Used Game To Survive? EA Plans To Drop Online Pass

Krazy Kanuck writes "Introduced in 2010, Online Pass was marketed as a way to 'preserve' online content or DLC as titles were sold in the used game market. Many saw this as a way to cut out the second hand game market. EA has now decided to end this program 'partly because the players didn't like it.' Unfortunately this appears to only be for future released games, those previously released will still be subject to this feature. Activision and Ubisoft still use this form of content control, it will be interesting to see if they follow suit."

Of course...

[Hsien-Ko]

What good's an online pass when they shut down the game's master server after a year?

From the likes of EA, sure....

[grasshoppa]

But EA doesn't encompass the entirety of the gaming industry. And while yes, many larger software and hardware companies are following suit with the hostility to consumers, this creates an amazing environment for indie game development companies to flourish.

Which, frankly, is exciting. I'm tired of the same ol' crap from companies too scared to take risks.

Re:Of course...

[Sylak]

because it was for console games, and those are more to the whim of the console's network maintainer than the publisher

Umm...

[JMJimmy]

" Unfortunately this appears to only be for future released games, those previously released will still be subject to this feature"

Will they or will free codes be made available? There seems to be no concrete information on this anywhere.

Good Riddance

[medv4380]

I've never bought an online pass and never will. I won't even tough BioShock Infinite because of the Season Pass on the shelves at GameStop. I'll wait until the games drops in price and all relevant dlc comes bundled. I will not by and Online Pass, Season Pass, or any other such money grab nonsense. They can take their project 10 dolla, and eat it. However, I suspect this is just getting rid of one demon and replacing it with another.