EA Gets Ready to Throw Down With Steam - UPDATED

[shrekfan246]

valve DOES have a monopoly on the digital distribution side of sales when it comes to PC games

This statement is unjustifiable. To begin there are other digital distributors such as Direct2Drive which ensures that right now Valve does not have a monopoly. Also Valve nor any other online distributor has ever released statistics regarding their market share, however it is estimated at 70% for Steam, which is not a monopoly.

then what makes a monopoly? because i'm sure microsoft doesn't have THAT many people using their PCs when i see plenty of ironic 20-somethings using macs.

mo·nop·o·ly
   /məˈnɒpəli/ Show Spelled[muh-nop-uh-lee]
?noun, plural -lies.
1.
exclusive control of a commodity or service in a particular market, or a control that makes possible the manipulation of prices. Compare duopoly, oligopoly.
2.
an exclusive privilege to carry on a business, traffic, or service, granted by a government.
3.
the exclusive possession or control of something.

If Steam had a monopoly over the digital distributors, GOG, D2D, and even Amazon.com would not exist.

well its the most prominent, to be sure, and since even microsoft, ea, and a few other high-profile companies have called steam out as being a monopoly, i'm inclined to believe it.

now if you'll excuse me, i have a wedding to plan.

Bolded and italicized the relevant parts. At this point I have to assume you're simply trolling, or really just dense about how economics work. Yes, it is the most prominent, I will agree there but there is no form of the English language that would allow for it to be a monopoly. And honestly, if you're referencing Microsoft, EA, and other high-profile companies (I'll assume Activision fits in there somewhere) about bashing of Steam, then I defer to my first comment.

I was going to leave you alone until you put in that edit to your last post, because you clearly have no clue what you're talking about. All games that are being released on digital platforms for download cost exactly the same as a NEW physical copy from a brick&mortar store. Yes, you can't get a used copy from a digital download, but that's kind-of the point.

And yes, I will give an example. Infamous, a game that came out 2 years ago, costs at the most $25.00 on the PSN now. I think it might actually be down to $20 by now, but I'm not sure. As it has been pointed out many times before in this thread, Steam constantly has sales and discounts for many of the items in their library. And I'm relatively certain that services such as GOG.com are selling digital downloads for the same price as physical copies (Though I can't speak because I don't use it).

TL;DR: You're full of yourself. Stop trying to make it out like EA is the stalwart hero of this tale. No game publisher can claim a moral high ground in my eyes, but when you compare a company like Valve to a company like EA Games? Yes, Valve is the paragon of all that is good in the world. To make this TL;DR a bit long, have you even seen what they did to Darkspore? It requires a constant internet connection at all times to even play. So you know what that does to anyone with a bad wireless connection? Oops, your internet cut out, you can't play anymore. And yes, that is all because of EA.

Every company is out for money. EA is trying to monopolize the market of their own games by only supplying them through their download service. If they uphold that stance, then they will be able to keep the prices of said games as high as they want because, and try to pay attention now, they will be the only providers of the product. That is what a monopoly is.

EDIT: And I preemptively apologize for coming across as a douche, because I know that I do in the above post.

 

[Godhead]

As long as I can get Battlefield 3 and ME3 on Steam I frankly don't care.

Prepare for a heart breaking reality... I am already crying myself to sleep at night... thank you EA... thank you for Mass Effect 3 and Battlefield 3 being Origins exclusive...

Please excuse me. *steps into sound proof jar*
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO *gasp* OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

*steps out*

Excuse me, I need to go commit suicide.

Edit: I checked out the Origin website. And according to my quote they won't be putting Battlefield 3 or Mass Effect 3 on Steam, but they can have the Orange Box on Origin. WHAT??

 

[tkioz]

Well this sucks... here's hoping that new Mass Effect and Dragon Age games still come to Steam because the EA online service sucks big old donkey wang... not to mention that Steam sales are when I personally buy new games... and the fact that prices drop over time on the service, just like they do in retail stores, which doesn't generally happen on one company services (the reason I don't own a copy of Star Craft II).

 

[Setch Dreskar]

As long as I can get Battlefield 3 and ME3 on Steam I frankly don't care.

Prepare for a heart breaking reality... I am already crying myself to sleep at night... thank you EA... thank you for Mass Effect 3 and Battlefield 3 being Origins exclusive...

Please excuse me. *steps into sound proof jar*
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO *gasp* OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

*steps out*

Excuse me, I need to go commit suicide.

Edit: I checked out the Origin website. And according to my quote they won't be putting Battlefield 3 or Mass Effect 3 on Steam, but they can have the Orange Box on Origin. WHAT??

There is but 1 hope, that Origins fails so completely before Mass Effect 3 can be released that they hand it to Steam as an apology.

4000 hordsh - Sounds like the accent of an ork. - Capatcha

 

[Firehound]

From The Origin Help section [http://help.origin.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/2085/kw/activation%20limit]

QUESTION
I've received an error message on Origin, what does the error mean?
ANSWER
You may receive one of the following error messages if you have reached the maximum amount of times your game can be downloaded through Origin:
For security reasons, you are allowed # concurrently active licenses. This limit has been reached. Please wait until one of the other licenses auto-expires, then try again.
License response error: '78008,Max machine lifetime entitlement met:#
Error: 10000:78008
Every time the download button is clicked, a download count will be added to your lifetime total. If you have installed your game via Origin on more than three computers within a ten day period, you will need to wait until the first installation expires.
Note: Re-installing your operating system, or interrupting a current download, will count as a new computer installation.
If you have reached your download limit, click Contact Us and include your account name, the title of the file or game you are downloading, and a brief description of the issue.

So if you stop a game while it's downloading, you've used up one activation if you do this 3 times with in ten days of each other you have to wait at least ten days to finish downloading your games.

That's nuts if you ask me. I've stopped downloading huge games many times on steam because I wanted to stream a movie or download a patch for WoW or what ever.

Of course, steam is usually polite enough to realize your doing something then sit in the corner wringing it's download hat until you finish. So another point Steam.

 

[PettingZOOPONY]

valve DOES have a monopoly on the digital distribution side of sales when it comes to PC games

This statement is unjustifiable. To begin there are other digital distributors such as Direct2Drive which ensures that right now Valve does not have a monopoly. Also Valve nor any other online distributor has ever released statistics regarding their market share, however it is estimated at 70% for Steam, which is not a monopoly.

then what makes a monopoly? because i'm sure microsoft doesn't have THAT many people using their PCs when i see plenty of ironic 20-somethings using macs.

mo·nop·o·ly
   /məˈnɒpəli/ Show Spelled[muh-nop-uh-lee]
?noun, plural -lies.
1.
exclusive control of a commodity or service in a particular market, or a control that makes possible the manipulation of prices. Compare duopoly, oligopoly.
2.
an exclusive privilege to carry on a business, traffic, or service, granted by a government.
3.
the exclusive possession or control of something.

If Steam had a monopoly over the digital distributors, GOG, D2D, and even Amazon.com would not exist.

well its the most prominent, to be sure, and since even microsoft, ea, and a few other high-profile companies have called steam out as being a monopoly, i'm inclined to believe it.

now if you'll excuse me, i have a wedding to plan.

Wait your using Microsoft EA as examples which by your definition of a monopoly both are exactly that, know you have completely failed at logic.

 

[thublihnk]

And nothing of value was lost.

 

[gurall200]

nothing short of a complete and utter remake of the entire Ultima series (ALL OF IT), with lord british voiced by Kenneth Branagh and the model for the Avatar based on the chuck norris, would make me use this service.

Though strangely, I am inclined to believe EA a bit, what with them throwing the wing commander and ultima series over to good ole games.

 

[Kunzer]

Well i can tell you right away that if i refuse to have two "steam" apps on my pc.

If that means i cant play mass effect 3, then that is too bad for EA.

Honestly, i never liked EA, and this sort of "play it our way or not at all" business strategy pushes me away from their products.

There are too many good video games out there for me to waste my time with the EA empire.

 

[masher]

Hmm... Steam servers... EA servers... HMM.

 

[bfgmetalhead]

valve,steam. crush them for westwood! down with EA the festering wound of the gaming world

 

[Chocolate Source]

My moneys on steam.

 

[Snowy Rainbow]

Guess who's not buying Mass Effect 3 now? Meeee

 

[Snowy Rainbow]

"Sir, we're going to limit our products to one platform, this will 'drive' people into our business like cattle!" "Won't this also limit how many places we can make money from and as a result, make us less money as convenience is the master of impulse-buying?" "Um..."

What a lovely post. Witty, funny and very true.

Nice work, citizen!

 

[RobfromtheGulag]

The 'Free ME2 w/ DA2' tactic got me to download their online dispenser because I'd ditched my old game disc in frustration, but odds of me dealing with another dds are unlikely. As long as EA keeps it's drm out of the Mirror's Edge extremely annoying sector, I'll likely just buy hard copies.

 

[Deathfish15]

EA started to become great in 2008 through the end of 2010....but now they're going ass backwards.

First, they start to increase the PC games to $60 instead of $50. No, there's no price inflation otherwise consoles would update as well. Consoles were/are $10 more than PC games because they have to play licensing fees to the console company and there is no licensing fee for the PC because of how open it is. No, they did it on pure greed.


Then, they decided to pull this crap hating on Steam as a digital distribution and say they still support their "retailers", when just within this past year they were complaining up a storm that "used game sales hurt video game companies." SO....they support companies like Gamestop, which sells their games used for huge profit and dismisses Valve, which uses pre-order discounts, free games, and TF2 bonuses to promote digital sales of other developer's games.

What the *BEEP*?!

 

[Clive Howlitzer]

Does this mean that I won't be able to get Battlefield 3 on Steam? If so, that is unfortunate. I tried to pre-order it from EA originally via their digital service(Only because I had a discount coupon for their site). Although the fine print stated that after 1 year, I could never download it again.
Nuts to that! Steam please!

 

[Jaime_Wolf]

I'm usually against the constant EA hate, but I sincerely hope this fails within the next few months. Sadly, I really doubt it will considering that EA seems to own damn near the entire AAA game industry at this point. For the first time, I actually want to do the whole internet boycott thing, but even more sadly, I'm once again sure it will fail given the number of enormously popular titles that EA is going to force people to buy through Origin.

Yes Steam had a monopoly, but monopolies are dangerous, not inherently bad. Thus far, Steam has mostly been a pretty good monopoly at least for consumers (at least for me and other games I know).

The whole beauty of Steam is that it provides a central hub, keeping all of your games tied together and all of your friends in one place across games. A competing service that does exactly the same thing and forces you to use it to play certain games completely defeats the purpose of the thing. You end up having to deal with two programs that do almost exactly the same thing.

And then there's the fact that "Origin" (Really, that's the best name EA could come up with? It sounds like a bad name for a generic business front in some crime movie.) is just worse that Steam. It's clearly less-developed, the interface is visually appealing, but lacks utilitarian polish, and it just doesn't seem to function as well. I suppose it could get better with time, but I'm not holding much hope.

Hell, you can't even set a custom name. Whatever you choose, and your choices are limited by the already massively-consumed EA account namespace, you're stuck with it.

And why on earth does every PC application developer have such a goddamn problem with windows now? Windowing was a great development for the PC and shoving everything back into attached panes (speaking specifically of the Origin friend list) is not a step forward.

 

[Nouw]

I wonder how the elitists will think of 'the last good gaming thing alive' being challenged. Moving beyond that, I'm not so sure if it's a smart idea. I hope they can co-exist

 

[Matterer]

The way I see it, this idea succeeding is a worst case sinerio.

We will have 2 programs using the background of our computer, so twice the usage there. Potentially we could have multiple conversations between different friends on different services.
If we play a steam game, we couldnt talk to our friends while they play origions games and vice versa.
Twice the risk for personal data loss, like weve been seeing recently.
The gaming world would get more beffudled for outsiders.
EA would get more money, and so then everything will be OK 8D

Seriously though, this is the first thing I have ever felt a need to boycot D: