For once its nice to see someone talking about the problems origin has without just being a valve fanboy. Origin could be really good if EA were willing to listen to points like this when they were made
Dear Origin, You Stink
- Thread starter Shamus Young
- Start date
I might've gotten Battlefield 3 if it wasn't locked to Origin. I would've got TOR. I would buy ME3. But my reflexive response to someone trying to strongarm me into something lies rather closer to Yol Toor Shul than meek acceptance. EA, you think you can make me get your platform by preventing me from getting your titles elsewhere? Sorry. I'm sure there's other games I can find to entertain me.
(Evochron Mercenary? Ooh, what's this?)
(Evochron Mercenary? Ooh, what's this?)
Bingo. EA isn't just criminally evil, they're stupid evil.
When you've created a huge subset of gamers that are MORALLY AGAINST BUYING YOUR PRODUCTS, you have done something horribly wrong. Origin is not a system anyone wants to use, it's a system they're forcing on us to make more money. It's all set up in the desperate hope that their customers don't know what Steam is. It's already set up for failure.
I can't by any good conscious buy ME3. Every single EA product I have bought in the last 5 years has made me physically ill with regret due to all the bull**** they keep putting me through; from abusive DLC, to ridiculous codes, to horribly buggy games, to overpriced PC titles, etc, etc. And they want me to trust them with my credit card? I can't trust them to release a complete game.
It hurts because they could actually be making much more money, they wouldn't even have to advertise quite as hard if they actually gave a damn about the people keeping them in business. People buy from their developers despite EA, not because of them.
When you've created a huge subset of gamers that are MORALLY AGAINST BUYING YOUR PRODUCTS, you have done something horribly wrong. Origin is not a system anyone wants to use, it's a system they're forcing on us to make more money. It's all set up in the desperate hope that their customers don't know what Steam is. It's already set up for failure.
I can't by any good conscious buy ME3. Every single EA product I have bought in the last 5 years has made me physically ill with regret due to all the bull**** they keep putting me through; from abusive DLC, to ridiculous codes, to horribly buggy games, to overpriced PC titles, etc, etc. And they want me to trust them with my credit card? I can't trust them to release a complete game.
It hurts because they could actually be making much more money, they wouldn't even have to advertise quite as hard if they actually gave a damn about the people keeping them in business. People buy from their developers despite EA, not because of them.
You know I was browsing XBox Marketplace thinking the same thing as you said with Origin Shamus - I saw Oblivion, downloadable without any expansions for £20, when you can buy it for about £5 now, what a rip! I even exclaimed myself that it's dumb, they don't have to pay to burn a new DVD or buy a new box to put it in, do these developers think we're dumb? (On second thought, don't answer that)
The thing is, if Origin proves successful for whatever reason, it'll probably encourage more people to pull their franchises from Steam to do something on their own as well (pulling in people with exclusive sequels - UbiSoft could do that very well), complicating things for the customer unless they move to something like xFire and offering questionable innovations by competition if they do it like EA/Origin.
I'm all for more competition to keep the gears turning, but it doesn't work if you create small monopolies on titles to draw customers in instead of providing a better service.
I'm all for more competition to keep the gears turning, but it doesn't work if you create small monopolies on titles to draw customers in instead of providing a better service.
It seems most of the issues people have with Origin is that it's not Steam and is competing with it. I use Origin and have had absolutely no trouble at all. The privacy issue ain't pretty though ...
Edit: also, note that you can buy games from other distributors besides Origin (just not Steam), so unless your definition of monopoly is having to have Origin installed they certainly don't have one. That is just what Steam does btw.
Edit: also, note that you can buy games from other distributors besides Origin (just not Steam), so unless your definition of monopoly is having to have Origin installed they certainly don't have one. That is just what Steam does btw.
You know you can redeem the key's you have bought in steam in origin ? At least that's what I did.Shamus Young said:
Don't know of it still works but that's how i got ME2 and DA2 on origin.
Thank you for articulating something I could not. I have always been a BioWare fan, having played everything (multiple times) from Baldur's Gate to ME2 and DA2. The simple fact I cannot now own ME3 on Steam, alongside 1 & 2 is frustrating beyond measure. I want to play it, I want to buy it, I want to get all the pre-order goodies, I don't give a damn about selling it on used and I don't want Origin.Shamus Young said:
EA because of their business strategy (and for having the downright cheek to say "it's valve's fault" when not one person alive buy's that garbage line) are actually preventing me from playing it. I may just get the 360 version (although I'm sad I don't have an ME2 Shep to import) or I may try to find an Origin-free version online, or I may buy a physical copy and hope it doesn't require origin, and if it does, "tweak" it so it doesn't.
Great post, shame it's a little late, but well argued. I'm in that unfortunate position of absolutely loving BF3 but being compeletely unable to recommend it because of Origin - I had to download 24Gb of data all told trying to get BF3 working, and I had the freaking disk.Shamus Young said:
Not impressed.
All your points about price are moot. Steam is the most expensive place to buy games. £40 for Arkham City? Fuck that it was under £30 the day it came out at retail. £29.99 for Portal 2? Fuck that it was £25 from online retailers. The only time it's worth buying games on Steam is if you're desperate enough to spend an extra £5-10 or its on sale. Even then when the newer releases go on sale its either cheaper to buy it from a store/online retailer or the same price.
Also at least Origin lets you install your games to different hard drives, as for DLC I don't see what problem is. I installed Karkand fine, the game just updated itself with the DLC.
I think people just hate on Origin because its the trendy thing to do, Steam is still full of faults and the customer service is abysmal, it takes well over a week to get a response (This is from experience, I've raised 3 tickets total each one took over a week to get a first response). You hear horror stories about EA's live support but I've never had a problem with it, and at least you get to talk to someone within 30 minutes instead of waiting ages for a reply.
Also at least Origin lets you install your games to different hard drives, as for DLC I don't see what problem is. I installed Karkand fine, the game just updated itself with the DLC.
I think people just hate on Origin because its the trendy thing to do, Steam is still full of faults and the customer service is abysmal, it takes well over a week to get a response (This is from experience, I've raised 3 tickets total each one took over a week to get a first response). You hear horror stories about EA's live support but I've never had a problem with it, and at least you get to talk to someone within 30 minutes instead of waiting ages for a reply.
Origin wasn't downloading the game from the internet, it was taking it off the disk. I was really annoyed as I thought it was downloading it myself, so took the disk out and it stopped, could of done with something to say its reading the data from the disk not downloading it.Wicky_42 said:
I had the miss fortune of helping my cousin with installing Fifa 12. It was a mess. He knows a basic thing or 2 about computers, but he could not get fifa 12 installed.
Technical aside, I'm completely behind the point that's made in the post. I'm a heavy steam user with a 100+ games in my library. Why should I even think about switching to Origin. Only because I can play one game, which being Mass Effect 3? That's not worth all the effort of switching or even installing it for that part.
I'm very much looking forward to playing Mass Effect 3, but origin makes me think twice. I don't know if I want to deal with this, knowing that there's a platform which just works very well.
EA, fix origin or Mass Effect 3 on pc will have a very hard time. Just like Fifa 12 and Battlefield 3.
Technical aside, I'm completely behind the point that's made in the post. I'm a heavy steam user with a 100+ games in my library. Why should I even think about switching to Origin. Only because I can play one game, which being Mass Effect 3? That's not worth all the effort of switching or even installing it for that part.
I'm very much looking forward to playing Mass Effect 3, but origin makes me think twice. I don't know if I want to deal with this, knowing that there's a platform which just works very well.
EA, fix origin or Mass Effect 3 on pc will have a very hard time. Just like Fifa 12 and Battlefield 3.
I liked that final part about Mass Effect.
For instance, I hold Mass Effect (1) - Steam, Mass Effect 2 - Disk ... IF I'd now also buy ME3, I'd go straight for three different means, as - since I'd be forced to use Origin anyway - I'd buy it via Origin.
Now, I refuse to use Origin. Due to your points, as well as the parts you mentioned in the intro: It's simply not worth it, when this service is an intrusive, bugged pile of ... yeh ... And trying to compete with an already established service - one I already use.
However, there is this one important point: There are means to avoid the data collection (legal means, actually ... You can demand a change to the service designed specifically for you, in regards to such a thing. It doesn't mean they have to agree, but it's at least an option. And of course there are other means, such as effectively blocking Origin's access to certain files - either via external hard drives you simply don't connect, or whatever. Thing is: it's possible.)
So, with that piece'o'cake solution of giving anyone with valid copies (which EA always managed to collect through serials and whatnot) their digital counterparts on Origin, I might even bother working with such a solution, and at some point even accept their service, once they improved to a certain point.
For instance, I hold Mass Effect (1) - Steam, Mass Effect 2 - Disk ... IF I'd now also buy ME3, I'd go straight for three different means, as - since I'd be forced to use Origin anyway - I'd buy it via Origin.
Now, I refuse to use Origin. Due to your points, as well as the parts you mentioned in the intro: It's simply not worth it, when this service is an intrusive, bugged pile of ... yeh ... And trying to compete with an already established service - one I already use.
However, there is this one important point: There are means to avoid the data collection (legal means, actually ... You can demand a change to the service designed specifically for you, in regards to such a thing. It doesn't mean they have to agree, but it's at least an option. And of course there are other means, such as effectively blocking Origin's access to certain files - either via external hard drives you simply don't connect, or whatever. Thing is: it's possible.)
So, with that piece'o'cake solution of giving anyone with valid copies (which EA always managed to collect through serials and whatnot) their digital counterparts on Origin, I might even bother working with such a solution, and at some point even accept their service, once they improved to a certain point.
But Origin has nothing to do with what you got a problem with. It's how Battlefield 3 plays with Battlelog. Origin just launches the game for you. Do you have a hard time telling the two apart?SovietX said:
Also you don't alt tab to change server, you just quit and find a new server. This is also not a Origin feature.
With Battlelog the whole part about finding servers have been so much easier and faster at the same time that I want Battlelog in all of my Battlefield games from now on.
As for the article. You claim it handles DLC badly while you have never tried it. I bought limited edition of BF3 and I got those codes with me. Put them in and it was done. The B2K DLC was downloaded in a patch and I could play it on launch when it came out.
So what part of it is hard? As I can't really find any.
The spying part is also quite laughable now. How many people have you seen gotten into trouble or publicly framed by EA for doing something from the information they've gathered? Not a single case.
So that whole paranoid part about being spied upon and getting fed with spam and such was and still is harmless.
You also claim Origin is clunky. How? Buttons works nice and quickly. The Origin Overlay works just fine as well. I doubt I will get any sort of answer on this because I've seen people trash other things and when you ask for proof they kinda just forget about it.
All I really see is people hating it because it's made by EA. Because it seems to be popular to hate EA and everyone has to do it.
This article just made everyone realize how much they loves their steam account. And the impulse buy thing is spot on. An impulse buy got me Terraria for $2.50 before Steam noticed the mistake and raised it to $5. It has allowed me to try franchises I would have normally passed on, for example MASS EFFECT! Yes, reading about the game I was never convinced it was for me, then a Steam sale had it for dirt cheap and I said hell i'll give it a try for that price. I then proceeded to buy the collector's edition of the second one and will do the same with the third one. EA owes Steam a big thank you for that because i'm sure om not the only one that did that.
But isn't that another huge failing? The vast majority of MMOs are done purely digital these days. When you give the option of dealing with Origin and all which Origin use entails, or running out to buy the box, as little an inconvenience that it is, it's enough for people who are only passively interested to say "screw it" and spend their MMO dollars elsewhere. And really, releasing a full price MMO with a monthly sub in a world were nearly every other MMO has gone F2P in some capacity was a bad idea at best. They don't even have a few day free trial available to help entice those on the other side of the fence.ash-brewster said: