Yantelope Posted July 14, 2011 Author Report Share Posted July 14, 2011 You can only access UPlay features through a code or the online features through a code? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WTF Posted July 14, 2011 Report Share Posted July 14, 2011 You can only access UPlay features through a code or the online features through a code? same thing as project 10 dollar. Uplay is the portal they use to activate their online only pass. It's really stupid. The code comes with new copies of the game. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Yantelope Posted July 14, 2011 Author Report Share Posted July 14, 2011 This all kind of feeds into another problem/annoyance and that's the prolifieration of every single studio having their own online service. Now you need a Uplay account, EA online, Bungie.net, Rockstar, Steam, and soon Activision will probably get in on it. We already have the XBl network that these things operate inside of so how many more studios do we need accounts with? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Saturnine Tenshi Posted July 14, 2011 Report Share Posted July 14, 2011 I'm in despair with a world of innumerable accounts! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RockyRan Posted July 14, 2011 Report Share Posted July 14, 2011 This all kind of feeds into another problem/annoyance and that's the prolifieration of every single studio having their own online service. Now you need a Uplay account, EA online, Bungie.net, Rockstar, Steam, and soon Activision will probably get in on it. We already have the XBl network that these things operate inside of so how many more studios do we need accounts with? The bigger problem is that half these people don't even secure your information properly, based on Lulzsec's antics a couple of months ago. They want everyone to register for their own proprietary online services, but aren't willing to secure them properly or otherwise put any real effort into them. Not to veer the conversation off-topic again, but it's kind of like EA's shutting down servers of games. They want to run their own system, but aren't willing to actually invest time and money into doing it properly. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WTF Posted July 14, 2011 Report Share Posted July 14, 2011 Activision has COD+ for now but we'll see something coming soon probably similar to Battle.Net since they have it working nice and fine for PCs. Squeenix well Eidos could come up with something when they make more MP focussed bigger budget games. Capcom is bound to get in with this as well. I bet we could see something in sf vs tekken. Maybe Namco but unlikely. Most western devs are going to get in on this. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Saturnine Tenshi Posted July 14, 2011 Report Share Posted July 14, 2011 This is all just another reason why I avoid games from most of these companies. It's auxiliary, but it's still there and justification enough on its own. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Yantelope Posted July 14, 2011 Author Report Share Posted July 14, 2011 Not to veer the conversation off-topic again, but it's kind of like EA's shutting down servers of games. They want to run their own system, but aren't willing to actually invest time and money into doing it properly. Agreed, but in many cases their own servers are shut down just to spur people to buy the newest game. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RockyRan Posted July 14, 2011 Report Share Posted July 14, 2011 Agreed, but in many cases their own servers are shut down just to spur people to buy the newest game. Which is even worse, IMO. Rather than provide an actually desirable product that people want to buy on its own merits, EA just takes away major components of the products people have already paid for. That's not the way to do good business. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RockyRan Posted August 2, 2011 Report Share Posted August 2, 2011 (edited) http://www.joystiq.c...th-online-pass/ Battlefield 3 will also "probably" have the same thing now. Truth be told, it would be more surprising if it DIDN'T ship with anti-used-sales measures considering how it's one of EA flagship titles. Of note is the hilariously poor argument: "The whole idea is that we're paying for servers and if you create a new account there is a big process on how that is being handled in the back end," Bach said. "We would rather have you buy a new game than a used game because buying a used game is only a cost to us; we don't get a single dime from a used game, but we still need to create server space and everything for you." Because, you know, they live in an alternate reality where selling used games consists of duplicating a copy, forcing the poor devs to "create" extra server space considering how the guy who "sold" the game is TOTALLY still using the service. Edited August 2, 2011 by RockyRan Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deanb Posted August 2, 2011 Report Share Posted August 2, 2011 Technically they are making a new user for storing your soldier. Though that's minimal, like a few KB's of data. I get a few GB's for free from Dropbox. Space is hardly an issue. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RockyRan Posted August 2, 2011 Report Share Posted August 2, 2011 Indeed. Some costs are so minimal they're really just built into the day-to-day operations. Cherry picking them and dragging them out to blow them out of proportion and saying that's the reason why they charge $10 per person really doesn't make for a good argument at all. I'd really like to know what magical servers they run that cost $10 to store a few KB's of data. Those better be some damn magical servers run by unicorn leprechauns. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deanb Posted August 2, 2011 Report Share Posted August 2, 2011 Well just for the numbers: TF2 32 man server ran at a cost of $20/month. Which means, should the person be playing 24/7 with zero breaks whatsover (in reality a 32 man server can accommodate a few thousand people in that month) that works out to: $20/32 = $0.62/person-per-month $10 Project Ten Dollar fee = 16 months of playtime. Though as I said in reality you're going to have many people on throughout the day so that $20 serves way more than 32 people. Still even if it was just one server to 32 people it still covers nearly a year and a half which is about how long it'll run anyway. On the PC side of things it's dedicated servers meaning community paid. Though given there's no such thing as used sales on PC I doubt it'll have online pass. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Yantelope Posted August 2, 2011 Author Report Share Posted August 2, 2011 (edited) Clearly they're just giving some stupid excuses so they don't have to say "we're just boosting our revenues". I wonder what the breaking point is though. I suppose soon the online pass will be for everything past the first level. Used games are pretty much doomed and in turn so is physical media. What will be most entertaining is watching Gamestop trying to avoid a slow and painful death. So has there been any sales impact on RE5 on the 3DS because of the one game save thing? Does Madden sell any fewer copies these days? Edited August 2, 2011 by Yantelope Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RockyRan Posted August 3, 2011 Report Share Posted August 3, 2011 Clearly they're just giving some stupid excuses so they don't have to say "we're just boosting our revenues". I wonder what the breaking point is though. I suppose soon the online pass will be for everything past the first level. Used games are pretty much doomed and in turn so is physical media. What will be most entertaining is watching Gamestop trying to avoid a slow and painful death. So has there been any sales impact on RE5 on the 3DS because of the one game save thing? Does Madden sell any fewer copies these days? This is something I'd like to see. Exactly how is this going to play out in the long run for GameStop? Because this is going to put a damper on their business one way or the other. At the very least they'll have to make a permanent price drop of all their games that have this thing by $10, because otherwise people are just not going to buy their games. EA's going to push this further and further just to see with how much they can get away with, and people are eventually going to catch on, so they'll eventually turn away from buying used games at GS if they figure that $50 copy actually is a $60 copy after buying the multiplayer code. Is GS going to fight back with something of their own, or are they just going to suck it up and drop their used prices? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thursday Next Posted August 3, 2011 Report Share Posted August 3, 2011 To be somewhat bull headed. Gamestop are the ones that should budge on this. Publishers (developers etc.) create the content and provide the service. When it comes to used game sales Gamestop pay naff all for them and then charge fractionally below the RRP for the next guy to walk in. It's free money for them, they've been creaming mega bucks off of selling the same game twice (or thrice) and don't kick anything back to the publishers. If they'd kept the publisher sweet by chipping a % of the profits their way, then publishers be much more pumped about used game sales. As it is, publishers will continue to annex the "service" part of their products and retain control over that. Gamestop will just have to adjust their pricing structure to reflect the fact that second time round they are only selling content and not service. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deanb Posted August 3, 2011 Report Share Posted August 3, 2011 Hasn't the whole "no other industry requires a used sales person to toss money the creators way" thing being thrown out many times before? If that's what EA is waiting on then I'm waiting for the day when all Gamestop sell is a disc with the intro logos on and you have to download the rest of the game with the single-use key that comes on a slip of paper that bio-degrades after 3 months. I get EA isn't happy with the setup but surely there's way around it that won't piss off the consumer so much? It doesn't really feel great to know that even though you're hte one actually buying the damn games you're ignored by the publishers in their spat with trying to annoy Gamestop n Co. Have EA looked into making cheaper games like what THQ are doing? Have EA looked into not charging for demos? Have you guys looked into not giving any store exclusive DLC to Gamestop n co if you're pissed off with them? Just seems it might be worth a crack into adding value instead of taking features away. I know it's pretty fucking damn easy for publishers these days to take stuff we already used to have as part of the game and charge extra. You know like those demos. And multiplayer. And levels/maps. It was a nice age before all this. okay example: Buy Portal 2 new on PS3 and you get the PC version free. (I know that EA published the PS3 version but I have a feeling given how EA deals with every other buy new "incentive" that it was most likely Valves idea) You get the full PS3 game you've paid for. All the levels, no store specific bull shit, no stripped out multiplayer. But if you buy new, you get an entire copy of the game on another platform thrown in free of charge. Buy BF3 new get BF:1943 for free? Get EA points to spend on your favourite EA downloadable titles? 10 points per full game, 3 points per downloadable game; 100 points gets you ME3 on Origin! Hey it's not as cheap a thing to do as taking parts of the game n slicing them out, but it provides incentive to new game buyers, and with the bonus of making us feel loved. Rather than just being treat like we're at least not dirty dirty used-game buying scum. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Yantelope Posted August 3, 2011 Author Report Share Posted August 3, 2011 Hasn't the whole "no other industry requires a used sales person to toss money the creators way" thing being thrown out many times before? If that's what EA is waiting on then I'm waiting for the day when all Gamestop sell is a disc with the intro logos on and you have to download the rest of the game with the single-use key that comes on a slip of paper that bio-degrades after 3 months. This already happens on the PC kind of. Supreme Commander 2 shipped with only half the game on the disc. The other half had to be downloaded from steam and it's locked to your steam account so you can't sell or lend it. If it happens on PC why will it not happen on console? I don't buy that EA is only annexing service. They're shutting down used sales period, it's just going to be a slow process. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thursday Next Posted August 3, 2011 Report Share Posted August 3, 2011 If you buy anything second hand you don't get the service that comes with a first purchase. Cars: No manufacturer warranty, but you can buy a warranty from the main dealer. Sky: Buy second hand box, minimum channels unless you subscribe. Phone: No calls unless you pay. Games are no different. Buy second hand and wysiwyg. Buy new or pay the extra and you get to have the full service. Portal wasn't just a Valve thing (please don't make the mistake of thinking they are some benevolent altruistic NPO, they're out to make money too), first purchasers of Alice MR got Alice free. Second hand have to pay for it. EA also did "buy Dead Space 2 LE (which iirc cost no more than the standard edition) get Dead Space Extraction free". Not sure what you mean by "charging for demos" and as for "taking out" content, that simply doesn't happen. A game doesn't get made, then EA look at it and say "what can we remove from this to sell separately?" DLC is planned from the start to be a separate offering. There is a degree of customers getting caught in the crossfire, but that's on Gamestop. They know that the second hand products are worth $10 less once the code is burnt, they just haven't moved to take that into account. They've been ripping customers off for years with used sales anyway. Maybe this will finally make people realise that it's not such a great deal after all. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deanb Posted August 3, 2011 Report Share Posted August 3, 2011 But when you buy a used car you get the passenger seats with it too. And I'm pretty sure games don't come with a warranty for you guys to take away. Also Sky is a shitty shitty example. Sky IS a service. That's more of an analogy of saying buy a console, have to buy games to play anything on it. Unless EA have some skewed view of what buying a game entails. The charging for demos would be the "Season Ticket" for "the people that we really care about the most," that EA Sports have recently announced. $25 a year nets you a 3-day demo of EA sports games. As for taking stuff out we've gone over ME2 last year with the magical ship with 2 doors that never open unless you have the DLC. Despite it being in the base game. So sorry if I don't believe you on the whole "DLC isn't bits removed from the game" line. I'm pretty sure it wasn't Gamestop who came up with Project $10. And I doubt that even if Gamestop were to cede to EA's demands that EA would stop with Project $10 and all the affiliated schemes. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thursday Next Posted August 3, 2011 Report Share Posted August 3, 2011 But when you buy a used car you get the passenger seats with it too. And I'm pretty sure games don't come with a warranty for you guys to take away. Also Sky is a shitty shitty example. Sky IS a service. That's more of an analogy of saying buy a console, have to buy games to play anything on it. Unless EA have some skewed view of what buying a game entails. The charging for demos would be the "Season Ticket" for "the people that we really care about the most," that EA Sports have recently announced. $25 a year nets you a 3-day demo of EA sports games. As for taking stuff out we've gone over ME2 last year with the magical ship with 2 doors that never open unless you have the DLC. Despite it being in the base game. So sorry if I don't believe you on the whole "DLC isn't bits removed from the game" line. I'm pretty sure it wasn't Gamestop who came up with Project $10. And I doubt that even if Gamestop were to cede to EA's demands that EA would stop with Project $10 and all the affiliated schemes. 1. Online gaming is not a car seat, at best it is an optional extra. Physical copies of games do in fact come with a warranty (for the disc itself not the software on it). 2. The DLC was planned for ME2 when ME2 was being developed. If the extra rooms hadn't been included then the DLC would not have meshed with the full game and would have felt "tacked on". EA did not make the game with those extras in, then have a raffle to see which characters should be removed for DLC. 3. Season ticket gives you early access to the full game, not a demo. There are lots of early access promotions out there. This service means that you can play the game while you wait for play.com or whoever to deliver it to your door. No need to go to midnight launches to get the game first. Oh and yes... EA probably does care more about the people who pay them more money, just like every other business. 4. As it is, Gamestop are the one's overcharging for second hand games. Not publishers. If Gamestop had paid a royalty to the content producers for second hand sales, content producers may not have felt the need to go direct to the second hand purchaser for some money. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deanb Posted August 3, 2011 Report Share Posted August 3, 2011 So in battlefield games multiplayer is "at best it an optional extra"? Is this EA's official stance on the matter? That in a broadband enabled world and where games like COD rise high and with a decent chunk rarely touching the campaign of these games, multiplayer is just an optional extra? To go with the analogy a car seat is pretty optional too. A car doesn't need to be able to carry passengers. It is however expected. And it starts to feel a bit shitty that the car manufacturers feel that it is perfectly okay to start taking them out just cos the used car salesman won't pay them royalties. I'm pretty sure things like having Garrus in was also planned during the full game too. If you're able to plan and develop these things while making the rest of the game, then what exactly is the reason for putting in all the mesh work like extra room around the ship and the option to have them in the suicide missions and just not including the characters? Other than to have them sold as extra costs to the main game later on. The whole thing of "we make the DLC while making the main game so it meshes well" isn't a defence for the practice it just makes it worse. If it's made, if it's all set up to just slot right into the game. Then why the fuck isn't it in the game? From my understanding the demo/early access (semantics) stops the day the game comes out. So if you are waiting on Play.com then you'll be in the same position of not being able to play on launch whether you have or haven't got Season Ticket. And yeah I got the implied nature of Moores quote in them caring more for those who pay the extra for the Season Ticket. Can you tell me exactly why EA should be getting "royalties" for used sales? I am largely amused by how special the games industry seems to think it is and how normal rules don't apply. I bought this a couple weeks back. Now games publishers would have me believe that buying this second hand means I shouldn't really expect to get the "Special Edition" features. But not only do I get those special edition remixes, I also get the rest of the album (as expected), a booklet with art work and biographies, and some fetching artwork in the case too. (And I can rip the CD to my Phone too. Modern marvel eh) I don't really see the music industry bitching about not getting royalties on used sales, or fucking over your albums so only buying new can get you stuff. (just owning the disc gets you access to the special features on those multimedia discs you see around now n then) And it's a CD too so it's as good and digital quality as the day it was printed unlike cars and just like games. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thursday Next Posted August 3, 2011 Report Share Posted August 3, 2011 You seem to be deliberately ignoring the fact that online gaming is a service. It requires continual investment to run, not just server space but the people to run/maintain the servers, the hardware, the software updates, all that stuff. Analogies with car parts don't really work because once a seat is in a car it costs nothing for the manufacturer to leave it in and would cost more to take it out. They do still charge you for servicing though if you go through their dealers. Getting angry because ME2 was planned to have more content added at a later date doesn't make any sense to me. Either they magically added in extra rooms to the Normandy which would have left people moaning that the layout was wrong and there were more windows inside than outside and why didn't EA think it through instead of foisting ill conceived tacked on DLC on the game or they put the rooms in during early development so that everything meshes together nicely. Do you get annoyed that your legos had bits sticking out that are obviously there so that more legos can be stuck on them? With regard to Demos/Early Access. It's not semantics. Early Access is the full game, downloaded to your console / PC in advance. There's nothing to suggest that demos won't continue to be released as before, but they will be small portions of the game, a couple of teams and limited gameplay options. There was some talk of having Season Ticket overlap with release, maybe this was dropped or maybe it's in the pipeline. I don't know. Buying music, films and so forth are not services. They are products. You don't see official forums for every album / film release filled with people asking for x or y issue to be fixed. If Maximus is wearing a Casio in Gladiator there will not be a patch to fix it or if there is it will be in a new boxed product which you will have to buy, if Jimmi Hendrix misses a chord they won't correct the error. You got the content, that's it. Game publishers are service providers. They support products, sometimes years after launch in a way that album and film makers do not as such they deserve to be paid for every copy sold, even second hand ones, because these days they are expected to continue to support products after they have been purchased irrespective of if they were purchased first hand, second hand or swapped with a mate. That said, I wouldn't have an issue if any shop (bar charity shops) that sells goods second hand had to kick a % to the original manufacturer (maybe stick a 5-10 year limit on it or something so older stuff is exempt). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Saturnine Tenshi Posted August 3, 2011 Report Share Posted August 3, 2011 (edited) Adding to the train of EA love. I'm very grateful EA do not make many games I enjoy — enough to ignore their line-up entirely. http://www.rockpaper...ctive-accounts/ Edited August 3, 2011 by Saturnine Tenshi Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thursday Next Posted August 3, 2011 Report Share Posted August 3, 2011 You are not seriously complaining that if you don't even log in to Origin for two years that EA "may" delete your account for non use? It's a classic CMA clause in the EULA. In most EULAs half of it is stuff that is included to cover worst case scenarios and the other half is bluff clauses that wouldn't stand up in court for longer than it took a judge to clear his throat. Really not worth the panic. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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