The lights are on
Update: We had a chance to talk with Electronic Art's VP of corporate communications, Jeff Brown, and he spoke towards why EA has decided to abandon online passes.
"There's not much to say. The online pass came out in 2010. It was a way of packaging together a suite of post-launch content and services for people. There was also an element for people who bought the game second sale. It never really caught on. People didn't like it. People told us that they didn't like it and you know, we went through a cycle and we're about to put out some new games and we just decided not to do that anymore. We're 100 percent committed to creating on-going content and services so the consumers get more value out of the game – you know games like Battlefield and FIFA where there's all sorts of new things that get added all the time – but the whole idea of packaging it up with an online pass, clearly it was not popular, so we listened to people and we stopped doing it."
We asked if this new policy will affect released games that have existing online pass structures, and Brown said he would check on that question and get back to us.
Original story: Electronic Arts has decided to leave the controversial system that requires players to purchase or redeem a code to access a game's online features behind.
EA's senior director of corporate communications John Reseburg confirmed the discontinuation of the program in an e-mail to VentureBeat. Reseburg said EA launched the online pass program, "As an effort to package a full menu of online content and services, many players didn’t respond to the format. We’ve listened to the feedback and decided to do away with it moving forward.”
This certainly isn't the end to online passes appearing in other games, but moving forward, Electronic Arts titles won't require you to either purchase an online pass, or redeem a code to play online. It's good news, especially when you consider our predictions of a world where the online pass has run rampant.
[Source: Venture Beat]
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BREAKING NEWS ... EA listens to customers, does something right. More.....at 11.
That's good news for a lot of people. I've always been indifferent about the online passes, but I know most people hated them.
EA its about time you did something for us. Thanks.
All great things come one step at a time
Maybe after getting the worst company award 2 years straight EA thought they should rethink their business structure. Either way I think that's a great first step, especially for all the gamers that buy a lot of used games.
This is the best news I've heard in a long time. The Online Pass takes away personal ownership of a game, and (in America at least) if I buy something, it is 100% mine. Online passes allow the publisher to maintain ownership of their games after launch, which is illegal. If you sell something, you don't own it anymore. Hopefully Sony and Ubisoft (and anyone else using online passes) will follow suit.
please ubisoft do the same.
*Slow clap* You finally figured it out EA. Want a cookie?
that's awesome .. i think online passes are just stupid to begin with anyways
About friggin' time.
EA actually doing something nice?! I think I'm drinking a lot of Coke to be hearing this news. It might have something to do with the new CEO maybe.
Good job EA, finally some good news about the company.
Aka they started losing more money cause people refuse to buy used games with an online pass, than how much money they were making from them
To those who complain about how they feel EA lied when it said that they online passes were for the good of the consumer (and not just so that they could cut into the used games market) OF COURSE they aren't going to tell the truth. But in this case does the already known truth even matter? They got rid of it, which is more important than their reasoning behind it. It's basic PR.
Whoa whoa whoa...EA...EA...listened...to the customers?