EA's new motto: please pirate our games... er, storefronts

[nemowolf]

From Ars Technica:

EA doesn't mind piracy of Sims 3, as retail customers get the whole experience. In fact, please pirate the company's future games. Why? EA is selling a service, not a game. Consider everything that comes on the disc a demo; the real value is online.

Interesting indeed. If they have truelly changed their stance on this i want to know what they are going to be doing about DRM in their games...

[KarmaKiller]

Well, I can tell ya the people on some websites *cough* TPB *cough* took their advice.


also there are cracked copies that allow for online gameplay out there.

[thephilosophizer]

I really do think that this is the real future of not only video games, but digital media generally. Already we see this with netflix and their instant play movies, and there have been some services to start trying this with music, though that doesn't seem to have really taken off.
I'll be honest, I don't generally buy games that don't have an online component. The value of a game that has multiplayer, or other significant online features is significantly higher than a game that doesn't.
In the end I would rather pay $100 to valve for full steam access, than just buy one or two games a year. On that note I do think steam serves as a good model for managing video games. And I do believe that Valve made a similar statement in relation to the release of L4D, though they did seem to start pumping the sequel pretty quickly.