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EA Launches Origin Online Game Distribution for Mac

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MacRumors

macrumors bot
Original poster
Apr 12, 2001
63,522
30,800



A Mac client for EA's digital distribution platform Origin was launched today, as first noted by AppleInsider. Origin for Mac was originally announced in August 2011 and went into alpha testing in late January. 

Origin is quite similar to Valve's Steam and allows users to download games and demos, chat with friends and continue saved games from most computers.

Screen-Shot-2013-02-07-at-5.54.51-PM-800x507.png
The store currently lists 48 Mac games available for download, including games like Batman: Arkham City Game of the Year Edition, LEGO Batman, Harry Potter and Star Wars, Tropico 3: Gold Edition and The Sims 3 and its plethora of expansion packs. The new SimCity is supposed to launch a little after the March release of the PC version of the game.

EA Origin Vice President of Production Mike Blank told AppleInsider that EA brought Origin to Mac because of two reasons: growing Mac marketshare and a vocal community of Mac gamers.
"We're seeing increased activity from our Mac gamers," he said. "In the past, we've brought games slower to market for Mac than for PC partly because the audience hasn't been at the same level. The growth of iOS and Mac devices, though, means we're starting to see gamers demand to play their games on devices that are becoming more prominent. I think, across the board, developers have focused on the PC platform, but I think you're going to start seeing some changes there. [Origin] is the first step in a strategy you're going to start seeing coming out of EA."
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Origin client for Mac is available as a download for free at EA's Origin website. It requires OS X 10.6.8 or higher and an Intel Core 2 Duo Processor.

Article Link: EA Launches Origin Online Game Distribution for Mac
 
Article Link
https://www.macrumors.com/2013/02/07/ea-launches-origin-online-game-distribution-for-mac/
kjs862

kjs862

macrumors 65816
Jan 21, 2004
1,297
24
Really want to play the new sim city when it comes out. How do you think it will run on a virtual machine using parallels?
 
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Eriden

macrumors regular
Sep 5, 2006
167
15
EA is the soulless corporate juggernaut of the gaming industry. I can only imagine how great the ENTIRETY of Mass Effect 3 would have been had EA not gotten its hooks into Bioware.

Instead, thanks to EA, we got a game that was 95% awesomeness followed by 15 minutes of ending that ruined the whole fusking series.
 
S

Spetsnazos

macrumors regular
May 3, 2012
244
9
No one uses it on PC other than for battlefield 3 and no Mac can run bf3...

Good luck in your distribution goals of 2013 EA :)
 
rockyroad55

rockyroad55

macrumors 601
Jul 14, 2010
4,152
59
Phila, PA
Spetsnazos said:
No one uses it on PC other than for battlefield 3 and no Mac can run bf3...

Good luck in your distribution goals of 2013 EA :)
Click to expand...

Actually the retina MBP can run BF3 at medium-high settings. I'm doing it now.

But, then again, you are right, I only use Bootcamp for BF3. This EA thingy will never be installed on my mac side.
 
H

holmesf

macrumors 6502a
Sep 30, 2001
528
25
kjs862 said:
Really want to play the new sim city when it comes out. How do you think it will run on a virtual machine using parallels?
Click to expand...

Poorly. Virtualization works pretty well in a lot of cases, but games are not one of them. The DirectX calls have to be translated to OpenGL calls.
 
B

bungiefan89

macrumors 6502a
Apr 5, 2011
565
76
Aside from the Batman game, I see nothing of value on this list.

Much better selection of games on Steam. Team Fortress 2, Half-Life 2, Nuclear Dawn, Limbo, Assassin's Creed 2, The Binding of Issac, Left 4 Dead 2, Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic...

Sorry EA, you're a day late and a dollar short. On EVERYTHING.
 
S

sesnir

macrumors 6502
Sep 21, 2008
366
287
Nobody likes EA, but if this is what it takes to get better Mac support from a big publisher, then I'm all for it.

Sim City is coming. Maybe we'll get Battlefield 4. Either way, this can only be a good thing. I mean, ideally EA would ditch Origin and get friendly with Steam, but that isn't going to happen.

I just think that when a big gaming company sees a vocal community and rising marketshare and decides to invest in the Mac, then it's cause for celebration.
 
boto

boto

macrumors 6502
Jun 4, 2012
437
28
I will NEVER install this spyware game client on my Mac. NEVER. Windows is a different story since I don't store any important information on my Bootcamp partition, only games.
 
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Fatalbert

macrumors 6502
Feb 6, 2013
398
0
"Origin is quite similar to Valve's Steam." What's the point then? There's already Steam and the App Store. Unless this turns out to be a more stable and less annoying version of Steam (which I don't use because it's CRAP), then it's dumb.

I've also used just one EA thing on a PC before, and it was a horrible experience. But all their software for game consoles is good.
 
F

Fatalbert

macrumors 6502
Feb 6, 2013
398
0
Just wondering, what has EA done that makes everyone hate it so much? I honestly don't know because I haven't experienced much EA on a PC besides the Harry Potter games and a horrible avatar system for PGA. When I think of EA, I think of SSX3, NASCAR '07, Need for Speed Underground, Harry Potter, and Harry Potter 2, which are good games.
 
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kjs862

kjs862

macrumors 65816
Jan 21, 2004
1,297
24
holmesf said:
Poorly. Virtualization works pretty well in a lot of cases, but games are not one of them. The DirectX calls have to be translated to OpenGL calls.
Click to expand...

Dang. Maybe I'll do a windows partition.
 
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bungiefan89

macrumors 6502a
Apr 5, 2011
565
76
Fatalbert said:
Just wondering, what has EA done that makes everyone hate it so much? I honestly don't know because I haven't experienced much EA on a PC besides the Harry Potter games and a horrible avatar system for PGA. When I think of EA, I think of SSX3, NASCAR '07, Need for Speed Underground, Harry Potter, and Harry Potter 2, which are good games.
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Hardcore gamers like me don't like the way they cram the Origin software down everyone's throats.
It started with Battlefield 3 back in 2011. BIG hype and anticipation for this game, but on PC, you suddenly HAD to plug in to this Origin system in order to play the game, and on consoles the game had an "online pass" that everyone had to pay $10 for if they got the game used instead of buying at full retail... that just doesn't happen with other console games.
Since then, they've been dangling the franchises they have control over (Battlefield, Crysis, Mass Effect) in front of gamers with strings attached to things like first-day DLC and other little "rewards" for people who buy for full price on the first day of availability. They've also taken a strong stance against selling games at reduced prices like we get with Steam Sales.

In a nutshell, EA is kind of at the forefront of this creepy movement in the gaming industry to get gamers to pay more money for their games. They're trying to get everyone used to a world where nobody gets a game at a reduced price because it's used or it's been out for a few years so the price is dropped... instead, they want a world where all gamers pay full price for every game they play, which is a big deal because most full games these days sell for around $60 when they first come out.

That's why people don't like EA.
 
S

SoldOnApple

macrumors 65816
Jul 20, 2011
1,013
1,680
Their servers are crawling.

----------

And I see Bookworm isn't free anymore, at least in Australia. Doubt I'll ever buy a single thing from this store, unless the new BF is Mac compatible.
 
Glassed Silver

Glassed Silver

macrumors 68020
Mar 10, 2007
2,096
2,567
Kassel, Germany
kjs862 said:
Dang. Maybe I'll do a windows partition.
Click to expand...

Don't worry, it's not flawless and not as speedy as running it natively in Bootcamp, but it sure does work nicely enough if you've got decent specs.

Granted, my Mac is almost completely maxed out, but it probably will work nicely enough for the thing to work.

It does for me in a way that I can't be bothered to reboot my Mac all the time. ;)

@topic:
Definitely will pass on that.
Nice try, EA.

Glassed Silver:mac
 
D

Dainin

macrumors regular
Sep 4, 2009
211
161
Origin will never be on my Mac, and never on my gaming PC for that matter.
 
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