meh i personally don't see the loss, its a single player game wont hurt much being played on origin or anywhere

That can't be right. Steam games and DLC are sold at other stores - I've seen Magicka DLC at Gamersgate and Direct2Drive.

I think the issue is with DLC that's sold direct from publishers. Like you said Magicka DLC is available on GamersGate and Steam, D2D I think as well. With DA2 and Crysis 2 however the DLC can't be bought on Steam, it has to be bought direct from Bioware/Crytek.

I'll be honest, in EA's case I think it's having control where they would normally not. I'm willing to bet that Sony and Microsoft get a good chunk (probably similar to what valve wants) of the DLC money and they have to obey those restrictions. The system that EA has in place with the DLC in it's games give them the most control possible and even better, they keep all of the money since it doesn't go through another retailer.

Ehhhh, I'm not liking it, but I understand it I guess. But at the same time, other games that use DLC have no issue with it, it really does make EA look a bit greedy overall.

In that case, why are both Mass Effects still being sold through Steam? Both have DLCs, the DLC for the first is ONLY available through EA's origin-store, and the ME2 DLCs are only available through EA / Bioware - you even have to buy virtual Bioware-points to get them....

Yep, it's all about pushing their new store and control.

I can honestly say I don't care if another EA game is released on steam. All the most recent EA games have been money grubbing piles of crap anyway. I mean DA2 actually depresses me so much with how shallow and repetitive it is that I don't think EA could pay me to shove some more substandard DLC down my throat.

My understanding of the issue was that the problem wasn't the DLC not being sold on Steam, it was that it's sold from within the game itself, but not using Steam's 'marketplace' frontend (which almost certainly nets Valve a cut). I believe those F2P MMOs and TF2 both use the marketplace thing.

My guess is the new terms and conditions are not applied retroactively. The current removal of EA games only happens when the new DLC is actually released, or about to be. Older titles are no longer still updated, afaik.

So the one who originally releases the game, they own everything? I thought that gamemakers had silver elven shield +2.
Atari I think sued cd-red.. or is it cpd-red.. what ever.. I believe in artististic freedom.

Ah, I see the difference between you and me is that I side with EA in this case. :P
I'm not a fan of EA or Valve for the record.

Yes. Games for Windows Live is exempt because apparently the in-game client does not sell DLC, you have to get it from their website. That is how I understand it anyway.

Basically Valve are trying to use their muscle to get in on all DLC sales and EA are trying to use their muscle to ignore Valve's muscle. It's a pissing match between two corporations, neither of whom is anyone's friend or has consumers first in mind.

I don't necessarily side with Valve, though I do have a vested interest in their side in that I own games on Steam (or rent, if you prefer) but not on Origin.

Frankly I can see both sides, but I don't think either one is 'right'. Both are businesses, and both have made decisions that they quite rationally feel are in their own best interests.

But StingingVelvet is right: consumer's best interests are probably the furthest thing from either side's minds in all of this.

I admit, while I like the sales through Steam, it's only of marginal convenience. It's as tolerable as all of the other systems that are in place I guess, and since Steam hasn't locked me out of my DVD drive yet (As other DRM has) or taken control of my computer away, I've found it livable.

Origin on the other hand...I've had lots of problems with it, and I was only stupid enough to buy 1 game on it. Can't run the game through the client, have to exit out of the client completely to get the game to work....it just doesn't work cleanly and is far more of a pain in the ass then everything else I have.

In this case, I'm not on either side, it's childish on both ends but EA really is the one that comes out worse for it. There are simply other ways of working around what they're doing, they just refused to do it.

I have to ask, why are you bothering to run games through the Origin client when you don't need to? The whole advantage of Origin is it isn't DRM it's simply a re-skinned EA Download Manager. Once you have the game installed you don't have to bother with Origin. Unlike Steam.