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EA Access Members Get Six Hours Of Madden Before Release
EA has today shed some light on a key EA Access feature. Early game time isn’t new to EA (the company offered it as part of the EA Sports Season Ticket a few years back). This incarnation is slightly different, though.
According to EA, players won’t have unlimited playtime when Madden goes live for EA Access members five days before the August 26 release. Instead, users will get six hours of gameplay.
We’ve reached out to EA for clarification about whether that is actual in-game time (rather than idling on the menus), what happens if the clock expires during an in-progress game, and whether those six hours will be usable post-release or if that offer expires come August 26. We’ll update should we receive a response.
In addition to early game time (which will not replace demos, according to EA, with FIFA and NHL as evidence), EA Access offers players the opportunity to download and play catalog titles in “the vault.” EA has promised that titles will not be removed from the roster, indicating that the $5 per month ($30 per year) service will increase in value as more games are included.
[Source: EA Access]
Our Take
Those who bought into the old EA Sports Season Ticket are likely to be disappointed by this more limited incarnation. For everyone else who might be interested in EA’s broader offerings, this might be interpreted quite differently.
Unfortunately, the communication up front wasn’t entirely specific. While EA did say that amount of time in-game would vary from title to title, laying out the details of the first early play time game might have, in hindsight, helped set expectations.
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