Origin, EA’s online game distribution platform, will surely have few defenders – though, its occasional free game offers are a nice perk – but it is often a necessary evil to endure in order to play the publisher’s raft of games. However, a new US law has forced EA to ban the use of Origin in an entire country.
A few days ago, users in Myanmar found that they could no longer access their purchased EA games through Origin. As reddit user trivial_sublime described the situation:
“I live in Myanmar, and I own about 20 games on Origin, and have spent hundreds of dollars on the platform. I’ve bought the full editions of all of the Battlefield games up to this point, with their season passes. I was trying to log into Origin a few days ago, and got a bizarre “Access Denied” message. I googled it, and found that “Origin is no longer available in Myanmar.”
According to an admin (or Origin Champion, as they are known) on the EA Answers forum, “with the Origin 10 update, US laws (which is where EA is based) forced them to block certain countries. Unfortunately you live in one of those countries. I’m sorry but there is nothing we ca [sic] do here to allow you access again.”
The move highlights the potentially transient nature of digital game purchases that rely on an online platform to play: despite paying for and ‘owning’ games, access to them can be taken away at any time, at the whim of the platform’s administrator, and without compensation or reimbursement.
EA is yet to make an official statement on why it has pulled the Origin platform from Myanmar, which US law is responsible for the prohibition, nor has it stated which other countries may be affected by this US law.
According to a new report, the GeForce RTX 5090 GPU will be very expensive. It…
A new AMD processor in the form of an engineering model has been leaked in…
SK Hynix has claimed to be the first company to mass-produce 321-layer NAND memory chips.…
SOUNDS GREAT – Full stereo sound (12W peak power) gives your setup a booming audio…
Special Edition Yoshi design Ergonomic controller shape with Nintendo Switch button layout Detachable 10ft (3m)…
Fluid Motion: These flight rudder pedals are smooth and accurate that enable precise control over…