
List of Online Services EA Has Shut Down - sturadnidge
http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:0L266uiy59kJ:www.ea.com/1/service-updates+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=uk
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larrydavid
Note that most (if not all, as I only scanned the list) of these games do not
depend on an online connection to play the game like Sim City V. They have an
offline single-player component and it is the multiplayer functionality that
has been shut down.

There are also a good amount of mobile/Facebook apps in the list.

If you are being critical of EA then the worst examples are games that were
only released 2-3 years ago, such as many of the sports games like FIFA and
Madden. Although these have had at least a couple of new iterations since then
because of the yearly release schedule for their sports franchises. The
majority of the player base tends to move over to the new version very
promptly, much like the COD series.

On the whole this list looks far worse than it actually is. I don't think it
is entirely unreasonable to shut down the multiplayer component of games that
were released 8 years ago.

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arkitaip
8 years ago? People can still play games such as Diablo II and Starcraft and
those were released between some 15 years ago.

~~~
larrydavid
Well, the online multiplayer element anyway. I am not a PC gamer as such and
so I have never played the games you mention, but even I know that there are
no games in the list that are even moderately comparable to Diablo II and
Starcraft in terms of longevity. Those two games are iconic PC titles with a
huge fanbase/following even today.

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mindstab
So there's a weird gap. I can still pay games I bought in the 90s... but
apparently EA games I bought >5 years ago I can no longer play...

~~~
whatupdave
Yep. And most likely you wont be able to play SimCity 5 in 5 years time.

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kevinh
Can we _not_ obsess about this like reddit is doing? This is entirely
tangential to the purpose of this site. One article about this is more than
enough.

~~~
potch
I'm curious what you've decided the purpose of this site is. This seems like a
huge issue to discuss around the future of software and the concept of
"abandonware", as well as a cautionary tale about DRM, scaling, and failing to
plan for success. All sounds about right to me for this site.

~~~
jarcoal
It is an important issue, and that's why we have the other thread.

~~~
jjm
I too believe it's an important issue. One that will hopefully spur enthusiasm
of a few to come up with solutions.

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colinshark
I guess I'm tooting my own horn now, but one of the original design choices
for my game was to allow player-hosted servers. I don't want my game to die
when I stop supporting it.

Matchmaking is centralized, but the game can be configured for third party
matchmaking servers.

If it was good enough for 90s games, it's good enough for today's games.

~~~
simcop2387
I've always thought a nice matchmaker that was OS would be nice to have for
all of that kind of thing. Also nice game, voted for it on steam for you.

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dendory
And this is what's wrong with always-on DRM. A sad state of gaming we are in
now. In 20 years, we will look back at the games from the 80s and 90s, then
see a wide empty gap from an era where almost all new games required vendor
support and are therefore unplayable anymore.

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bicknergseng
I should point out that a lot of those on that list are original xbox games,
which all would have been shut down on MS's end when they shut off the
original Xbox Live. See [http://kotaku.com/5535672/the-last-man-to-play-
halo-2-on-xbo...](http://kotaku.com/5535672/the-last-man-to-play-halo-2-on-
xbox-live).

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mmanfrin
Madden 11? Meaning, a game that came out _2 years ago_ is no longer playable?

~~~
flyt
Most people that play Madden games move yearly to the new releases. The
servers that support the old games probably drain fast and are unneeded after
some predictable period of time. Whether or not server shutdown behavior
encourages this yearly migration is another issue.

~~~
prawn
Most people, not all people. Pretty tough on those who forked out and wanted
to keep playing online.

~~~
flyt
I'm not disagreeing with you, but at the end of the day EA has the exact
numbers of how many players move from one game to the next, and are making
business decisions with that in mind.

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SoftwareMaven
They don't really give you a choice, do they? Wouldn't it be in their interest
to drop support after two years, even if 25% of people were still playing to
push them to buy a new copy?

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fletchowns
If they are going to shut down a server for a game, why not release that 1
final patch that will either let people run their own server, or make it so
it's no longer dependent on a server?

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Lockyy
If that happened why would you buy the new games that the servers were shut
down to make way for?

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ekianjo
Naive answer: because they make better, newer games ?

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phaus
This is EA we are talking about. Each new release is just as likely to
completely fuck up the core gameplay mechanics as it is to marginally improve
them.

Actually, now that Bobby Kotick has completely destroyed everything that
Blizzard stood for, you can say it about pretty much every large game
development company other than Valve Software.

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ryguytilidie
Every single 11 series game being gone is inexcusable. I have friends who own
TW11, Madden11, NHL11, FIFA 11 and everything is just dead now. I understand
they have to take things offline at some point, but for the amount of money
they made this is just shocking.

~~~
mynameisvlad
Not really. Sports games have insanely high turnaround times. People go to the
next version really quickly to get the newest rosters and engines.

They look at player data and make a decision that it's no longer profitable to
keep the servers up.

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tedchs
I thought the point of "the cloud" is companies can relatively easily serve
"the long tail" of consumers?

~~~
jellicle
They could serve you for very little cost. But what if they believe that
turning off the old games will likely get you to pay full price for a new
game?

~~~
rz2k
Planned obsolescence, and the idea that it is strategical to design something
like a car to wear out in a few years is popularly believed to be clever and
widely practiced.

However, harming your brand is far more damaging than a short term gain. New
customers are far more expensive than repeat customers, and a previously
angered customer is even more expensive. In the long term, value as perceived
by customers gives companies more pricing freedom, and as long as there are
competitors that do not collude, attempts to create scarcity ultimately will
be counter productive.

~~~
tsotha
>Planned obsolescence, and the idea that it is strategical to design something
like a car to wear out in a few years is popularly believed to be clever and
widely practiced.

"Planned obsolescence" is a grossly misunderstood and misused term. It's not a
nefarious scheme to get you to buy more stuff. The term has meant a few
different things over the years, but that isn't one of them.

It's a popular mis-use of the term to mean they're designing your car to break
down so you have to buy a new one. Companies are smart enough to know the
value of reputation.

~~~
rz2k
The popular misconception is relevant to its efficacy, but I think the
operational meaning of the term is generally well understood. There is a
linguistics discussion to be had about prescriptivism and descriptivism as to
whether it refers only to iterative increases in quality, or also intentional
reliability.

To see the historical use of the term, I encourage you to glance at some of
the literature[1] — especially in auto industry contexts.

[1][http://www.google.com/search?q=%22planned+obsolescence%22...](http://www.google.com/search?q=%22planned+obsolescence%22&btnG=Search+Books&tbm=bks)

~~~
tsotha
You didn't really put a link to a Google search in there, did you?

~~~
rz2k
Sure, but to <http://books.google.com>, though the front of the link doesn't
make it obvious. You can alter it to focus on a specific time frame if you
choose, or add a term about automobiles.

As you pointed out, the concept of intentional unreliability over time is like
an anti-pattern for business, yet it is one encompassed by the term "planned
obsolescence".

~~~
jellicle
I'm sorry, but there are plenty of companies that have made great businesses
out of producing less-reliable products.

If I buy a thing - almost any thing - from Walmart, I know that quality of
that thing is not the first priority. A hammer from Walmart - theoretically a
kind of good that can last forever - is going to be made from worse steel, the
grip is going to fall off with heavy use, the wooden handle will splinter,
it's going to rust. It will not last as long as a hammer purchased from Home
Depot. On the other hand, it will be cheaper. Walmart is making a perfectly
good business off of selling such goods.

Walmart chooses to stock lesser quality goods. We accept that as a legitimate
business model. But Walmart doesn't come to my house and worsen the goods
later on - they don't come and spray the hammer with salt-water to encourage
me to get a new one. Digital goods don't fall apart on their own, so companies
like EA which want to sell inferior goods have to take affirmative action to
make them fall apart ("hey, let's link all our goods to a server, and turn the
server off a few months after the good comes out"), and this doesn't sit well
with us in our perceptions.

~~~
rz2k
What are you sorry about?

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sturadnidge
The above is a cache link because ea.com is returning 500's, I assume as part
of the Sim City debacle. The actual URL is here: <http://www.ea.com/1/service-
updates>

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jiggy2011
Just to clarify, I assume that for some of these games the actual multiplayer
game hosting is not done by EA and follows a P2P model or allows the use of
third party dedicated server (e.g counterstrike)?

So it's just the match making servers that are shut down?

If it's just matchmaking then perhaps a third party can support all
matchmaking for abandoned games, Steam seems to do something like this with
it's built in matchmaking.

For example it's still (last I checked) possible to play the original Unreal
Tournament online.

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brokentone
This is my big concern with the new SimCity. If I pay $60 for SimCity, I want
it to stick around more than 2 years, heck last time I booted my 486 I got
simcity 2000 playing again. A little more real-world, I still occasionally
play the original Starcraft. The argument against these always on games is
that they _could_ do such things, then add to it that EA _does_ such things...

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ctide
Should also include Rupture:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rupture_(social_networking)> :(

Oh, and I Play Wow too: [http://wow.joystiq.com/2009/01/16/i-play-wow-
facebook-app-re...](http://wow.joystiq.com/2009/01/16/i-play-wow-facebook-app-
reaches-100-000-users/)

~~~
notquite8
Not quite. Rupture eventually became Origin.

~~~
ctide
It didn't. Origin was built by a different team within EA after Rupture was
laid off. I was the engineering manager at EA for the Rupture team.

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nthitz
I'm sure that list of sports titles will grow every year which is rather
unsettling. Especially considering EA has an exclusive license with most of
the sports leagues so other publishers can't even compete in the area.

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jjm
I originally wanted to buy new SimCity but thank good ness I didn't. It wasn't
until now that I see how chock full of 'DRM' it has.

Someone should kickstart(er) a SimCity 'like' game the way it was _meant_ to
be.

~~~
T-hawk
Yup, that's already happening.

[http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1584821767/civitas-
plan-...](http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1584821767/civitas-plan-develop-
and-manage-the-city-of-your-d)

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antidaily
NO! Not MVP 07 NCAA Baseball for PlayStation 2 and Xbox.

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drivebyacct2
Tried to play BF2: BC yesterday, sure enough Origin was getting pounded. I'm
not a huge gamer so it's not a big deal for me to say so, but I won't buy an
EA game again.

~~~
rcfox
This might help you: <http://blog.nofate.me/?p=35>

I've never tried it myself though because I don't own any games on Origin.

