EA Sports to charge $10 to play used games online

Everlong said:

I remember reading an article about a survey that looked at pirated software, and the average of any given software was 20% pirated, which, and I'm not saying "that's a low number, it's fine to pirate", but it is blown out of proportion. Modern Warfare 2 still managed to net in quite a large amount of money.

I've different views on this latest move by EA though. It doesn't really affect me as I buy most of my games through Steam now, but when you do have a game shop selling second hand games, they do get all the profit from that game, and a lot of the time, if it's a new game, they charge near full price for it.

But then, there is the point that someone has already paid for that game, so in essence they can do what they want with it.

Actually, I don't think it's quite as high as the companies think it is, in all honesty. They just want people to think that. Take WoW for instance, it sold a lot more copies out there than a lot of other games did, and Blizzard Entertainment makes millions of dollars a year just from that game alone, much less StarCraft and the other titles, despite the fact that there's also a lot of "free WoW servers" out there. Millions of people still play retail WoW, and Blizzard is always trying to bring down the private servers. Of course, they can't really do that when said private server is owned and being hosted by a person in the Netherlands, since they don't have that many internet laws in the first place.

This is for those that didn't bother to read the article and just read the quote in the OP,

Starting in June with Tiger Woods PGA Tour 11, sports games will come with a one-time use code that will allow gamers to play online on the Xbox 360 or PS3 systems. If you rent the game, you can play online for seven days for free, but that only works one time per game. If you buy the game used and want to activate the online features, you'll have to buy the Online Pass directly from EA, for $10.

Nice to see how the entire thread went off track with the whole PC/piracy tirades when the article in question doesn't even have anything to do with the PC. What it basically is is an attempt to kill off the used console game market, which you will probably find that most of the game publishers think of in the same light as PC piracy.

Some of the copy protections aren't nearly as bad as they are made out to be.
This IMHO is one thats not so bad. If you purchase the game, this will not effect you in the least.


Others, are just too far overboard.
For example:
Internet Connection required for one time activation is one thing.
Requiring that connection just to play (offline single player games) everytime its launched or it fails to work is a completely different matter.

When the protection is simply rediculous, I'll pass on that game.

They wonder why people pirate games. This all may be the cause.

However, theres no excuse for theft, plain and simple.

I have no issue paying for game a thats good. But regardless how good it is, to strict of a DRM and Ill take my buisiness elsewhere.

Wishmaster said:

Some of the copy protections aren't nearly as bad as they are made out to be.
This IMHO is one thats not so bad. If you purchase the game, this will not effect you in the least.


Others, are just too far overboard.
For example:
Internet Connection required for one time activation is one thing.
Requiring that connection just to play (offline single player games) everytime its launched or it fails to work is a completely different matter.

When the protection is simply rediculous, I'll pass on that game.

They wonder why people pirate games. This all may be the cause.

However, theres no excuse for theft, plain and simple.

I have no issue paying for game a thats good. But regardless how good it is, to strict of a DRM and Ill take my buisiness elsewhere.

Which is exactly what I'm talking about. The people who DO pirate games, simply just don't care about stealing it, or simply because they don't want to deal with the bogus cd-protection crap that's out there.

I already said, if the companies don't have cd protection on their games, they'd make more money. More people out there are honest more than you think there are. The people who pirate games think they should get it for free simply because it's for a computer, and not say like a TV or something similar. CD's are easily ruined, and to have to buy another copy just because your cd broke or was damaged enough that you can't use and have to buy another is simply just bogus. The gaming companies have the ability to make better cd's, and add more protections to them, but seeing as how most are greedy dillweeds, they go more for profit, with low cost making of said item rather than putting money into better protections for cd's. This is also why people pirate games because companies care more about their money than anything else. Which is my entire point, and it's been proven the entire time.

Game companies are trying to always blame the piraters out there no matter what the game company is at fault with. And that's mainly due to the cd-issue, as well as people thinking they should either get computer games free, or at a lower price, when in reality of the whole thing, is that most companies period, care more about money than they do their customers. It's a common fact. Banks do the same crap, as well as credit card companies.

I myself, hate the fact that with every game I own, I'm required to put my stupid cd into the cd-rom drive, just to play a single game. It's annoying, ridiculous, and simply put, just plain retarded in the first place. Every time you have to put in a cd, you have the chance of dropping it, scratching it, and ruining it, no matter how organized, patient, level-headed, or plain just have good hand skills. You'll sooner or later, ruin the cd. Then what? You gotta buy a new one. And that means more money for the gaming company simply because they don't add any protections to the cd's they produce for their games. I have had to go through countless cd's for my games simply because I drop them by accident, and have to pick them up. I'm not willing to buy another copy because I accidentally dropped it countless times.

pparks1 said:

Richardc269 said:

I already said, if the companies don't have cd protection on their games, they'd make more money. More people out there are honest more than you think there are.

So, why so much effort placed on piracy over the years? I think the only reason more people are honest today is that it's getting harder to play online and such with hacked/pirated copies of games and gamers are being forced to pay to play.

Richardc269 said:

I myself, hate the fact that with every game I own, I'm required to put my stupid cd into the cd-rom drive, just to play a single game. It's annoying, ridiculous, and simply put, just plain retarded in the first place. Every time you have to put in a cd, you have the chance of dropping it, scratching it, and ruining it, no matter how organized, patient, level-headed, or plain just have good hand skills. You'll sooner or later, ruin the cd. Then what? You gotta buy a new one. And that means more money for the gaming company simply because they don't add any protections to the cd's they produce for their games. I have had to go through countless cd's for my games simply because I drop them by accident, and have to pick them up. I'm not willing to buy another copy because I accidentally dropped it countless times.

It's annoying...yes I agree. Seems like you have a seriously hard time with these disks though. Like I said before, I don't believe that I have ever cracked or flat out broken a cd/dvd by simply dropping it a handful of times and I'm 35 and have been handling them for over 20 years now.

The average person is honest. I didn't say all of them are. Not everyone is.

As for the disks, I don't even bother with sticking them in the drive. I just create .iso files so I don't have to deal with that garbage. Even if they don't crack/break when dropped, they still get scratched when you have to pick it up off of the floor. Do it enough times and the scratches become too much, then the cd-rom can't read it. It's pretty normal for people to drop them by accident. This is why I said the companies need to put better protections onto their cd's, instead of the way most are.

As for the original discussion, I thought it was for PC's, and not consoles. Never liked consoles and I never will. I don't even own a console, and I sold the old Playstation I had in 11th grade simply because I hardly ever used it. Sold it for $30.