Can EA really pull content out of games?

[sanquin]

Did you buy the game from a retailer, and was the co-op feature visible on the box? (As in, did the box/description promise co-op?) If so, then EA is definitely violating consumer laws. When you buy a game from a store you basically make a contract that you get everything that's been promised in the description/on the box, while not being allowed to make illegal copies of it and reselling them. If the feature for co-op was promised, and you can't play co-op then EA violated that contract.

Only when the game is no longer buy able in stores and only obtainable second-hand, THEN they can shut down the service after a while.

 

[Terminate421]

Not sure what the original purpose of live was, but nowadays its mearly a "tax" to play online through the xbox console. Its a ripoff, when Playstation and the PC both offer free online, instead of being another payment on top of your internet/ game subscription costs

Oh for the love of god, do not start that argument. Xbox live is great, even for a measly 7 bucks a month. (or 60$ a year, the price of a game, which one would be getting anyway)

EDIT: I'd they begin to pull actual content that was popular, like say, Bad Company 2's multiplayer, then I'll be pissed.

 

[zehydra]

EA, not even once.

Somehow they did it. Against all odds, they became worse than Activision.

Lol, since when were they ever NOT worse than Activision?

 

[AdamRhodes]

My friend and I picked up two copies of Army of Two: 40th Day, only to find out when we get home that it doesn't support system link multiplayer. Plus it doesn't even have subtitles. FUCKING SUBTITLES! At this point, I wouldn't be surprised if subtitles were released as an invisible patch alongside some DLC.

 

[Kargathia]

Spoiler

Spoiler: snip snap

Ah yes, but trade isn't a 1 way street. It is in fact your problem because if they cannot turn a profit your service still stops. They are not cutting services on tiles that have successful ways of supporting the title.

You are always walking the knife edge between customer satisfaction and loss of profit. The customer wouldn't pay anything and get everything if it were completely up to them. Afterall they are just trying to get the best deal. Just like the publisher.

The key is to cut the cake so both side walk away happy. Its not just about making the customer happy. Yeah the customer has the power to buy, but the publisher has the power to sell. The value must be determined by both parties. It reminds me of Jim Sterling's video about "Games are to expensive" that boiled the argument down to "If games were cheaper more people could get them". Yeah well its not just about getting more people to get them. If the publishers made everything free then everyone would be able to get them, but the publisher wouldn't get any money.

Now Valve has done this brilliantly. How do they subsidize old services that uses Steamworks for their matchmaking, but forcing you to use Steam. By getting Steam on your computer they increase the chance of you buying something on Steam increasing profits overall. In other words. Titles become worth maintaining by adding value to the Steam service that then gets subsidize by future purchases.

It certainly tends to be the producer who always is walking the knife's edge when it comes to gaming, as gamers not buying their products means they go out of business, while them not making games is hardly going to make a dent in any customer's life (obsessive fanboys should die anyway).

But when it comes to actual reality I'm all in favour of customers aggressively pushing for terms most favourable to them - mostly as nobody else is going to do it - but also because it breeds innovation, both in artistic terms, and business strategies.
It's exactly the same thing as we're seeing at the piracy debate next door: companies either try and forcefully suppress it, or they evolve and adapt.

In that context I'd call it a good thing for companies to be walking a knife's edge. The problem, however, is when you get large multinationals such as EA trying to steamroll their way over the knife by squeezing every last cent from their customers because they can.

And while I'm somewhat reluctant to consider any argument posed by Jim Sterling for anything but its comedic value, I'll point out that "if X is cheaper more people will buy it" really is nothing more than basic economics. The same basic economics as the ones that are getting horribly mangled when it comes to gaming: things just don't seem to work that way over here.
On one side EA and its ilk are constantly proving just how much you can get away with before people collectively call you out as a fraud.
On the other hand you see Valve gleefully disproving the basic inverted linear relation between price and units moved: it appears that a 75% discount increases sales by about 5000%.

Consumers also are perfectly willing to pay for entertainment: Radiohead had their own little experiment on the music side of things, and the humble bundle is doing something compatible on this corner of the entertainment block.

It of course would be heresy to suggest that good customer services (and the simple act of not being a dick) in any way, shape, or form increases the amount of people willing to pay for your products.

Which concludes our detour into the wild thickets of my rambling, and brings us right back to the whole issue of cutting support for games relatively soon after release - especially when combined with online passes.

It makes you look like a dick, and thereby effectively shoots long-term planning in the foot. Which is pretty much what EA appears to be doing right now - and I for one can't wait to kiss this particular dinosaur goodbye.

(Somehow I doubt anyone managed to hang on to that train of thought. My apologies - cerebral functions seem to be somewhat... different at 6am.)

I think you are going off my message.

Extremely likely. sleep deprivation does funny things. But I've had some sleep now, and suddenly things seem a lot less... purple.

I am not saying anything about being against customers trying to get a better deal.

What I am saying is that with the spread of online gaming a large amount of services showed up. In the customers mind they were free, but in reality they cost money.

Now we are at an crossroad. Give up on the service or find a method for paying for them. We cannot expect to have services and then not pay for them. And before you go "it was paid for when we bought the game", no... that is the whole point of a service... you dont get to own it.

If the customer will keep stomping his feet and saying "NO I WANT THE SERVICE! BUT YOU ARE DICKS FOR BILLING ME!" then the choice will be made for you.

These are your options:
- Give up on your service
- Find a way to pay for them

Actual costs, and business models of online services will vary heavily, which is why I'll stick with debating this purely on the customer side of things for a moment.

Setting the impression that online match-making is a freebie included with the game, only to present the bill a few months later, or pull support entirely is a bad move that was badly communicated.

First of all it doesn't even need to happen: clients are perfectly capable of match-making[footnote]It won't be as sophisticated as eg. Steam's, but even a "connect to IP" function beats having fuck-all[/footnote] and hosting small games such as Army of Two.
Even if client versions of the game couldn't handle simultaneously playing and hosting the game, then a server client - while not required - is not an unreasonable thing to release, certainly if you don't want to foot the bill of dedicated servers years into a game's lifespan.

Secondly: while charging customers for services could easily be construed as reasonable, we are in a situation where "reasonable" seems to be nothing but faint nostalgia.
In triple-A land there's the magic of online passes, cut content, reams of DLC, and the complete and utter absence of any adjustment to RRP to reflect reduced costs of digital distribution(PC only, that one).
With an in-depth explanation many of these things can be understood, but that doesn't diminish the fact they're badly communicated towards the customer, who increasingly feels like he's being squeezed. This is further aggravated by a steadily increasing customer sophistication, who really do want to hear about what's going on - and not just have things like this sprung on them without any kind of advance warning. Many of them (not all) are not stupid, and yet are treated as such.

In the end it's nothing more than yet another drop in the bucket of patience people will have with these old business models.

You are still stepping around it.

Your first point.
Yeah they can host the sessions independently, but you still need a third part that collects the lists of a available hosts. You dont search willy nilly on the net. No you have a location where location where sessions are gathered and that is a service. The alternative you can have is direct IP connection where you have to know the IP of the person you want to play with.

Just saying, but there's a footnote down there noting that even a bare-bones "connect to IP" beats having exactly nothing.

Your Second point

while charging customers for services could easily be construed as reasonable, we are in a situation where "reasonable" seems to be nothing but faint nostalgia.

Then show the alternative. I went through 3 models before all with heavy consumer backlash. What is the reasonable method that works for the console?

You will have to make
No micro-transaction
No subscription
And as you pointed out, the service must be sold with on resale

Right of resale is what is killing it for the console market lowering the shelf time to a bare minimum.

What is your alternative?
How will you pay for an ongoing system where the system is currently rigged so it can only pay for 3 months?

There doesn't even need to be a major alternative business model - the main reason for consumer backlash is not because they have to pay, but because they feel they are getting squeezed.
I'm sure it feels for you that I'm side-stepping the topic, but this is a very much straight-on answer.

Many of those reviled payment models are perfectly workable, but the communication around them is horrible. EA's PR department is a notorious example, but they are only one of many who simply don't have a clue how one should not alienate their customers.

The moment they stop treating their customers as mindless sheep waiting to be shorn, is when suddenly most of that backlash against payment models evaporates - and the sheep can be shorn anyway.

Or in practical terms:

- Provide match-making for the entirety of a game's lifespan, not your sales span, and if that's over, then provide the tools so players can still play.
- Don't punish paying customers for what the pirates are doing. DRM is a no-win situation, where your best-case scenario is you generating a massive backlash (think Diablo 3).
- Try and keep your code as open as possible. People like modding, and having the feeling they can actually screw around with the game as they see fit - as opposed to being rail-roaded down the exact route(s) the development team wanted them to take. (Admittedly this is almost exclusively a PC thing, but even consoles would benefit from accessible)
- Be upfront about your payment models: you want to gently remind people about the option to buy your stuff, not try and sneak it past their back.
- Watch. Your. PR. Big one. Done by doing little things such as not suing every time you have the chance, and if you have to, make sure to pass it off as "unfortunate lawyer business that sadly needs doing".
Spontaneously donating a few copies of your latest game to crippled orphans also does help.
- Be human. WoW's customer service is a good example: there are entire sites dedicated to memorable and funny GM conversations - and those probably have had a better effect on customer satisfaction than their actual help with ingame issues.

The list goes on. Bottom line stays the same: Don't look like a dick.

 

[fix-the-spade]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but wouldn't I be the host of the game? Not EA?

Yep, but Xbox Live (and PSN) actively prevents you from hosting games that are no longer supported, whether it's matchmaking or Peer to Peer, once the switch is flicked you can no longer use the online modes.

All publishers on both systems can pull features when they like without any advance notice. If you think that stinks, then you'd be right.

Unfortunately, people continue to buy the games.

 

[Kargathia]

You are still not showing me an alternative.

You are going around the subject matter and making it a PR question. It isn't a PR question. It is a direct method question. My general idea i kill the used games industry and go into a full distribution service equal to that of almost every digital distribution. Increasing the shelf life indefinitely and subsidizing the service cost into future purchases.

I am trying to break it down to its bear bones. I know what you want here, but how do you intend to pay for it?

How do you intend to pay for something for for the full games lifetime that only pays for itself for 3 months?

You need the money to have the service. Not a point you can step around. Where will you take the from?

Its not about looking like a dick. It is how would you make it work?

Also.... why do you even go "Keep the code open"? On a console? Not really their choice now is it.

The first problem to be solved is very much a PR issue - one can't effectively introduce new payment schemes when there's going to be a significant backlash just because they don't like you.
And even in the current payment scheme I'd definitely see it as important to keep up match-making services for afore-mentioned reasons - even if they're not directly getting paid for by sales it's a worthwhile investment. Matchmaking for locally hosted games is not exactly server-intensive by any stretch of the imagination.

 

[Kargathia]

You are still not showing me an alternative.

You are going around the subject matter and making it a PR question. It isn't a PR question. It is a direct method question. My general idea i kill the used games industry and go into a full distribution service equal to that of almost every digital distribution. Increasing the shelf life indefinitely and subsidizing the service cost into future purchases.

I am trying to break it down to its bear bones. I know what you want here, but how do you intend to pay for it?

How do you intend to pay for something for for the full games lifetime that only pays for itself for 3 months?

You need the money to have the service. Not a point you can step around. Where will you take the from?

Its not about looking like a dick. It is how would you make it work?

Also.... why do you even go "Keep the code open"? On a console? Not really their choice now is it.

The first problem to be solved is very much a PR issue - one can't effectively introduce new payment schemes when there's going to be a significant backlash just because they don't like you.
And even in the current payment scheme I'd definitely see it as important to keep up match-making services for afore-mentioned reasons - even if they're not directly getting paid for by sales it's a worthwhile investment. Matchmaking for locally hosted games is not exactly server-intensive by any stretch of the imagination.

You are still avoiding my question.

I know they need better PR, but what method would you implement for payment?

Do I need to spell this out? Costs for matchmaking servers for locally hosted games can and should be covered by up-front sales revenue - especially as matchmaking can easily be set in a single larger service, such as Steam, uPlay, Origin, or even Gamespy.

A single service can easily cover many games, so that even lesser-played games aren't hogging any more CPU cycles and bandwidth than strictly neccessary.

I'm sorry, but it really is a stupid question - especially as I'm reasonably sure that for a bare-bones matchmaking system my PC and internet connection would suffice.

 

[ElPatron]

I think EA are pretty cool. They stop supporting older games so you'll buy the new ones. Meh. Pretty standard business move there, right across pretty much all industries. Some of my favourite games of recent times have been made possible by them, like Crysis for example <3

Cars do not self-destruct when a new model is released. There are shotguns several decades old that grandfathers around the world still use. I think that first generation iPads still work. Heck, not even consoles kill themselves when a new generation come out.

Somehow I don't believe that every industry does the same.

 

[neonsword13-ops]

They did the same thing to Brutal Legend on PS3.

I was planning on having some crazy online battles with my friends. Guess that wasn't happening under EA's watch.

Odd thing is, they also pulled all of the DLC and the demo as if to say that they never released the game on PS3 all together.

Bastards.

 

[Nightmare99]

I think EA are pretty cool. They stop supporting older games so you'll buy the new ones. Meh. Pretty standard business move there, right across pretty much all industries. Some of my favourite games of recent times have been made possible by them, like Crysis for example <3

Cars do not self-destruct when a new model is released. There are shotguns several decades old that grandfathers around the world still use. I think that first generation iPads still work. Heck, not even consoles kill themselves when a new generation come out.

Somehow I don't believe that every industry does the same.

As cars age and the warranties expire the car companies make money off of repair parts, accessories and so on. People still have to buy new ammunition for an old shotgun. Old consumer electronics do not cost the producer money to keep them running. Keeping game servers running is not free, and unless there is some sort of micro-transaction system in place there is no way to pay for these ongoing costs once new copies of the game are no longer selling.

The examples you provided are totally inapplicable to this situation. You might as well have said they should keep these old servers running because McDonalds still sells cheeseburgers.

 

[ElPatron]

As cars age and the warranties expire the car companies make money off of repair parts, accessories and so on.

Not the same thing. You're not forced to pay for EA's maintenance. Plus, you have always the choice of

1. Not even having a car long enough for it to have problems
2. Choose a reliable car
3. Choose kickoff brands. Stupid, but still a choice.

EA's move would be the same as Honda walking up to your car and just shoot the engine. Hey, you can still get inside, but you can't move. And no replacement engines for sale.

People still have to buy new ammunition for an old shotgun.

Because you are forced to buy ammunition from the same manufacturer.

Hint: you don't. You can buy a firearm and not pay one cent to the manufacturer in ammo. Buying a Benelli? Buy Federal ammo. Buying a Winchester? Don't buy Winchester ammo. Or even just buy the supplies and reload your own ammunition.

Ammunition is only necessary for the firing of a weapon, it will cycle and fire "dry" all day. It will not lock itself when a new model arrives. In this case ammunition is a better analogue to internet bills.

Keeping game servers running is not free, and unless there is some sort of micro-transaction system in place there is no way to pay for these ongoing costs once new copies of the game are no longer selling.

You mean in a world where P2P services are increasing in popularity?

The examples you provided are totally inapplicable to this situation. You might as well have said they should keep these old servers running because McDonalds still sells cheeseburgers.

I am pretty sure you don't thought any of your analogies through because they make no sense at all.

I just said that not every industry pulls that move, contrary to what you said. McDonalds never suspended their cheeseburgers so the analogy falls flat on it's face.

 

[Aprilgold]

Not sure what the original purpose of live was, but nowadays its mearly a "tax" to play online through the xbox console. Its a ripoff, when Playstation and the PC both offer free online, instead of being another payment on top of your internet/ game subscription costs

Not only that, but both are probably more secure then XBLA. I remember having to reactivate my account three times and eventually just created a new one because someone kept hacking it. Different passwords that were polar opposites of eachother and it was hacked three times within about two weeks.

Not only that, but if the point of XBLA is to have a fun, secure online experience they haven't kicked the sexist, racist, homophobic and generally dick kids on the service.

I honestly rarely find people who are actual dicks and not just kidding on PC or PSN but find them on the ass-load on XBLA.

To end it, Live was originally made to support the Xbox version of Halo's multiplayer so that you could play via wifi, now you see how big its expanded. I may be wrong, you might want to wiki-search it, but that is what I have heard all the time.

Anyways, this isn't about XBLA, its about EA and whether they can take away content from games and the answer is yes, they can. They won't release something that a developer makes [a form of the above] can demand that the developers don't release the game or DLC with this certain item or mechanic. They can do whatever they want with who they own and that is why they are evil.

 

[Nightmare99]

snip

I understand what you are saying. The example I gave was intentionally flawed. The difference between online play in a console game and a car or shotgun is that the online play (at least with dedicated servers rather than P2P) is a service. A service that has a cost to it. A better example might be OnStar or a similar system in a car. You are welcome to keep the car, but if you do not sign up and pay for OnStar beyond the initial period that comes with buying the car you lose access to that service.

I guess why the other examples didn't really work for me was that no manufacturer comes and destroys an object that you have purchased from them after a set period. Even if online servers are shut down (most) games still have their offline single player (and rarely offline local mulitplayer). You don't lose the game, you just lose access to a service after a certain time, longer with more popular games, shorter with games that sell poorly. If you buy a satellite dish you have to pay a subscription to keep using it even though you have already paid for the dish because programing and all the equipment used to transmit cost money to buy, maintain and upgrade. What I was getting at is that with most games and their online modes there is no way to pass the cost of this upkeep on to the consumer without MTs. All dedicated online servers eventually shut down once the demand dies off. They shut down the sports game servers often shortly after the next years version comes out. The question to ask is how long is long enough in terms of keeping these servers up and running at no additional cost to the consumer?

This is one arena where console games really fall flat when compared to PC games. With PC, you have games that have been long since abandoned by their creators kept alive online by players hosting their own servers. The way they have consoles locked down currently that just isn't the case.