EA "Retires" Online Support For Older Games

[frans909]

It's freaking ridiculous that I can't play Fifa 2009 online anymore. EA = cunts.

 

[General BrEeZy]

d'oh well...i guess....never really played online other than halo anyways...and im sure i miss out, but too bad.

 

[Jelly ^.^]

Hey EA, Hey EA. Why not start a tender-based bidding process to the rights to host online servers to other entities for long or short-term contracts for all the games you're shutting off?

Actually, why not do that from the start?

 

[Canadamus Prime]

There ought to be some sort of regulation that requires these companies to keep these sorts of services online for a minimum of 10 years. ...not that I actually play any of the games effected mind you, it's just some of them don't seem that old.

 

[BrotherRool]

Im prepared to be bombarded with people telling me im wrong... but its my understanding that a company chooses to close down support for games because they are no longer cost effective when it comes to keeping servers running for the game... so why dont they try and impliment servers like the pc games use to have, where anyone could buy and run a server... for instance if there was tht opertunity for halo 2 on the xbox, im sure many people would have raised funding for some servers to keep it running. I know its harder to justfiy on the consoles... im just curious as to why console games dont ever impliment a server browser to help over come problems like this... i think the only console game i ever remeber having anything like this was cod 3 ? anyway please dont flame me, just explain where im wrong so i can understand...

Oh you mean a reasonable way to extend our purchase by running our old servers? That's CRAZY, can't be done, INCONCEIVABLE!
The reason it isn't done that way is so publishers can force you to buy THEIR dlc and buy the new version every 2 years. What you said is reasonable and would be easy to implement, but it's not going to make them money so don't expect it.

Edit: replaced developers with publishers, I love the devs (I be one myself and I know how shitty publishers are)

I'm not a developer, but I'm guessing the move would require developing quite a bit of code and would probably cost a lot of time and money.

So I guess the argument is why they don't do it from the start? And thats a fair enough complaint I guess. I do remember some people really hated the online of on of the latest shooters to be like that, they had never come across non-company run servers and found the other system to be very out of date and annoying

I don't know where I stand. I don't tend to play online games too much and all that I do are on company servers

 

[chronobreak]

If so little people play the games, what's the big deal with having a server for them? I mean, can't they just lump them together or something? I don't know how it works, but couldn't they switch to a smaller server at least? I was actually gonna pick up Army of Two recently too.

 

[Jonny49]

Battlefield 2: Modern Combat for Xbox 360
Battlefield 2: Modern Combat Demo for Xbox 360
Medal of Honor Airborne for PlayStation Portable
Medal of Honor Heroes 2 for PlayStation Portable and Wii

Are you sure you didn't mean Medal of Honour Heroes 1 for for the PSP? Airbourne isn't on the system.

But anyway, that is a shame. I really liked BF:MC and MOH:H. Many a fun time spent on those games.

I might have to reinstall Medal of Honour on my PSP and play it one last time as a goodbye.

 

[Jared Brokaw]

what do you mean by online support? like i cant find a server, no more updates or i cant go online and get help with it.

 

[Chibz]

"The decisions to retire older EA games are never easy. The development teams and operational staff pour their hearts into these games almost as much as the customers playing them and it is hard to see one retired,"

Um. Wow. Are they honestly trying to say that people "pour their hearts" into a generic yearly release?

Egad, that's unbelievable.

And many of those games, they're approximately a year old. At most. Their online is ALREADY being "retired"?!

 

[FoolKiller]

I just picked up NHL 10 so that I can play with a friend of mine. That was a waste of thirty dollars.

It's just blatant money grabbing. I keep hearing we have to turn off the servers, but really it feels like "buy our new game to play online".

Oh well, I guess that will have to be it for playing those with my friend.

Funny how things like Left 4 Dead didn't have this issue when part 2 appeared. Apparently EA servers are really shiny and expensive.

 

[Upbeat Zombie]

Honestly there should be something preventing a company from shutting down its online service for a game that isn't even 2 years old.
Really shutting down the servers for any game that is in the current console generation just feels like them ripping of the customers who bought those games.

 

[twm1709]

This is why I don't buy online multiplayer focused games. They have an expiration date.

Honestly EA the only one I see who keeps bringing down servers.

This happened to me with Demon's souls too... which is a shame because the multiplayer feature, while not central to the game, was neat.

 

[Korten12]

This is why I don't buy online multiplayer focused games. They have an expiration date.

Honestly EA the only one I see who keeps bringing down servers.

This happened to me with Demon's souls too... which is a shame because the multiplayer feature, while not central to the game, was neat.

DS servers are still up.

 

[twm1709]

This is why I don't buy online multiplayer focused games. They have an expiration date.

Honestly EA the only one I see who keeps bringing down servers.

This happened to me with Demon's souls too... which is a shame because the multiplayer feature, while not central to the game, was neat.

DS servers are still up.

Really? thought they were going down on march. Haven´t played since january so I didn't check.

 

[Andy Chalk]

Are you sure you didn't mean Medal of Honour Heroes 1 for for the PSP? Airbourne isn't on the system.

Maybe, but that's the list posted by EA.

Honestly there should be something preventing a company from shutting down its online service for a game that isn't even 2 years old.

You could always opt to not buy it. Otherwise, the bottom line is that EA publishes the game and EA can pull the plug whenever i wants. I'm a little surprised by the newness of the some of the games in the list too but if they're not popular, if they're not being played, then that's that. Some people will always end up getting screwed, but it's just business.

 

[Richard Allen]

Im prepared to be bombarded with people telling me im wrong... but its my understanding that a company chooses to close down support for games because they are no longer cost effective when it comes to keeping servers running for the game... so why dont they try and impliment servers like the pc games use to have, where anyone could buy and run a server... for instance if there was tht opertunity for halo 2 on the xbox, im sure many people would have raised funding for some servers to keep it running. I know its harder to justfiy on the consoles... im just curious as to why console games dont ever impliment a server browser to help over come problems like this... i think the only console game i ever remeber having anything like this was cod 3 ? anyway please dont flame me, just explain where im wrong so i can understand...

Oh you mean a reasonable way to extend our purchase by running our old servers? That's CRAZY, can't be done, INCONCEIVABLE!
The reason it isn't done that way is so publishers can force you to buy THEIR dlc and buy the new version every 2 years. What you said is reasonable and would be easy to implement, but it's not going to make them money so don't expect it.

Edit: replaced developers with publishers, I love the devs (I be one myself and I know how shitty publishers are)

I'm not a developer, but I'm guessing the move would require developing quite a bit of code and would probably cost a lot of time and money.

So I guess the argument is why they don't do it from the start? And thats a fair enough complaint I guess. I do remember some people really hated the online of on of the latest shooters to be like that, they had never come across non-company run servers and found the other system to be very out of date and annoying

I don't know where I stand. I don't tend to play online games too much and all that I do are on company servers

Well as a developer I can tell you that the extra cost/ effort is minimal in most cases. They would simply need to release binaries for the severs the are running on. Some modification would probably be needed to allow users to edit stuff but it's a very small percentage of the total work. If it was common 10 years ago when sdk's were crappy and close to programming in straight c++ then it's possible today. Probably easier.

As for other user getting annoyed at picking servers, I agree, the default should be how it is today, but there is nothing preventing them with at least providing the option, cept money of course.

 

[BrotherRool]

Well as a developer I can tell you that the extra cost/ effort is minimal in most cases. They would simply need to release binaries for the severs the are running on. Some modification would probably be needed to allow users to edit stuff but it's a very small percentage of the total work. If it was common 10 years ago when sdk's were crappy and close to programming in straight c++ then it's possible today. Probably easier.

As for other user getting annoyed at picking servers, I agree, the default should be how it is today, but there is nothing preventing them with at least providing the option, cept money of course.

Fair enough, they should do this then. Most games probably wouldn't get enough interest to keep much running but if the choice is easy, they should always give it