I remember as a child making my mom drive me down to the local movie rental store (a now defunct place called “Ins & Outs”). It was there I would experience the best that my small town could offer in the way of Super Nintendo, Genesis, and N64 games. Despite their small selection, I recall renting great games like Mario RPG and Pilotwings64. I also recall some terrible ones (Mace: The Dark Age anyone?).
This was during the age of the gaming magazine, before the Internet blew up, and way before amateurs like me got to write my opinion on a public forum like Pixelated Geek. If you didn’t have a subscription to EGM or Nintendo Power, you picked the game based on the box art — gameplay be damned.
Now imagine if you could only play 50% of the game you just rented, until you paid the publisher twice the cost of renting the game. Congratulations! You’ve just bought EA’s online pass, designed to force gamers to buy new for something that arguably wasn’t worth $60 in the first place. Now EA is being sued for exactly this problem.
Monopolizing
A class action lawsuit was filed against EA in December of last year. This suit finally moved forward at the beginning of April and, although many legal experts and industry insiders predict the suit doesn’t have a leg to stand on, the fact that a suit actually went to trial addressing EA’s purchase of many exclusive sports licenses and their overpricing of resulting games is intriguing.
Many will remember that EA bought out the NFL license in 2004, and later acquired the NCAA and AFL licenses . This made EA the exclusive publisher of any and all sports titles related to known American football teams. EA has, since 2004, been able to release a game of any quality, good or bad, containing the NFL license. This effectively turned EA into a game factory, with only minor improvements in its franchises over the years. Some would even argue that sports games whose licenses on which EA did not have a monopoly also took a hit.
The problem with the EA online pass is that our choices are already limited. If EA has control of the content and the access to said content, what power does the buyer hold? Is EA’s ultimate goal to control every aspect of the gaming market? Some might argue that EA is just looking for an excuse to get some lost revenue back, not taking into account gamers who weren’t going to purchase their overpriced incremental sports update yearly anyway, but who elect to rent instead. Punishing gamers who didn’t buy their games new proves that EA is only thinking about the bottom line, not the consumers who enable them to generate so much of the revenue in the first place.
Stifling Innovation
With a monopoly comes industry stagnation. The motivation to out-perform or out-innovate one’s competitors is erased, which completely removes any room or need for growth or innovation. The closest thing to true competition that EA has had on the football front has been 505’s Backbreaker, a game that utilizes the Euphoria natural motion physics engine allowing for realistic physics and “backbreaking” tackles. Madden has used some pre-scripted PRO-TAK actions in the past, but nothing breathtakingly innovative.
Backbreaker sadly flopped in the sales department, due to a very buggy release and absence of the NFL license. Even so, 505 released it’s first game at a lower price point than Madden, further proof that it is indeed possible to recognize the value of the game that you release, something that EA has lost touch with.
Imagine if Activision bought a skateboarding license, preventing game’s like EA’s own Skate from being made. Skate succeeded because it innovated over the stale formula of the Tony Hawk franchise. I know that many will argue that EA doesn’t have a monopoly on American Football as a whole, but I think that many would agree that the NFL and the sport it represents are synonymous.
True Value
The crux of the argument comes from the value. Gamers, I believe wrongly, have voted with their wallets year after year, purchasing every yearly update to Madden, NCAA, or AFL games. Are we truly getting enough for our $60?
To put it in perspective, Take-Two’s ESPN 2k5 retailed at $20, against Madden NFL 2005 which retailed at the then industry standard $50. In many players’ eyes, 2k5 was the superior game for that year, even rivaling it in sales numbers. Take-Two may have realized at the time that the way to beat EA was to look out for the customer, and to charge a fair price.
The question remains: is the current Madden NFL 12 worth its $60 price tag? Let’s look at the differences between the edition set to be released this year, compared to last year’s model. Aside from an obvious yearly graphical upgrade, Madden NFL 12 boasts a new “surprise onside kick play,” as well as tuner set downloads, something that tweaks gameplay and bugs ever so slightly over the game’s lifespan, a feature that has become standard on all EA sports games. That’s it, folks. You are effectively paying for a new play and for EA to bring out small patches, something that all publishers do.
One thing I do not take issue with, however, is EA mandating the online pass for free, launch day DLC. This DLC typically isn’t a huge part of the game, but a perk for those that bought the game new. This perk, available for first-day buyers, neither hinders any content from the main game, nor does it hamstring the gamer in any way when trying to enjoy a product that they own.It is the gamer’s job to evaluate if, after renting a game like Mass Effect 2, it’s worth it to get DLC such the Normandy Crash Site and Zaeed Masanni (it absolutely is). This is an example of EA’s policy done right, and stands in stark contrast to their treatment of gamers otherwise.
Righting The Wrong
The only way to end these practices by EA is to show them that we can’t stand for this. Much like the mass boycotts of DRM-laden products in the past, we must boycott EA games that take away our rights as gamers. There are multiple examples of EA’s two-headed online pass policy. They have shown that they can treat gamers with respect, and we must support this aspect. We have mighty weapons in our wallets, and these weapons are enough to slay the beast.
If you have any questions or comments, leave them in the comment box below. You can also follow me @JamesMcCaulley on twitter, or email me at jmccaulley@pixelatedgeek.com. Any feedback is appreciated.