Further to that the experience of many people on this very wbsite in dealing with EA/Origin live support is contradictory to what has been reported in the article. Not everyone got exactly what they wanted but one thing in common is that EA's live support has on the whole been quick and helpful. Some GOG'ers have even reported customer reps going above what is expected by adding games to their Origin accounts that were not natively supported.

RPS know full well that EA as a corporate entitiy can't answer these claims quickly, they need to fact check everything and clear it with their army of lawyers first. If there has been some administrative cock up then you can bet there will be some ass kissing and free swag given out because EA won't want potential Origin customers scared off by the actions of some over-zealous mods. If these complainers did do something shall we say.. naughty then expect EA to be completely covered with a statement to that effect.

End of the day no one should lose the right to play a game they purchased because of their actions on a forum, no one is disputing that. What is in dispute is what exactly these guys did to warrant such harsh treatment. I simply don't buy it when someone says they were banned outright for saying the word teabagging.

Wasn't aware of RPS's Steam bias. I'll be on the lookout for it from now on. Thanks to all who pointed it out.

I have been amazed at the general negativity spewed towards Origin. While I don't have BF3, I do have 9 games on the service. When I play them, it's like it's not even there.

Forum bans equaling account bans is stupid though. If that is in fact the case, they need to fix that quick.

They're quite a few of them that sound like 12 year old boys on XBox Live:)
It is sort of egg on EA's face, I think this has been an issue in the past but before they were trying to make Origin into a Steam-like service. This detail should have never been overlooked on the way to launching Origin. Still I expect EA to make good even so. As bad as everyone makes them out to be they want desperately to succeed in this market and are likely to bend over backward to do so.

I avoid like the plague any place that bans you from your games if you're banned from the forums

It shouldn't be legal and both shouldn't be tied together

I can testify to that as well. I activate DA:O on Origin (purchased on Steam) and the German version unlocked (despite me selecting English during the process). I tried Origin live support and was blown away with how helpful the rep was. I ended up with essentially a couple extra games by the time I was done activating EA titles acquired through other distributors. I've never purchased anything directly from Origin, but I have half a dozen titles in my Origin library.

And lose access to their "press" accounts and the free games they get? Of course not. Hell, you've surely seen how they whine when they don't get free games. Seriously, self-entitled gaming "journalists" are worse than the self-entitled gamers they tend to write for. RPS may as well just cut the pretense and become Kotaku PC.

Yep, they've done that for me on more than one occasion.

what the hell are you talking about? they had criticized steam many times and why would they lose their accounts for being venomous?


anyhow:

if rps is bad what one would suggest instead for PC gaming news?

Um, no. RPS always tread on egg shells when it comes to Steam unless they're dripping praise on it.

Take a look at all their articles criticizing Ubisoft and EA, and compare those to the few that point out minor concerns with Steam. Then try to find the articles that criticize Steam's major flaws... you won't find them.

Blue's News!

Probably not what you had in mind - Blue is more of an aggregator and commentator than a generator of journalism content - but his selection of news and opinion pieces is excellent.

The comments are mostly from cynical, EULA-weary older gamers, and it can be fun to join in and heckle at the world from the sidelines.

they do criticize steam when they f--- up. but steam is older than RPS its core problems were discussed millions of times.

and still it does not make sense saying that they will lose access to new games for reviews. thats publisher who decides. valve cannot give away someone else property.

@domgrief

thx i shall check it out.

No excuse, considering many of the current major flaws are actually fairly recent (within the last couple of years).

As for your second comment, I've experienced first hand on more than one occasion being denied access to purchased content not based on the decision of the publisher but solely on the actions of Valve. So don't believe for one minute that Valve wouldn't "accidentally" remove a press account.

@bansama

you know what? okay. you are right about everything. Valve bad and all that stuff and can ban press steam accounts.
the thing is: RPS lives out of it. barely btw but they make money out of having access to hundreds of games, on day -5. Otherwise KOTAKU and all others will take their readers just because they play nicer with big publishers. So the fault lies in the industry, with valve than RPS really.
So fine. RPS sucks STEAM cock. They do not suck Publishers cock tough. That's kinda of better than most 'professional' (so to speak) reviewers and game website do. the reviews and other stuff i read there are mostly fair, interesting and covering games properly without relaying on hype, on how they criticism is interpreted by fans or publishers.
I can live with that.


PS: please clarify what recent steam problems. The EUR-Dollar thing and that japan is screwed over by everyone? or something else too? Cause been using Steam since HL2 release and all the problems i have with it now are the same problems i had with it when steam come into play.

Kind of related post. Here in Mexico is OK to burn the stuff you own, regardless of any EULA/TOS the disc or data might have. It is also fine to lend your disc or the data inside the disc to anyone and make use of it however you want, as long as you don't make profits and it is not mass distribution. So couple of friends and maybe your cousin and brother = Legal. 'Torrenting' and P2P is also legal, 'torrenting' movies it is not when more than 1000 people have downloaded it. I'm posting all these because I don't know how the EULA/ToS would affect me if I live in a country where they don't really take EULA/ToS as a serious contract.

I also found some links that should be helpful:

http://www.gamesbrief.com/2011/11/games-law-eulas-and-terms-of-service/
http://www.gamesbrief.com/2011/11/games-law-piracy-and-free/

Are people being banned from the GOG forums?

A W E S O M E ! ! !