Sony rejected EA Access for the PS4 because it's not worth the money

By Ironman273
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Grand Master

Ironman273

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Sony rejected EA Access for the PS4 because it's not worth the money
BY JAMIE RIGG
 

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EA revealed its new Access subscription service for the Xbox One yesterday, which lets you play a bunch of EA titles, take advantage of discounts and get upcoming games early in exchange for a small monthly (or yearly) fee. While it might've looked like a platform-exclusive partnership with Microsoft, Game Informer has learned that Sony actively rejected EA Access for the PlayStation 4. "We evaluated the EA Access subscription offering and decided that it does not bring the kind of value PlayStation customers have come to expect," Sony said, adding that the success of PS Plus "shows that gamers are looking for memberships that offer a multitude of services, across various devices, for one low price." And, just in case we hadn't got the message, Sony's statement concluded: "We don't think asking our fans to pay an additional $5 a month for this EA-specific program represents good value to the PlayStation gamer."

 

It appears, then, that Sony would rather not support a service of questionable value than leave that decision up to PS4 owners. As we said yesterday, Access doesn't seem particularly overpriced, especially if you're a fan of EA's sports game franchises -- you can always drop $5/?4 for a month, grab a discount code, try out the new FIFA early, and revisit an old title to while away a weekend without any long-term commitment. But perhaps Sony would rather those gamers get acquainted with the PS Now rental model instead.

 

Source: Engadget

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Grand Master

PGHammer

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Unless it turns out to be a big success and then they'll look to add it in if they can, or make a deal with some other publisher.

Pretty much - Sony hates the idea of being a guinea pig for the first efforts of publishers it doesn't own; however, it is perfectly willing to do so itself.

Grand Master

bdsams Veteran

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I'm still waiting for the catch on this...it's $30 for a year and I get access to Madden, Battlefield and Fifa, all games that I would buy, but have not because I didn't want to spend $180 on games. So, for $30 a year, I can play them as much as I want, sure I can't keep them but new versions of each of those games come out next year that I would have wanted to buy, but didnt.

 

It seems like a way to save a lot of money.

Grand Master

Ryoken

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Good on Sony.. EA produces a lot of crap to begin with. Keep their stuff far far away if they can. 

 

Remember Sony is also the company that doesn't make you pay a fee to use services on their consoles.. like Netflix, the Web Browser, etc. Unlike MS where you need XBL to do anything on your console aside from single player.

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LightEco

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Ryoken, on 30 Jul 2014 - 12:37, said:Ryoken, on 30 Jul 2014 - 12:37, said:Ryoken, on 30 Jul 2014 - 12:37, said:

Good on Sony.. EA produces a lot of crap to begin with. Keep their stuff far far away if they can. 

 

Remember Sony is also the company that doesn't make you pay a fee to use services on their consoles.. like Netflix, the Web Browser, etc. Unlike MS where you need XBL to do anything on your console aside from single player.

 

Except you don't need gold to access services anymore....

 

Sony is also the company pushing a very overpriced rental service of their own right now, so I'm guessing that's the conflict. Why pay $30 for a year of Battlefield, FIFA, Madden, and others when you can pay $30 for 90 days of one Final Fantasy game?

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Showan

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Good on Sony.. EA produces a lot of crap to begin with. Keep their stuff far far away if they can. 

 

Remember Sony is also the company that doesn't make you pay a fee to use services on their consoles.. like Netflix, the Web Browser, etc. Unlike MS where you need XBL to do anything on your console aside from single player.

 

 

Your statement lets me know that you are out of the loop...

 

 

 

On another note.  I'm not the biggest EA fan at all.  They are some sneaky folks over there.  But $30 for a full year is a steal.

Grand Master

George P Global Moderator

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This gives me a bit of a laugh, good for Sony, yeah, good on them possibly missing out on another thing that could give the competition an advantage *golf clap*. 

 

You guys think the other big publishers aren't keeping on eye on this to see how it turns out and aren't thinking about calling up MS and jumping on if it does?  At what point does the "it's EA and they suck" type excuses stop working?   Just look at how things have been going so far, EA starts it's own PC store, origin, now Ubisoft has it's own as well, UPlay,  just following right behind.  I have no doubt at all Ubisoft won't follow EA on this as well if it works out for EA, no doubt at all.  After that, as close as MS and Activision have been all these years, hell, why not bring them in to?  

 

So yeah, Good for Sony, at least they'll have their own, expensive, service to charge you to "rent" games as long as you want. 

Grand Master

George P Global Moderator

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I'm still waiting for the catch on this...it's $30 for a year and I get access to Madden, Battlefield and Fifa, all games that I would buy, but have not because I didn't want to spend $180 on games. So, for $30 a year, I can play them as much as I want, sure I can't keep them but new versions of each of those games come out next year that I would have wanted to buy, but didnt.

 

It seems like a way to save a lot of money.

 

 

Because I bet you're in the minority who consider buying the same game, Fifa, Madden, each year over and over.  From their point of view they probably expect to bring in way more people on this ongoing subscription easier instead of trying to sell them next years sports game again.   And it's a clear deal, specially if you're big on those and want to keep playing the newer one.  It's all about the numbers and what they expect, costs are down as well, it's all digital and they're cutting out the resellers and lenders, can't do any of that so more for EA. 

 

Only time will tell but if I was big on most of the games I expect they'll have on there then I'd sign up for $30 in a flash.

Grand Master

123456789A

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Good on Sony.. EA produces a lot of crap to begin with. Keep their stuff far far away if they can. 

 

Remember Sony is also the company that doesn't make you pay a fee to use services on their consoles.. like Netflix, the Web Browser, etc. Unlike MS where you need XBL to do anything on your console aside from single player.

 

Peggle 2 is good.

 

Also, unless you've been sleeping under a rock lately, you don't need to pay to use those services on Xbox either (except for multiplayer, but I think you have to pay for that on PS4 now too).

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Gaffney

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I'm still waiting for the catch on this...it's $30 for a year and I get access to Madden, Battlefield and Fifa, all games that I would buy, but have not because I didn't want to spend $180 on games. So, for $30 a year, I can play them as much as I want, sure I can't keep them but new versions of each of those games come out next year that I would have wanted to buy, but didnt.

 

It seems like a way to save a lot of money.

The "catch" is clearly that it will only offer older EA games when retail sales of that game are essentially negligible to the company. So for EA they will probably get more revenue because people probably would never buy the games at full or even discounted price after a certain point. So I wouldn't expect Battlefield Hardline to be added until the next Battlefield has already been released. Sport games will probably be released earlier before the new versions come out and in between they will have some smaller games like Peggle.

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theyarecomingforyou

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To be honest I don't understand Sony's angle. This is not something that Sony has to pay for and consumers will ultimately decide the value in a service. It's also a risk when Microsoft, Sony's main competitor, is offering that service. The only reason I can see for Sony turning down such a service is if it expects to lose revenue, yet I don't see why that would be the case. Does Sony sell EA games through its own digital store?

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Bigkaye

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I'm still waiting for the catch on this...it's $30 for a year and I get access to Madden, Battlefield and Fifa, all games that I would buy, but have not because I didn't want to spend $180 on games. So, for $30 a year, I can play them as much as I want, sure I can't keep them but new versions of each of those games come out next year that I would have wanted to buy, but didnt.

 

It seems like a way to save a lot of money.

 

$30 + Xbox live subscription and most likley to load any you'll need an always online DRM, so internet wherever you intend to play. I can only guess if your internet isn't up to par the games won't be either. Each one is like 10-20GB big, a lot to download/stream on slow and capped internet. I don't know the details on how it works, but either scenario don't play well in my mind. Its the 180 on always online check slowly migrating back.

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Avi Patel

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Posted (edited)
Ryoken, on 30 Jul 2014 - 14:37, said:Ryoken, on 30 Jul 2014 - 14:37, said:

Good on Sony.. EA produces a lot of crap to begin with. Keep their stuff far far away if they can. 

 

Remember Sony is also the company that doesn't make you pay a fee to use services on their consoles.. like Netflix, the Web Browser, etc. Unlike MS where you need XBL to do anything on your console aside from single player.

You clearly have no idea what you're talking about. 

First off, you severely underestimate the selling power and attractiveness of EA's gaming offerings.  Second, if you had been paying attention to the gaming industry, you'd know that ms no longer requires fees for their services.  And don't forget that sony always bashed Microsoft on requiring a membership to play online, yet sony became the biggest hypocrites when they implemented ps plus for playing online. 

Lesson:  Sony isn't without its flaws as it acts like all businesses.  EA isn't the evil company you make it out to be. 

 

-cheers ;)

Edited by Andrew G.
Grand Master

trooper11

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I have to say that while Sony does a lot of good things for customers, this excuse seems hollow.

So Sony decided for us, playstation owners, that an OPTIONAL deal was not good enough for us? I'm sorry, but that comes off as something people would criticize MS for saying.

Honestly, Sony should have just said nothing about the subject and focused on getting ps now rolling out.

I would say that the likely reason Sony turned this down was because it would have been an independent competitor to their own ps now service. I'm also now wondering if Sony has been able to secure deals with 3rd party publishers like EA to offer their games via ps now.

PSN Plus gets you "free" games anyways, and I hate sports games, so no loss.

EA does more than sports games though. They even mention Dragon Age as part of the future content roll out. There is a variety of content at their disposal. Plus, when was the last time that an EA sports game showed up for free via the ps+ deal? I'm not sure when that has happened.

   

$30 + Xbox live subscription and most likley to load any you'll need an always online DRM, so internet wherever you intend to play. I can only guess if your internet isn't up to par the games won't be either. Each one is like 10-20GB big, a lot to download/stream on slow and capped internet. I don't know the details on how it works, but either scenario don't play well in my mind. Its the 180 on always online check slowly migrating back.

The games are not streamed. You literally download them like you would when buying a game digitally. The only online check involved is the one to verify you have an active subscription. Think of it like ps+ or GwG. You can keep playing the games as long as you keep an active subscription. There is no xbox live requirement unless you want to play online.

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Brendeth

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 it does not bring the kind of value PlayStation customers have come to expect

Those reasonably priced rentals on PS Now are surely that great value /s

 

While I am by no means sold on EA Access, let's not pretend that Sony are doing this out of a kindness to their customers. it is simply to make sure that they aren't supporting a service that could end up being a competitor to PS Now, or at the very least stop EA titles from being available on Sony's service.

Grand Master

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PS Plus is the landmark "rental service" right now that EA are already part of.

Seems like Sony would rather EA opt into their service than the other way about. If this kicks off what's next, Ubisoft doing the same?

I'd rather have the risk right now that EA feel pressured into opting into Plus than Sony for EA. Or we will end up with goodness knows how many monthly subscriptions in a years time from every big publisher.

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jerzdawg

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Not sure how anyone could congratulate sony for not giving their customers the option. I mean, if the value isn't there, don't subscribe but why not let us decide?

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