Battlefield 3 Probably Getting Online Pass

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A growing number of games are locking out preowned customers from certain content -- usually online multiplayer -- unless they purchase an online pass-equivalent from their respective publishers. This allows publishers, who normally make no money on preowned sales, to at least get some revenue from the active second hand market.

DICE has half-confirmed to Gamerzines that Battlefield 3 will be shipping with some form of online pass system, but seemed somewhat shaky on the details. EA also closed the door on the discussion, asking the site to pick up the conversation at another time.

"The whole idea is that we're paying for servers," explained Battlefield 3 executive producer Patrick Bach. "And if you create a new account there is a big process on how that is being handled in the backend. We would rather have you buy a new game than a used game because buying a used game is only a cost to us; we don't get a single dime from a used game, but we still need to create server space and everything for you. We want people to at least pay us something to create this because we're paying for it. It was actually a loss for us to have new players."

If Battlefield 3 does end up shipping with an online pass system, it gives Modern Warfare 3 everything to play for. Whatever you may think of Activision's other business practices, one thing the company hasn't done -- yet -- is incorporate an online pass system. If Battlefield 3 ships with an online pass and Modern Warfare 3 doesn't, that may be enough to send a few people who were on the fence between the two rival military shooters in the direction of Activision's title.

Posted:

Source: http://www.gamepro.com/article/news/221541/battlefield-3-will-probably-feature-an-online-pass-as-compensation-for-server-costs/

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"Battlefield 3 Probably Getting Online Pass" :: Login/Create an Account :: 63 comments

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GuyNamedBobPosted:

-Jordan- Anyone against online passes is clearly a moron with no care for the developers. Simple as that really.
how do they have no care for the developers if they dont like the idea of an online pass? the excuse EA uses for this is the servers getting to crowded and they have to pay to run them. but if someone sold the game, they obviously won't be taking up any more space in the servers. if they're afraid of people buying used that badly, than they can just lower the msrp a few months after the game to get people to buy the game new. they're already a multi-million dollar company, and will certainly make millions more with bf3, theres no reason why they should nickel and dime their own players.

matt0268Posted:

Completely against this, the game alone will be roughly $65 (39.99 GBP), pricing is going to kill console gaming.. to get the maximum performance out of a game now counting: Passes, Map packs and addons, each game is going to cost around $100, if there stopping people selling games no one is going to want to buy new games. I just think everygame should be sold with everything. you do what you want. No one should be allowed to sell things such as map packs and keys as you've payed for the game at the start. your just getting restricted content. Its going to end up pay by match content of big games.

PSPianistPosted:

"Without needing much clarification, I think it was pretty safe to assume that Battlefield 3 would have some form of online-pass as well."

Cool story bro, but good assumption.

-Jordan-Posted:

Anyone against online passes is clearly a moron with no care for the developers. Simple as that really.

ReconPosted:

RecklessMirror That means More People will buy MW3...cause no ones gonna waste $5- $10 dollars on an online pass...there just gritty bastards who want more money **** ****...lmao


why would they go to MW3? BF3 is going to be such a great game, why would anybody turn this down because of a simply fee?

SmokeDizzy420Posted:

not surprising at all, this is EA they do this with all their games now.

iJarH3adPosted:

Sorry guys!

For some reason i don't see my message in there? Look like it's a glitch! And I can't delete that comment! :/ Anyway

Here's my message

"That could be true. But most NEW PC games are cost under 30 bucks and required the keycode.

Most NEW xbox 360 games are cost $60 or $50 (depends). Plus we are paying the xbox live which is $10 a month....

See the difference? There shouldn't have a online pass on xbox. In my opinion, I think Microsoft won't allow online pass for the all games company on xbox in the future...

PC's code key is fine, it's totally different than xbox...

End of story...".

TC3054Posted:

3OH3
TC3054 Poor kids...lmfao...Can't afford another 10$...
It's not just the $10... I'm sure everyone can afford the extra $10 if they wanted to play the multiplayer. It's just that people would rather not spend the extra money just to play online.


Its not really even extra money...most people are going to buy it new. I applaud them for using servers for their online. They pay a lot for these servers to run. If I could pay extra to not have terrible lag and host migrations on call of duty, I definitely would.

RojoPosted:

That means More People will buy MW3...cause no ones gonna waste $5- $10 dollars on an online pass...there just gritty bastards who want more money **** fagots...lmao

SlightlyPoeticPosted:

iJarH3ad
ZBrush
3OH3 I'm upset to see how greedy these companies are beginning to be. The argument that they "have to make space for you" is misleading. Yes sure your character file is saved to a server but it's not going to be that big of a file. So what about actually playing the game? Surely that means that they have to make room for you also since youre on their server... Wrong. Guess what happens when people buy a game used EA? It means that someone no longer wanted to play it and sold it. So essentially that person is just replacing another player on the server so nothing is really changed all that much. If they really want money that bad then just place an add in the game. Yeah sure it may be a little annoying looking at it but armrest everyone could play...

Imagine if I went over to a friends house with my copy of BF3 and we were going to play it. Yeah we'd have fun except we can't because my friend doesn't have an online pass to play the game. Now I could just recover my account with the online pass except my profile contains a higher amount of gamer score than the average user (I'm sure we can all relate and how it takes us a while to recover). So now it is going to take me 15-20 minutes to recover my account so maybe instead of doing that we just decide to play some Modern Warfare: 3...

^^^ that is just one example of how an online pass could actually reduce sales instead of increasing them. Maybe my friend would have seen how good the game is and gone out to buy it for himself the next day. But because of the online pass he was never given the opportunity.

So..... if you couldn't tell, I am completely against the online pass. Buying used games won't cost all that much more money so deal with it... And if your concerned that much then just lower your money that you spend on advertising. I'm sure all of us know that the game is coming out in Novemeber and will be a great game. But sadly we all know that MW3 and BF3 are going to get into an advertising war as the two games release dates approach spending millions of more dollars than need to be spent and could have been used to pay for their server...


I don't want to stop on your post but...

PC has had keys for games since the first online games came out, This is nothing new and just another protection method to stop the loss of sales through piracy and pre-owned copies.

It was bound to happen sooner or later,
hell I was pretty surprised when I found out the Xbox 360 wasn't going to implement it on release.

So please don't complain,
its not that bad buying a new copy for and extra 10 dollars and you'll probably be able to purchase codes off the internet just like you could in BFBC2.


Pc games are like 20 bucks..... plus online pass equal 30 bucks

Xbox games cost 60 bucks plus 10 bucks equal $70... That's fuc**ng near to $100!!!! Use your brain next time...

Big games are the same price on every platform.
20 buck games like CSS are decades old.


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