EA to unveil Origin

Neil79 · 3 Jun 2011 at 09:59

This Friday, Electronic Arts will unveil its own take on the popular online PC shopfront Steam, with the launch of a service called Origin.

According to a report on the Wall Street Journal, this service will function much like Steam, as a single store and gaming platform on the PC that will let customers "purchase, download and keep track of" their games.

It's even lifting Steam's social features, and will also feature cross-platform notifications that will "let gamers on a variety of devices broadcast messages to online friends when they defeat online opponents or accomplish other gaming goals."

So I can be eating dinner and an ** friend message me on my phone saying he scored some mad Dragon Age loot? Wonderful.

A "hypothetical" example of this cross-platform integration would be Battlefield, with EA saying players could rack up experience points on a mobile version of the game that will count towards unlocks on the PC edition.

With the full reveal not due until tomorrow, expect more details (and a better idea of how it'll all work) then. One thing I can say now is, that name? That's one unfortunate brand revival if ever I've seen one.

http://kotaku.com/5808095/ea-is-launching-its-own-steam-competitor

Utnac · 3 Jun 2011 at 10:03

Competition's good... Will seem a bit pointless if it's only going to stock EA games though.

Shamikebab · 3 Jun 2011 at 10:04

Good for Steam to have some big name competition

Sleepery · 3 Jun 2011 at 10:09

Intrusive and unnecessary GFWL-a-like ahoy!

Or so I reckon anyway. They'll let their usual greed get in the way and end up with something that shoves itself in our faces at every unwanted opportunity.

ic1male · 3 Jun 2011 at 10:09

I only hope it doesn't mean that all EA titles will disappear from Steam! It would be reasonable to assume so. Valve's games will never appear anywhere else...

Sleepery · 3 Jun 2011 at 10:10

ic1male said:
I only hope it doesn't mean that all EA titles will disappear from Steam! It would be reasonable to assume so. Valve's games will never appear anywhere else...

SWTOR is to be Origin exclusive for digital distro.

trigger-happy · 3 Jun 2011 at 10:11

good to see competition in the market but isn't this ea store?

ic1male · 3 Jun 2011 at 10:12

trigger-happy said:
good to see competition in the market but isn't this ea store?

Sounds like it will be replacing that.

niroe · 3 Jun 2011 at 10:15

Will we be forced to buy a new version of Origin every year with very little difference in features

/sarcasm_off

Competition for Steam can only be a good thing, lets hope EA do this right :cool:

trigger-happy · 3 Jun 2011 at 10:15

ic1male said:
Sounds like it will be replacing that.

lol if they remove all the games you previously bought from them, it will be trolling on another level.

ic1male · 3 Jun 2011 at 10:16

I know people say competition for Steam is good but I want all my games in one place. I don't want to have to have a separate games system for Activision, EA, Valve, Ubisoft, etc. Shame they can't all come together and offer one service for the PC platform.

ic1male · 3 Jun 2011 at 10:17

trigger-happy said:
lol if they remove all the games you previously bought from them, it will be trolling on another level.

What a thought. I think that would be illegal. Valve would have to refund everybody's money back, surely? :eek:

Tombstone · 3 Jun 2011 at 10:20

ic1male said:
I know people say competition for Steam is good but I want all my games in one place. I don't want to have to have a separate games system for Activision, EA, Valve, Ubisoft, etc. Shame they can't all come together and offer one service for the PC platform.

I can certainly relate to that, I too want all my games in one location. I dont want to have 6 different downloaders on my pc, with 6 different clients, using 6 different voice chats and so forth.

I like to keep all my stuff in steam, one downloader, one client, one chat.

Antar Bolaeisk · 3 Jun 2011 at 10:20

They will keep a few games exclusive to Origin, of that I have no doubt, but to deliberately limit the sales potential of all their products by not stocking them with the single greatest online digital distributor would be madness.

Still, it will be interesting to see what they produce.

niroe · 3 Jun 2011 at 10:24

"To put Origin on the map, EA will make it the only place you can download the huge Star Wars: The Old Republic MMO"

So says Eurogamer whose quoting the Wall Street Journal!

Karma_UK · 3 Jun 2011 at 10:24

A "hypothetical" example of this cross-platform integration would be Battlefield, with EA saying players could rack up experience points on a mobile version of the game that will count towards unlocks on the PC edition."

Why?

So EA can sell the more copies of the mobile version of BF3!!!!

Gee thanks EA, good to see you are thinking of us gamers and not your pockets as usual. A great starting point for your new community.

So what would an online EA community be like? Full of hate and no interaction from EA, that's currently how it is on all there current forums.

Well I don't think EA want us there they just want our money, not a good building block for a community at all.

trigger-happy · 3 Jun 2011 at 10:28

I started ea download manager and it looks like ea store wont be coming on for awhile. there is like a maintenance page.

Frapple · 3 Jun 2011 at 10:29

New EADM is fantastic, wouldn't have a problem replacing Steam with it if it meant a single friends list for all EA Games.

Tefal · 3 Jun 2011 at 10:29

oh god bf3's going to be full of their tat for this or require me to sign into yet another on-line service isn't it?

More importantly i want no game on a system owned by EA when they have a habit of banning users for things not relating to the game.

If valve banned accounts for forum posts then i'd be much more wary about having hundreds of pounds on a steam account.

Frenzy · 3 Jun 2011 at 10:32

Not another one... steam, gog, d2d etc now origin... Please for the love of god someone make a program like trillian that lets you log into them all in one place!