EA Confirms No Battlefield 3 on Steam

[getoffmycloud]

I'm just hoping EA don't pull more of their games off Steam and other publishers don't follow suit in creating their own digital distribution platforms. I suppose with time Battle.net will become the Activision equivalent, but I can't help but feeling that we consumers will be the worse off for all these pointless quarrels.

Really? Doesn't competition tend to benefit the customer?

OT: Eh, I was going to get a physical copy anyway, or I'd just get it xbox.

But if every publisher is gonna limit digital copies to only their service then that eliminates the competition entirely, since it means that the game is only gonna be available on one service that the publishers have full control over.

If EA wants to make Origin competitive with Steam, they should stop pulling games from Steam and in stead focus on making a good client that can compete on a purely qualitative basis. Forcing people to come to them in stead of making it beneficial but optional is going to achieve the opposite, it's gonna build animosity towards them and drive people away in stead.

The problem EA has is it seems to me that from the moment they announced origin a large number of steam users wont even give it the time of day even if it is good just because its EA so by forcing people to use it to get there games might make people removing the blinkers they all seem to be wearing and realise origin isn't that bad.

Or of course EA are telling the truth and this is Valve's fault I doubt this is true but if it was the reaction from Valve's fanboys would be fantastic in trying to defend that lol

 

[The Coop]

"Battlefield 3 will not be available on Steam as the service restricts our ability to directly support players," a rep said. "The service limits our ability to deliver patches and downloadable content directly to players. No other download service has adopted these practices. At EA, supporting our players is a top priority, and we are happy to partner with any download service that does not restrict our ability to connect directly with our own consumers."

OK, this might be a bit trollish, but... I laughed at the bolded part.

Yes, supporting players is EA's top priority. That's why the players have to go and finish fixing their games when EA stops making patches after a year or two... like with Command & Conquer: The First Decade and the long promised 1.03 patch, which didn't come about until the players created it.

 

[Macgyvercas]

Can we all just say "Fuck you, EA" enough to drive them out of business?

Sure... Just as soon as I get my copy of Mass Effect 3. Then I'll help you with taking out these giant lying douchebags.

Oh, yeah. Good point. But I though Mass Effect was BioWare?

 

[Alphakirby]

Now that it's not on Steam,I officially don't give a shit about it. Because I am not downloading EA's stupid ass attempt to trump Valve just to play a first person shooter.

Instead you should get EA's stupid ass attempt to trump Blizzard just to play an MMO. Like me.

OT: EA calling out Valve on making it harder to support customers? How come this is the first anyone's said about it? Seems to me everyone else's having no trouble about it. This stinks of marketing gimmick. The only bright side to their trying to hype up Origin is that it could be a sign of Old Republic coming out soon.

Yeah,I probably should but I have X amount of free mmos so Blizzard can already suck it.
That's why I love this age,in the before times,free mmos were shit...now there are so many awesome ones to play.

 

[kebab4you]

Isn't the only reason why EA won't put bf3 on steam that steam want dlc profit(Can you blame them?Why shouldn't they get it) I doubt they in any way hinder EA's patches from making it out...

 

[Sixcess]

Does anyone else get this feeling that this is directly related to the fact that EA only likes customers who pay shiv and leg out the ass for DLC and steam has a funny tenancy to like to go and sell "Super bundles"?

Yup. I think this is exactly what the whole Origins thing is about. There's no way they'll match the frequency and extent of the sales that Steam does. I do wonder if that's going to pay off in the long run.

EA aren't Blizzard. Blizzard doesn't need Steam since they only do a small number of very big games with fanatical followings who will buy them regardless of price. EA publishes... some good games... but a lot of so-so titles. Thing is, I've bought some of those types of game on impulse when I've seen them in the Steam sales, and in some cases I liked them and would buy sequels, maybe even at full price.

Since I started using Steam I've bought very few games from any other source and have no inclination to even browse other retail sites. EA aren't going to lose the core fans of their games with this move, but they are going to lose a lot of casual purchasers who might have went on to become core fans.

I don't see how they can possibly see this as good business in the long term.

 

[Nackl of Gilmed]

The service limits our ability to deliver patches and downloadable content directly to players. No other download service has adopted these practices

I'll admit I don't know the technical points regarding Steam's agreements with videogame developers and publishers, but I do know that they have not blocked my access to patches and downloadable content for any game that I've purchased through them, so I suspect that this is not exactly the full story. I wonder what the real cause for this feud is.

 

[Darknacht]

Good, Steam is way too restrictive; I hope more companies pull their games from Steam, maybe then steam will get the hint.

 

[Bat Vader]

Can we all just say "Fuck you, EA" enough to drive them out of business?

Sure... Just as soon as I get my copy of Mass Effect 3. Then I'll help you with taking out these giant lying douchebags.

Oh, yeah. Good point. But I though Mass Effect was BioWare?

The Mass Effect series is developed by Bioware but EA published Mass Effect 2 and is also publishing Mass Effect 3.

On Topic: I never really cared for using Steam or any other type of digital downloading store. I like to buy my games retail and I plan on buying a physical copy of Battlefield 3.

 

[James Crook]

Woah, thanks a bunch EA, you just cleared up my fall of the year game purchase calendar.

Now that EA doesn't want to release games on Steam anymore because they want to use their extremely crappy platform, guess I won't be playing the EA games I want for a while.

Just so you know, I can only buy games online from Steam, and getting a game from any retailer in Hong Kong is impossible for me.
You see, Hong Kong has its own movie rating system, but it doesn't apply to videogames unlike BBFC does, in the UK, which is pretty silly because Hong Kong used to be a British colony. Since the Hong Kong Government are lazy bureaucrats, they follow both PEGI and ESRB to roughly determinate the age at which one would be allowed to purchase the game, which means a teenager aged at least 14 could buy a game rated T or M in the US, with no gore, sex or drugs, i.e. Crysis, Battlefield, Call of Duty 4, and others.
All of this worked well, until they decided, in 2009, to introduce "This game may not be sold, lent, rented, shown, or projected to any person under the age of 18" stickers to about half of the games, even some which contained no blood but still had violence. This just fucked everything over. I couldn't even buy a Dragonball Z fighting game. Just in comparison, a 12 year old is still legally allowed to go watch The Hangover II at a cinema that follows movie regulations, which is preposterous.

Now that Battlefield 3 is not on Steam, I have no ways to purchase the game. Thanks a bunch, EA, I would've loved to give you my money.

 

[drakythe]

Ehemn. I can use ALL torchlight mods from the modDB. So either all copies of Torchlight or on steam, in which case it makes sense that they have to work with steam. Or what you heard is BS

It is also possible that since I last messed with mods they have patched something to make it an identical install process. I just remember when I first got the game soon after it came out most of the mod discussion on the runic forums had steam/nonsteam compatible tags. I'm happy that it all works easily now.

 

[walrusaurus]

So before all the steam lovers start bashing EA. This is not EA's fault as the article says the game will be available on many different on-line services, just not steam. So it is not like EA are trying to make it exclusive so they can put others out of business. The real issue is Steam's terms being more restrictive than other on-line services.

Hows that Koolaid taste?

THe fact that it isn't exclusive to EA's service is merely a PR move. Steam is the only real competition in the market.

 

[Pinkamena]

Oh no!
What a tragedy.

 

[GeorgW]

I'm just hoping EA don't pull more of their games off Steam and other publishers don't follow suit in creating their own digital distribution platforms. I suppose with time Battle.net will become the Activision equivalent, but I can't help but feeling that we consumers will be the worse off for all these pointless quarrels.

Really? Doesn't competition tend to benefit the customer?

OT: Eh, I was going to get a physical copy anyway, or I'd just get it xbox.

But if every publisher is gonna limit digital copies to only their service then that eliminates the competition entirely, since it means that the game is only gonna be available on one service that the publishers have full control over.

If EA wants to make Origin competitive with Steam, they should stop pulling games from Steam and in stead focus on making a good client that can compete on a purely qualitative basis. Forcing people to come to them in stead of making it beneficial but optional is going to achieve the opposite, it's gonna build animosity towards them and drive people away in stead.

The problem EA has is it seems to me that from the moment they announced origin a large number of steam users wont even give it the time of day even if it is good just because its EA so by forcing people to use it to get there games might make people removing the blinkers they all seem to be wearing and realise origin isn't that bad.

Or of course EA are telling the truth and this is Valve's fault I doubt this is true but if it was the reaction from Valve's fanboys would be fantastic in trying to defend that lol

Yeah, I agree that it's silly to not just get a physical copy or use Origin (from what I hear Origin is actually quite nice, it usually has the best pre-order stuff and no client required.)
But still, it's a stupid business move, but I get why they did it, see below.

Okay, people, there seems to be a lot of confusion as to why they do these things. The problem EA has with Steam, or rather, that Steam has with EA is that they circumvent Steam when they sell DLC by doing it in-game and directing them to a separate service where Steam doesn't get their cut. EA also refuses to let Steam sell their DLC directly from their Steam store. EA has refused to give Steam their dues for getting their games to people through their platform and Steam has responded by pulling their games.

That's the reason, now whether EA is refusing to change is so they can blame Steam and promote their Origin through news coverage is entirely possible, but purely speculation.

-snip-

Could you please include this reason the next time this controversy comes up to avoid confusion?

 

[GeorgW]

So, let me get this straight. EA want to release the game on Origin, a few other DD services, and on Steam. Steam says no, only on our platform or not at all. And EAs pulling the dick move here? Right.

But let me guess, you didnt read the article, checked the comments section and saw that all the cool kids were hating on EA so you decided to do the same. Yep, that must be it. Because if you actually had read the article before making a reply, you would have noticed that BF3 does not need Origin installed to run.

I'm guessing you didn't read the article too well yourself, because the reason BF3 isn't showing up on Steam is not because Steam said "our platform or not at all." It's because of issues regarding how they get DLC to customers. Or, as another poster explained quite well, Steam now has a requirement that all DLC offered for games must also be purchasable through Steam as well. This is likely because of a previous issue with Mirror's Edge (an EA game) where the DLC didn't work with Steam versions of the game.

Other online retailers may be offering the game because they don't have this restriction, but looking back on the history of this particular issue between EA and Steam I'd be weary of buying BF3 on these other stores and expecting the DLC to be compatible with any non-Origins version.

Really, your "steam said just our service or it won't be on ours at all" comment made no sense. You do realize that Steam if full of games that are available on other online services as well, right? It doesn't even match up with what EA said the reason was; if Steam said "only our service or none at all" then EA would have said that, not "The service limits our ability to deliver patches and downloadable content directly to players."

It still makes sense. Steam is still working against having the game on their platform, and are just as much "at fault" here as EA. That was the gist of my statement, and its still right.

I'm still calling bullshit on what EA is saying. As I recall, I had to download an expansion pack directly from EA for Mass Effect 2. It was really annoying, but I did it.

Yeah, im by no means arguing against that. This kind of stuff nearly always ends up making the experience more complicated and annoying for the user. And I think theres a lot more in it than EA are saying here. What I was saying was just that I can guarantee that Valve isnt completely innocent in this, and EA getting all the hate is unjustified.

If I may say something. I think Steam is entirely justified in their decision. Why should steam advertise EA's games, give them server space and so on if they're gonna be completely cut out of the DLC profits? I think EA is being stubborn and stupid, possibly because they want publicity for Origin. Sure it's entirely Steam's decision to pull it, but EA had it coming and I respect that Steam's willing to lose out on the massive profits that BF3 is gonna make for its principles.

You may say so, and I would agree to an extent. As I said, I think its just unfair to give all the hate to EA and act like its entirely their fault, and as if they had absolutely no half way good reason to make the decision. It would be just as stupid to give the entire blame to Steam.

At the end of the day all of this is trivial stuff anyway, anybody who was wanted to play it will still play it. The only people that will "miss out" are those that may have purchased when it went on some crazy sale in the summer sale or something, but the people who planned on a purchase will still make it. I flat out dont believe anyone who says they will now not get the game even though they wanted to before hand just because a piece of DRM is not included.

(although one must say that it speaks volumes about how nice Steam is when people will actually praise and call for what is at its core just a DRM)

You're right, it's not just EA's fault, but I still side with Valve on this one. Once again, their terms are very reasonable, why should they have a game on their platform when the publisher refuses to let them sell the DLC via steam. DLC has become just as important as the game itself and cutting Steam out was a dick move by EA. Once again, I think this whole thing is justto get publicity for Origin, good or bad.

 

[Simeon Ivanov]

Now that it's not on Steam,I officially don't give a shit about it. Because I am not downloading EA's stupid ass attempt to trump Valve just to play a first person shooter.

You, sir, made my day. Thank you.

OT: Wait, who's stupid enough to do this? Ah, EA ... nevermind then, carry on.

 

[bootz]

I have a REALLY bad feeling even if you buy it retail or direct drive the game will make you install orgins.

 

[Beryl77]

Is anyone seriously going to believe what EA said? "supporting our players is a top priority", "ability to connect directly with our own consumers" This comming out of EA's mouth is hilarious and no I'm not a EA hater. It's just such an obvious lie that you could see it from the moon.
Sure EA isn't as bad as they used to be some years ago but that doesn't mean that they're saints who only care about their customers.
Steam is the biggest competitor for Origin and it's clear that they are trying to weaken Steam. But I don't get why they are doing this now with BF3, since they also want to dethrone COD and Steam has about 30 Million active users. Beating Steam and COD at same time is a bit more than they can handle in my opinion.
Anyway, BF3 was a day one buy but now I doubt that I'll buy it before I try BF3 and Origin out at a friends computer.