The lights are on
An increased reliance on digital distribution is inevitable, and if EA has its way it's coming sooner than later. Frank Gibeau, president of EA Labels, says a 100-percent digital strategy is in the company's near future.
"It's coming," Gibeau told GamesIndustry International. "We have a clear line of sight on it and we're excited about it. Retail is a great channel for us. We have great relationships with our partners there. At the same time, the ultimate relationship is the connection that we have with the gamer. If the gamer wants to get the game through a digital download and that's the best way for them to get it, that's what we're going to do. It has a lot of enhancements for our business. It allows us to keep more that we make. It allows us to do some really interesting things from a service level standpoint; we can be a lot more personalized with what we're doing,"
Gibeau says that the digital future is broader than simply making its games available on platforms such as its Origin service. Facebook, mobile, and game streaming are all parts of the puzzle, at least as EA sees it.
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I would very much prefer to have the actual disc in my hands. Now people can't share games. Two bad moves. How are people gonna tell their friends how good a game is without sharing it with them? Now, people have no way to know for sure. Plus, tons of people are probably mad about this. Why would you download a game that takes up like 6gb on your hard drives when you can just go to GameStop, Best Buy, or somewhere that sells games and get an actual disc. Then you only have the saves taking up about half a GB. Stupid move EA, stupid move. All you guys at EA better hope that I continue to play BF3 after this, I f**kin love BF3 and I love most of EA's games, but if you are going 100% digital, I dont have the hard drive space or the capacity in my brain to care about buying any more games from you guys. Congratulations! You've just lost a customer! I hope you are proud of yourselves!
Origin is the definition of forceful marketing.
I take this with a grain of salt. The British courts just ruled in favor of consumers' rights to resell digital games. This will eventually happen here too if lobyists dont get in the way. I spent over $150 on iTunes, then my iPod died and my HD got corrupted. Apple says sorry about your luck. I use digital content only when a hard copy is not viable or the price justifies it. And i sure as hell have now learned to back up my data!
behold the power of the dark side
Defeats the purpose of games.
The future scares me.
Hmm this could be interesting..