EA’s Origin service is clearly an attempt to ease into the video game online retail space, a space which Steam, until now, has completely dominated. But according to EA Europe’s Jens Uwe Intat, both services aren’t necessarily at loggerheads.
“I don’t even know if Steam Vs. Origin is a proper battle, I would rephrase that a little,” he claimed.
“I would say that we’re introducing Origin as our consumer relationship platform,” he continued. “We want to build a platform that allows consumers to have the best experience you could ever had with EA games. It’s going to be one of the offerings that consumers can use. There’s a space for Steam, there’s a space for Origin, there’s a space for third party etailers. Both pure etailers and traditional retailers that are entering the digital distribution space.”
According to EA’s COO Peter Moore, Origin is also attempting to move in on the social networking side of things.
“It will absolutely become a social network,” stated Moore. “I’m already using it every day to see what friends are doing, to understand what coming from EA, plus you’ll see announcements over the next few weeks of third-parties coming on board and having their content becoming available. We love the fact that we can deal directly with our consumers.”
Interesting that, while EA is almost spoiling for a fight with Activision with regards to Battlefield and Modern Warfare, they are keen to distance themselves from a war of attrition with Valve and Steam.
I guess you really do have to choose your battles wisely.
State of Play: Electronic Arts [Gamesindustry.biz]via VG247
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