23 replies to this topic

[duke_Qa]

http://kotaku.com/50...from-your-games

According to a post in the Red Alert 3 forum by 'eeapoc' (Apparently, C&C Community Manager Aaron Kaufman) EA is implementing a new policy that will tie your forum login to your Master EA Account. If you get hit with the ban hammer for misbehaving in a forum, you could find that you are locked out of your purchased games as well.

Now isn't that a fine way to sweeten the DRM pill .
Not that i personally would bother enough to join such forums(hell, it might be a good way to discourage the users i expect in such official forums), it is not unlikely that in the future you could get banned for pretty much anything if they feel like it.

[Soul]

It's lame is what it is, EA are such idiots.

Edited by Soul, 30 October 2008 - 08:41 PM.

[Phil]

The original thread; scroll down a few posts to see the relevant bits.

Yay for arbitrariness. Buying (read: "renting") a game from EA steadily turns into an adhesion contract (not sure if it's the right translation).

[duke_Qa]

hehe, I can see the good intentions that paved this road. Its a bit like politics now, one bad step and the wolves will come for you.

What comes around goes around i guess... as they say, karma is a bitch.

[Caspa]

So here's something to consider. You buy games from them. You get banned. They take away what you've paid for, without any intentions of giving your money back. Can anyone smell a digital theft case along the way?

Edited by Caspa, 31 October 2008 - 06:54 AM.

[Blodo]

If that is the case, then hopefully they will get sued beyond recognition. All the more reason to download Red Alert 3 instead of buying it though.

[ambershee]

Jesus christ, that's ridiculous. I spot a proper boycotting campaign coming on.

[Mastermind]

http://www.shacknews...article.x/55656
Getting banned from the forums won't ban you from the games.

[duke_Qa]

yeah, i figured they would come out soon and put out the fire somehow. it was pretty much to idiotic to be true. lets just hope that they don't shoot the messenger and fire apoc because of it, because that would probably not make things better.

[Ash]

That was too ridiculous even for EA. Enough people have boycotted them already, I foresee a lot more. Myself included, where possible.

I remember when EA used to be such a nice company, making stuff like Urban Strike and the James Pond series, as well as the yearly-update FIFA. Now they are quite possibly the worst thing to happen to gamers outside of mumorpergers.

[Romanul]

It reminds me the crap that happens in my country,you know.

Here you don't have the right to complain about the state,or else,you have to pay some pretty big bills.That means that the state is lately telekinetical,or maybe an psychic.

It seems EA is an psychic too,and,believe me,here there are way too many complains about the state,so for them its sometimes pretty hard to give those bills.

I think somebody out there should cut those money given to EA,or maybe an big share of rights,to bring them back to reality.

[Ash]

Hm, maybe EA should really rethink their corporate sales/DRM strategy, because that revenue surge won't last long if sensible gamers catch wind of it.

EA apparently "Sorely needs" the $50mil they'll save by laying off 500 employees. Someone explain to me how 500 people equates to 50 mil. Someone further explain how EA doesn't have the money to sustain a loss for a bit. They have nearly a billion dollars to their name. What are they spending all the money on?

[ambershee]

Chicks, cars and crack.

500 people can equate to 50 million in about 3-4 years on average salaries of just under 30k (graduate entry level) to around 40k (a few years experience). The number is justified, unfortunately.

[Blodo]

It's not just wages, it's also the cost of maintaining the office space, supplies, additional energy used, etc. What really astounds me is how they put 150 million bucks into a direct download service for their games. 150 million dollars. For what? A few servers and a website that serves files? If they put a million to it, it would be outrageous, nevermind 150...

[Alias]

What are they spending all the money on?

On all this fucking marketing bullshit, instead of actually on the games.

Edited by Alias, 01 November 2008 - 05:20 AM.

[Ash]

ROFL blodo, you make a point there. Stardock spent fuck all on theirs (Impulse) and it's the best one that's ever been made! Steam isn't even a patch on it. And no doubt EA's is full of big brother bollocks, along with Starforce and SecuROM's secret lovechild, etc. Oh and they'll make you pay a monthly fee to use it, like Games for Windows LIVE or something.

[Rawlo]

xbox live is free, you only have to pay to play games online, and I doubt strongly that they would put the same system in place for PCs simply because the backlash would be massive

Edited by Rawlo, 01 November 2008 - 11:54 AM.

[ambershee]

They'll do it. G4L did it, EA are but a step away already. It'll be free for a while though - give it a year. Then give it a bit longer after that before paying for the service becomes compulsory in order to run any games...

[Ash]

Thank God they aren't locking the poor souls who got a misprint in their RA3 manual out...

EDIT: corrected typo - had originally put CNC3, not RA3. Thanks Ambershee.

Edited by Ash, 04 November 2008 - 04:06 PM.

[ambershee]

You mean RA3 ?

It's nice to know I could write a brute-force program to give me every valid CD-Key.