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Gamers love oppositions. PC versus console. Mario vs Sonic. Dude from Modern Warfare 3 vs Other Guy from Battlefield 3. And so on. So when gamers spotted EA lumbering toward the digital arena and even throwing around some fightin' words, they assumed things were about to get ugly. Bets were placed, dukes were put up, and... nope. According to EA's David DeMartini, it's all just a big misunderstanding. We're still keeping your bet money, though.
"Obviously when a big publisher comes up with their own application and launches a site where you can buy games directly, people immediately jump to the conclusion that means they're going to exclude everyone else," DeMartini told Gamasutra.
“We believe in absolute freedom of choice to allow customers to buy through whatever retail outlet... as long as they're buying an EA game, we're delighted," he countered. "We feel like if you buy the product with Origin, where we're going on a long-term basis is we'll integrate some of the Origin feature set into many of our highest-profile IP... but by all means if your preferred retailer is Best Buy or Direct2Drive or Impulse or Steam or Amazon... we're going to make our product available to you."
And, contrary to popular belief, Origin was absolutely not working the smoke and mirrors behind the recent Crysis 2 Steam disappearing act. DeMartini explained:
"Crysis was taken down because the DLC was not available through Steam; it was available through [Direct2Drive]. That would, I guess, be a situation where two partners didn't see eye to eye, and by their choice, they were going to take that product down because they were insisting that the DLC be available through Steam."
He concluded, then, by reiterating EA's newfound hands-on approach to digital distribution, noting that it's now EA's way or the highway. So far, of course, there hasn't been a problem, but DeMartini's prepared to hold his ground if, say, EA and Valve don't see eye-to-eye on Origin integration. That said:
"I am absolutely not at this point saying, 'hey, it's Origin versus Steam.' It's never been about that."
Seems like that's pretty much that. So, anybody have any other videogame oppositions for us to verbally assault each other over? We're all in agreement about the whole PC-console issue, after all, and – last we checked – Mario and Sonic were, er, fist-bumping outside the Olympics. How about beards (Gordon Freeman vs Everyone Else)? Or best keyboard-cleaning product? Please! We're desperate!
Comments are closed on this article
joeyjr
July 08, 2011 at 12:40pm
If I go to an online or to local retailer I can buy any game I want in a box. Why should digital distrobution be any different? Except from, say gamestop, it seems they favor consolds, but could order one. Steam has grown so much now, why should it matter. I see a class-action law suite brewing, because everyone is sue happy these days. Guess nobody cares because we are buying them tax free. come on people fix this,
PawBear
July 07, 2011 at 6:06am
Profit is always the priority; Steam, Origin, GFW, no diference. I do wish, however, that they would consider customer experience as well. Steam is convenient but definitely has limits and is designed for sales. EA creates limits of its own. It'd be nice if I could play downloaded games without an internet check first, or a permanent connection!
Competition is great but it's also going to increase the purchase complexities. I'm already finding it difficult to compare price and package details. Now I'm also going to try to remember who I've purchased from.
Steam at least provides a consistent front end for gaming. So does GFW. Unfortunately nothing is compatible. I'm going to spend more time administering my games than playing them. I think if anything is going damage pc gaming, it's this.
Perhaps someone's got a better way to keep track of all this?
legacy2013
July 07, 2011 at 5:55am
It's already been stated that The Old Republic (BioWare's new Star Wars MMO) will be available for download exclusively on Origin. I personally don't mind, but don't go saying your giving people options on where to download stuff if your not going to.
Morete
July 07, 2011 at 4:46am
I agree with Holly Golightly on the Steam part and I agree wtih ShockerX, Vegan and Cocallahan on the EA part. Developers need to go with inhouse publishing, not vice-versa. Developers need to make the Rules AND the Money and quit being kowtowed by these glorified marketing pigs. Many Indie developers publish their own work so I believe it can be done on a large scale.
ShockerX
July 07, 2011 at 1:48am
EA is a known company that is greedy and not handling their game series well (except a few titles, like BC 2, ME series). Not only that, didn't I mention they are greedy? Oh, I did, but I need to tell you that about 100 more times until people get the point. I am still very bitter on how they handle Command And Conquer series and I miss Westwood Studios (EA bought them, then rips them apart :( ).
There are sales for EA games, but not that great, mostly under 40-50%, except for Sim3, but who cares about that? :(
Now compare that with Valve, that often sell their products at great prices over 80% discount, especially pre-purchase deals and package deals (EA have not done any good pre-purchase sale if I recall). And not once I believe, Valve product went over $50
So question is, which company serves customers better and more trustworthy? Again, no brainer, its Valve. I may be a valve/steam fanboy, but reputations, services, and history with customers tells me otherwise.
Vegan
July 07, 2011 at 1:05am
If it's not about Steam vs Origin, why is EA barely participating in the Steam Summer Sale this year? Tons of high-profile titles not discounted AT ALL when customarily everything is.
Holly Golightly
July 07, 2011 at 1:04am
Wow! People need to see competition as a good thing. When Origin was introduced, I, as a gamer, was completely happy. It means lower prices for me, and better choices.
The problem is, the Steam fanboys are a bunch of cry babies. Crying foul at the slightest of changes that does not work with Steam. It was Steam's fault that Crysis 2 was removed. Oh no, it has to be EAs fault, because Valve's Steam would never do something so evil.
With that said, I have noticed that Steam fans hate every competition that is not to their liking. They hate Games For Windows (Live) and they hate Origins, and I am pretty sure they hate retailers too. It is like if it is Steam's way or the highway... Which ideally makes them worst than iFanboys. I feel that iFans are more tolerable than SteamLovers. I don't know.
What I like about Origin is that I am free to play the game without running the client. I can't say that about Steam, which requires you to run the client each and every single time of your life, just to play a game that you legally purchased from Steam. No thanks Valve, my games are mine, and I want to play without having to run some annoying client that tries to sell me Dude-Bro games for cheap. I just want to play my games. This is where Origins works best, and I am proud to use it.
Anyhow, David DeMartini is absolutely correct though. It was all a big understanding. We can now all relax people. Anyhow, Direct2Drive is having a huge 31 day sale of up to 75% off... This to me is good news because competition works lovely. You can bet the other competitors are now working a new deal as well. Keep your head up.
bling581
July 07, 2011 at 9:44am
"Games For Windows (Live)"
You don't have to be a Steam user to know that it just sucks, period!
Ghok
July 07, 2011 at 9:07am
"Anyhow, Direct2Drive is having a huge 31 day sale of up to 75% off... This to me is good news because competition works lovely. You can bet the other competitors are now working a new deal as well. Keep your head up."
Uhh, maybe you should visit the Steam site....
Anyway,
The reason I hate GFW is because it's a horrible service that doesn't work nearly as well as Steam. It's also really redundant when working in conjunction with Steam.
"It was Steam's fault that Crysis 2 was removed. Oh no, it has to be EAs fault, because Valve's Steam would never do something so evil."
Are you trying to say EA has a better track record than Valve in pleasing PC gamers? Do you really blame people for being suspicious of EA?
Furthermore, it IS EA's fault here.
LOOK at the article above.
“We believe in absolute freedom of choice to allow customers to buy through whatever retail outlet... as long as they're buying an EA game, we're delighted," he countered. "We feel like if you buy the product with Origin, where we're going on a long-term basis is we'll integrate some of the Origin feature set into many of our highest-profile IP... but by all means if your preferred retailer is Best Buy or Direct2Drive or Impulse or Steam or Amazon... we're going to make our product available to you."
And, contrary to popular belief, Origin was absolutely not working the smoke and mirrors behind the recent Crysis 2 Steam disappearing act. DeMartini explained:
"Crysis was taken down because the DLC was not available through Steam; it was available through [Direct2Drive]. That would, I guess, be a situation where two partners didn't see eye to eye, and by their choice, they were going to take that product down because they were insisting that the DLC be available through Steam."
If I'm correctly understanding what this guy is saying (I may not, because I don't play Crysis). They gave D2D some exclusive DLC. Which means anyone who bought the game on Steam can't download it. It's great to have this competition you always speak of, but I prefer my competition on a level playing field. I fully back Valve on this because this is the type of crap that hurts the industry. True beneficial competition would be letting us pick our client, with the same games available everywhere.
I used to love to buy games at a retail location, by the way. Before all you were picking up was a box, a case, and a DVD. Maybe a few pieces of paper trying to sell you something else. I used to have stacks of discs back when you'd get a real manual and extra items. That's not the case anymore, so I'm better just downloading it.
The biggest problem you have with Steam is what I think is its greatest strength. All my games, in one place, from one client. Accessible from every computer. Cheap prices. Effective DRM, Automatic updates. If you're not looking for a service like that, I understand that. I generally don't like services like that because they tend to be bundled in with other things I don't like. Steam is just really good at what it does. We want different things, and that's okay.
I have heard of cases where people have bought a game at a B&M store and had to install and activate Steam to get it to play. I do think that's bullshit, and obviously if I were to buy a game that way, I'd be pretty pissed off I now had to run another program to play the game.
I'd just not be in that category because I like the Steam service.
Perhaps the lesson here is people don't like to be FORCED to use ANYTHING. I wouldn't mind GFW nearly so much if it didn't pop up unexpectedly when starting a game for the first time, then required me to update the game, then update GFW, then restart my computer... etc. etc. when I'm already all logged in to Steam. If EA just wants to sell games, give people the choice to use Origin, sure, but make sure your games work well without it on Steam.
someuid
July 07, 2011 at 7:15am
I disagree that what we are seeing here is competition. Competition is walking into Walmart or Safeway or Wegmans or Albertsons or Piggly Wiggly and buying which ever box of cereal I want at the price I'm willing to pay. I can then go to any other store to buy milk and mix the two.
What we are seeing in the digital video game marketplace is vender lock-in. Game companies are trying to lock everyone into their market place and force you to buy on their rules and terms and conditions.
Steam requires you to have their client running.
Origin won't let you re-download a game after, what was it, 1 year.
Gamestop says they are the only place for exclusive content and you have to pre-order.
If the grocery store ran food stuffs like the video game companies are running their digital sales, you would only be able to put Great Value (Walmart) milk on Kellogg's cereal. Piggly Wiggle would force you to buy milk with your cereal, whether you wanted it or not. Wegmans would only guarantee you hormone free milk if you buy cereal from them as well.
Another user commented we're going to be spending more time administering our games rather than playing them. He/she is right. We're going to be spending more time tracking what exclusive content we got, which game client has to run, and which games we'll have to keep the install files backed up thrise since we can't download them anymore.
It is turning into a junk of a problem. I'm going to hedge my bets and stick with Steam for now because I'm already vested in them and their store is more than just their big IP games. Running their client is no harder than keeping a firewall or antivirus or Dropbox running as well. I don't have to worry about my games because I can always download them again. Steam makes it very easy to backup my games folder to an external drive for workstation refreshes.
Origin has, what 124 games? Pht. Whatever Mr. EA. You're not even trying to beat Steam. You're just locking up your IP behind your store to charge FAT $$$.
0ly1r3m@1ns
July 07, 2011 at 5:00am
your wrong i used GFWL and it was terrible and half my games where a pain to get them to work and origine it has potential but i know ea and they will do some thing to fuck it up il give it a chance but knowing ea its going to be GFWL all over again
ShockerX
July 07, 2011 at 1:49am
While I respect your opinion my good sir, but it appears that you don't know EA very well. If it was microsoft competing for digital service, I'll go for it without question if its much better and improved service to succeed GFWL. EA actually have a digital service, but it was beyond terrible, and there were ownership limitations. But then again, you didn't know that.
Its EA and you don't seem to know anything about them ... Oh I already said that, sorry.
Holly Golightly
July 07, 2011 at 1:54am
Oh goodness gracious... A person who not only repeats himself, but actually gets the gender all wrong too. I am dealing with Grade A moron here! Please tell me you are in character here... Everyone knows that EA's service does not require you to run it while you are playing a game. Sigh, Steam fans, what did I tell you?
Ghok
July 08, 2011 at 1:56pm
What did you tell me?
Holly, you were the first person to post to this article, in your post you generalized Steam users and insulted them.
And when your wacky arguments are countered and the response isn't civil, you take that as evidence your generalizations are correct?
Try again.
Holly Golightly
July 08, 2011 at 3:10pm
Umm, I did not say anything to you. I was insulting the idiot who can not tell the difference between a man and a woman.
cocallahan
July 07, 2011 at 3:46am
For the record you may have guessed his/her gender wrong as well. In his/her defense, just because your avatar looks like a girl and your name sounds like a girl, doesn't necesarily mean you are.
To be on topic, I'm not necesarily Anti-Origin but I highly doubt I'll buy anything from it. At this point Steam has provided me with so many great games at such a significant savings (not to mention a community of people to play those games with) that I'm just brand loyal. I suppose that could make me a fanboy and I'm ok with that.
As for it not being Origin vs Steam, that's just BS. Of course it is. It's silly to imply it's not. There's no point in Origin existing if it's purpose isn't to make EA more money selling games on their own platform than selling it on Valve's.
I guess we'll see if EA means what they say when the Star Wars MMO comes out. I'm willing to bet it's Origin exclusive for digital distribution or will have a significantly better bonus package for purchase on Origin. If not, kudos to them.
I do have to say though that GFWL sucks. If your "ZOMG I hate Steam Fanboys" Fangirlism can't see that you need help. A ton of it.
