Tag: EA

EA To End “Online Passes”

On By WinstonIn Pop Culture, Uncategorized, Video Games4 Comments

I was catching up on my gaming news this morning when I learned that EA (Electronic Arts) has decided to do away with their online pass program.  Apparently the damage to their reputation was costing them more than they were making.  I was working at Blockbuster when they announced the program and I saw gamers reactions up close.  None of it was positive.

A few years later, EA finally seems to have read the writing on the wall….. Not to mention the profanity and occasional threats on the forums.  I understand why they did it in the first place.  The used and rental markets were eating up huge amounts of bandwidth on their servers without generating any revenue for them.  To reduce the overload, they introduced the online pass.  It was included free with new games, and allowed access to the online portion of the game on the account that registered it.

This of course meant that if you bought used, rented or borrowed from a buddy, you couldn’t play online unless you bought an online pass for an extra $10.  While this reduced the less on EAs servers, it also alienated a huge number of gamers who saw it as nothing more than a naked cash grab.  Used game resellers were forced to lower the prices on their EA titles to offset the cost of the pass and so lower their margins.  Long story short, nobody but EA really liked the program.  Its not actually over-stating things to say it was pretty much universally hated.  To their credit, EA has finally listened.

This proves two things.  EA isn’t just a giant, greedy corporation.  They can and do, listen to their customers.  They do understand that gamers are the people paying their bills.  They also understand that sometimes the extra revenue just isn’t worth the hit to their image.  Secondly, if you aren’t happy with how a company is treating you, nothing gets their attention like voting with your wallet.  If enough people do it, even an industry giant like EA is going to notice.

I admire any company that’s willing to admit they made a bad call.  Even more so when they decide to un-make it.  Not only are they not requiring online passes in new games, they’re phasing them out on existing titles as well.  That’s being a responsive company.  It will take a while to undo the damage to their corporate image, but at least its a start.

Well done EA.

Cheers, Winston

EA To Sell Gamers To Advertisers.

On By WinstonIn Media, Pop Culture, Society, Technology, Uncategorized, Video GamesLeave a comment

The nice people at Electronic Arts (commonly know as EA) are rolling out a new service called “Legend”.  Sounds impressive right?  Well here’s the thing, it’s not.  At least not for gamers.  Or is it?

Confused?  Sorry.  I’ve got some mixed feelings about this one myself.  First, let me tell you what “Legend” is.  It’s an analytic tool which EA will use to provide advertisers with detailed usage habits of it’s products.  This would allow advertisers to be much more specific in their marketing efforts.

From the corporate side, this is a potential goldmine.  If it works as (you should pardon the joke) “advertised”, there isn’t a marketing department in the industry that won’t want a piece of it.  On the player side, my first instinct is, “Oh goody.  More ads shoved in my face while I’m gaming.”

But maybe I’m looking at this wrong.  Not that that ever happens, but maybe this one time.

Maybe this time, they’ll start to get it right.  What if they use this marketing data to develop a functional “less is more” approach?  How about using this new analytic to create ads which are more effective, and can therefore be less pervasive.  That could work out to being good news for gamers.

Only time will tell.  But if the vendors in Fallout New Vegas start trying to sell me a “Simpsons” t-shirt to go with my new “West 49” board shorts, then I’ll decide whether or not it’s a good thing.

Cheers, Winston