Crysis 2 and Others Disappear from Steam, EA's Relationship With Steam Unknown [UPDATED]

What's really funny is that EA actually publish Valve's console releases lol 

@sandweed: is it any good though?

If you visit from Sweden, Alice: Madness Returns costs 449 SEK. Do the conversion, comes out at 70 USD.

Visit EA.com, see ad for Alice at 49.99 USD. Click through to store, find the actual price at (equivalent of) 69.99, because I'm not American. Go die in a fire, I never want to support you again.

EDIT: Just want to point out that Steam does this too (except they charge in EUR), and it makes me hate their guts too.

nm

I don't know how this changes things but Alice: Madness Returns was made available on Steam today. Does that nullify Patrick's original statement that it will be disappearing or is that still possible. Also sucks to Vinny because he could have just waited until Friday.

Whatever. I usually get my EA Digital games on Amazon anyway. They're usually a bit cheaper than in other places.

i like how the comments blocks look like they are embossed and popout a bit.

bought crysis2 from ea last weekend

NAW BRO, just use EA's download service, they'll even let you spin infinite brodies in the parking lot! Can Steam do that?! I didn't think so...

This reminds me... I still need to finish the first Crysis...

I wonder what are the specifics of the business terms that made them do that?

NAW BRO, just use EA's download service, they'll even let you spin infinite brodies in the parking lot! Can Steam do that?! I didn't think so...

I like that this article was quoted by PCGamer.com.

@personz said:

@Jeffsekai said:

Good move on EA. People seem to forget that Steam is run by Valve, a video game company and a rival for EA. I mean, can you even buy TF2 or other Valve games anywhere else other than Steam? Nope, double standards need to go away.

you can go to walmart and buy any valve game.

Yea you can buy valve games at retail or on amazon. They all use steam, of course, but that's no different from all EA games using their dumb EA account thing, except steam actually provides a useful service and isn't annoying.

Are games bought through Origin tied to my account (ie if my hard drive crashes can I re-download?) that I can move across new PC builds or OS re-installs . I read something about one time use serial numbers on the origin site which sounds...bad. Anybody know the specifics of Origins DRM?

I fully understand that EA wishes to push for their own service and Steam is operated by a rival, but for to be any interesting at all, they gotta offer better service than they do now. Steam has really done a great job with how easy it is to manage your licenses and re-downloads, which Origin just seem to blow at.

So, for now, I'll stay clear of Origin (it really hurts an old retro guy like myself that they taken the brand of EA finest developer and turned it into a online store) and stick with Steam. Only worry is if Mass Effect 3 (which is really the only EA game I can see any interest in for the coming year) would be Origin exclusive.

Unfortunately, EA is run by a business execs, not gamers, so they do what they think will bring in the most dough, not what's best for the gamer. Overall, it does seem like a step backward, but we'll see I guess.

Please put Battlefield 3 on steam. I really do not want to download another DD Client :(
 
Unless EA is doing something drastically different from Steam with Origin, this was  a foolish move.

Good move on EA. People seem to forget that Steam is run by Valve, a video game company and a rival for EA. I mean, can you even buy TF2 or other Valve games anywhere else other than Steam? Nope, double standards need to go away.

I hate you for this EA.

I will only buy BF3 if the retail copy lets me play for years.

But I don't know that yet. The reason I defend Steam is because I never had problems with it. And it's 4 years I've been using it. I know the early years were problematic but they're already good enough now, and EA is messing things up. I do not agree however with Steam removing Crysis 2. I personally did not buy that game, and in fact I dislike it a lot, but I think it's not right to remove a game because some company decides to run off. At least I hope there's some refunds.

@SeriouslyNow said:

@Vodun said:

@SeriouslyNow: A monopoly means that single individual or organization dominates their market enough that it makes others working in the same market unprofitable or infeasible. They have enough control that they can do as they wish. Steam pretty much dominates digital distribution on the PC and are fairly close to a monopoly, they could probably put down any prices they wish and a lot of customers would still remain with them due to a perceived lack of options. Of course there are competitors, but in the same way there are competitors to Coke and Pepsi in the cola market.

EA choosing to distribute their own products in their own channel is not a monopoly...how can you monopolize your own products? Or rather how can you not? Its by definition only you who produce them...How you choose to distribute these products is entirely up to you.

No. NO. Game retailers seeing EA open their own EA Sports stores would have an entirely different perspective on this. Don't just fantasize what Steam did in your head. They actively competed with other digital distributors on non exclusive, non VALVe product. They do not have a monopoly. They never did. Don't just use the word 'effective' as if justifies your broken logic. Something either is a monopoly or is not. If Steam is a monoploy why were their prices so competitive? Why have so many sales and special offers? Surely, the byproduct of a monopoly is price fixing. Steam isn't a monopoly but EA can certainly monopolize the sales of their own products. Of course you can monopolize your own products when you have previously gone from being a producer and supplier to smashing the supply chain altogether. There are even laws which prevent this from happening in many cases. Here in Australia our national telco was taken to task for exactly the same thing when they were selling DSL to suppliers and other ISPs for exactly the same price they were selling to their own customers. That's a monopoly and a non-competitive business practice. EA will be using these stores as a means of promotion and little more because if they do use them to break the supply chain they could be be in very hot water, legally speaking.

Yeah, I'm fairly certain I never used the word "effective"... Anyway, I can admit that monopoly was the wrong word to use here, but then I don't know the proper semantics to express my opinion. Please excuse my lack of a grasp of the english language.

I don't really see the comparison with an ISP sitting on the sole source of bandwidth with a game producer. Could you litigate against a milk farmer for selling their milk in their own store rather than selling it to a centralized distributor? He's the sole provider of his own milk, but hardly the only producer if that product. Sure, EA is the only one that makes EA games...but they're hardly the only games around.

@Vodun said:

@SeriouslyNow: A monopoly means that single individual or organization dominates their market enough that it makes others working in the same market unprofitable or infeasible. They have enough control that they can do as they wish. Steam pretty much dominates digital distribution on the PC and are fairly close to a monopoly, they could probably put down any prices they wish and a lot of customers would still remain with them due to a perceived lack of options. Of course there are competitors, but in the same way there are competitors to Coke and Pepsi in the cola market.

EA choosing to distribute their own products in their own channel is not a monopoly...how can you monopolize your own products? Or rather how can you not? Its by definition only you who produce them...How you choose to distribute these products is entirely up to you.

No. NO. Game retailers seeing EA open their own EA Sports stores would have an entirely different perspective on this. Don't just fantasize what Steam did in your head. They actively competed with other digital distributors on non exclusive, non VALVe product. They do not have a monopoly. They never did. Don't just use the word 'effective' as if justifies your broken logic. Something either is a monopoly or is not. If Steam is a monoploy why were their prices so competitive? Why have so many sales and special offers? Surely, the byproduct of a monopoly is price fixing. Steam isn't a monopoly but EA can certainly monopolize the sales of their own products. Of course you can monopolize your own products when you have previously gone from being a producer and supplier to smashing the supply chain altogether. There are even laws which prevent this from happening in many cases. Here in Australia our national telco was taken to task for exactly the same thing when they were selling DSL to suppliers and other ISPs for exactly the same price they were selling to their own customers. That's a monopoly and a non-competitive business practice. EA will be using these stores as a means of promotion and little more because if they do use them to break the supply chain they could be be in very hot water, legally speaking.

I don't see how this is a good thing. And what's with the you can have a game for only one year thing? So we're paying full price for renting a game now? No, competition never hurts the consumer.

@SeriouslyNow: A monopoly means that single individual or organization dominates their market enough that it makes others working in the same market unprofitable or infeasible. They have enough control that they can do as they wish. Steam pretty much dominates digital distribution on the PC and are fairly close to a monopoly, they could probably put down any prices they wish and a lot of customers would still remain with them due to a perceived lack of options. Of course there are competitors, but in the same way there are competitors to Coke and Pepsi in the cola market.

EA choosing to distribute their own products in their own channel is not a monopoly...how can you monopolize your own products? Or rather how can you not? Its by definition only you who produce them...How you choose to distribute these products is entirely up to you.

@Vodun said:

I admit, I'm a total Steam junkie. I love what they're doing and reacted with sighs when I heard of Origin. But at the same time...I find this reaction befuddling. The fact that Steam no longer holds a monopoly on this appalls us? We honestly feel that more competition on the market is a bad thing? I can't imagine this reaction in any other business where a monopoly break was attempted.

Monopoly? What monopoly? Do you even know what the word monopoly means? Steam never held a monoply. Impulse, D2D and others of the same ilk let alone OnLIve - all of them sold EA games (and the upcoming GaiKai was set to also). Origin is nothing like Steam. Origin just means EA selling games at retail price, with less chance of sales and more profits to them. Origin is EA trying to make up for the gigantic impending losses of ToR. If anything, Origin's existence, if EA are taking all of their games from other suppliers, is reflective of a real monopoly.

sure was alot of jumping to conclusions on the original story, nice work kotakubomb.com

@theoldhouse: Hopefully this exclusivity is just now in the beginning to get people to use the platform.

I admit, I'm a total Steam junkie. I love what they're doing and reacted with sighs when I heard of Origin. But at the same time...I find this reaction befuddling. The fact that Steam no longer holds a monopoly on this appalls us? We honestly feel that more competition on the market is a bad thing? I can't imagine this reaction in any other business where a monopoly break was attempted.

EA can suck it.
 
I'm sticking with Steam, always.
 
EDIT: Wait, isn't EA the distributor of Valve's retail copies of games? I wonder if that relationship has soured.

So if I understand this right, Steam removed Crysis 2 from their client because Crysis 2

is downloadable elsewhere? I'm too sleepy, but if that's the case, that's.. dumb.

EA claims this is not due to an action of their own, but their decision to make future key EA titles Origin-exclusive was essentially a declaration of war. I really doubt Origin will have what it takes to compete with Steam. Will Origin offer the same kind of neat, random, sales that make Steam so popular with gamers? Unlikely. I feel EA is shooting themselves in the foot by trying to out-muscle Steam. Steam is the king of online PC game sales for a reason.

@HubrisRanger said:

From the scuttlebutt that I've heard around and around, EA isn't the only publisher, major or minor, that is increasingly frustrated with just how much of a cut Valve is taking from every individual sale that is made in the Steam store. If the rumors that this is about the ability to buy DLC in the game directly instead of on the Steam store are accurate, I suspect this is the tip of a much bigger iceberg.

From a consumer standpoint, it would be nice to have a centralized place to buy and play games. But I can also see how from EA's viewpoint, they're just trading their retail relationship with brick and mortar to a similar retail relationship with Valve. One of the benefits of digital distribution is that there is no middle man needed, but I think Valve has entrenched themselves so firmly in the mind of gamers as the go-to company for selling products that they're idolized, despite the fact that they take clear advantage of their position of first-to-market.

well Steam also provides very unobtrusive DRM, voice chat w/ friends list, fast & unlimited re-downloads, and unlimited installs. EA's Origin is a shit sandwich in comparison. If EA actually offered something worthwhile people would be much more receptive.

EDIT: just saw this article made front page on Reddit. Nice.

This is a very bad idea. Origin is going to fail, and the sole saving grace of PC games these days is Steam, so cutting them out of the picture is just ridiculous.

@Xerxes8933A: Perhaps there was a cutoff date for these new terms or a pre-existing agreement. Just throwing out some speculation as I have not seen that actual changes to the terms that valve is using for their third part games on steam.

This is exactly the reason why I never bought any Mass Effect 2 DLC. I desperately wanted to play that stuff but sure as shit wasn't going to buy "bioware points" in order to get it. The transaction was just such a loss for me since there was no way to get the exact amount of points needed to make the purchase so they were forcing me to pay an extra tax on the DLC.

Seriously developers just make your shit easy to purchase. Steam is the best way to do this. Can't you see that this is going to lose you more money in the long run.

@Guibone:

While I agree, I think at this point it's a matter of "I like having all my games in one organized place" for most people. It's like if EA launched it's own store on Xbox/Ps3 and you had to buy anything published by them on there (as well as log into an EA account to play their games online, which you basically already have to do in some cases).

As an Australian I just had a look at the EA Origin web site and I have decided I am not going to use it. Almost all the games on there were asking $79.99 and I have to say If I am going to have to pay that price I would rather go get the retail version. The biggest reason I get online versions is because normally I can get it cheaper than retail. I dont even but games on steam if they are over $69.99 I consider that to be my limit and that is for a Digital deluxe edition or something .

Fuck EA.
 
I don't really play big budget games anymore, and I have a much, much stronger relationship with indie games and developers.
 
Steam is the best platform for these guys, I'm sticking with them and nothing they've done has ever deterred me from their incredible, revolutionary service.

My thoughts on this:

Valve makes free to play games available on steam. They update their terms to state that micro-transactions, DLC, etc. need to be purchased through the steam platform rather than from something inside of the game itself. This allows Valve to actually make business sense of offering free to play games on their digital distribution service.

Crysis 2 DLC is purchased through an in-game interface for the steam version thereby violating these terms.

All I hear is people fighting over money.

Keyword: origin.com. If I had to guess, other EA games like Battlefield 3 won't be on Steam either. I really hope Origin fucking tanks.

Fuck that.  I haven't bought the new Starcraft when it mentioned
it had its own shitty system to login to in order to use it.  Looks like
they kept Darkspore.  It was on sale yesterday on Steam for 40%
off ($30).
 
Like everybody else, I don't want another game management system
outside of Steam.  What I could see happening here is that Steam
buddies up with Mr. Softy or Sorny to rail against evil EA.   EA likes
to create divisivness among the gamers.  Fuck EA, you know?

Console BF3 here I come.

If Crysis 2 dissapears off of my download list or if Steam refuses to support it with patches and updates, I want a full refund of $60 for it!

My thoughts on this:

Valve makes free to play games available on steam. They update their terms to state that micro-transactions, DLC, etc. need to be purchased through the steam platform rather than from something inside of the game itself. This allows Valve to actually make business sense of offering free to play games on their digital distribution service.

Crysis 2 DLC is purchased through an in-game interface for the steam version thereby violating these terms.

Not sure why everyone is getting up in arms about this. It just seems like collateral damage from Valve trying to make steam games even CHEAPER by making them free. Nobody would care about this if the publisher for the game didn't have a competing download service for them to all have knee-jerk reactions about.

I don't see how this is a bad thing at all considering it will allow them to make even better weekend sales and have a more complete catalog of games that had heavy post release support. For example, the Burnout Paradise: The Ultimate Box was meant to contain the game plus all post release content but it in fact is known to be missing cars, etc.

In the end it appears to make steam less of an open platform but in the long run it will make the service better as a whole. I wouldn't weep for Crysis 2 and neither should you.

Doesn't really matter to me. I like Steam as much as the next person but if EA wants to keep more money for themselves instead of sharing with a rival company that is certainly their right to do. As long as Origin is user friendly that is the only thing that matters long term.

yes, because we can totally trust what EA says :rolleyes:

@Kontrapunkt said:

Wonder what Crytek were thinking. What possible digital service at the moment is better than steam?

Origin, of course. And GameStop.

Right?