they get to charge £40 a pop, and people are still stupid enough to go to them and hand over their money, despite there being places 20-30% cheaper.

Most companies sell to distributers/shops with the agreement that if they sell themselves, it must be at the RRP. Otherwise, whats to stop them undercutting?

 

With Steam (in the UK at least), you are pretty much guaranteed that within a couple of months of release you will see most games at a ridiculously discounted price (easter, summer, thanksgiving, xmas usally).

Perhaps if you want to buy a game in the first week of release you might pay £29.99 on steam rather than ~£26 on Amazon, but whats a few quid when you can be playing within a matter of minutes?

Not to mention the fact that as PC gamers surely all of us should worship the ground Valve walk on, for bringing us some of the greatest games of all time!

 

This x1000. So far it's looking like EA will be the only ones selling BC3, and it'll cost an arm, and Valve will be the only ones selling Half-Life 3, and it'll cost a leg. This is not a step forwards from retail shops, it's a step backwards.

 

Once again. Everybody except Steam sells BF3.

 

After what EA has done to PC Gaming over the last couple years I heavily doubt EA is the right Company to compete against Steam.

 

You know that is true that Portal 2 wasn't that cheap a game at £30, but it was still £10-£20 cheaper than high street games and other AAA titles, and it is the first to drop in price and go on sale a lot quicker than other such titles. Valve know how to play the system

Precisely, too much moaning when i just went and purchased from amazon for £30- £10 cheaper than origin! (and a £15 amazon voucher....can't pass that up!)

 

The standard price for PC games is £30.

 

Well portal is bang on the money, so why is BF3 so expensive from origin?? and COD MW3 £40?

Thats the kind of AAA games i'm talking about, those that demand a premium. Portal 2 was undervalued otherwise.