EA reviews Origin ban policy

EA reviews Origin ban policy

Mon 16 Apr 2012 7:23am GMT / 3:23am EDT / 12:23am PDT
Online

Single player content now available to users with banned accounts

Electronic Arts has revised its ban policy for Origin accounts, altering its terms and conditions so that users who transgress rules and have their account banned or suspended can still access their single player content.

Access to online multiplayer will still be unavailable until a player's account is reinstated.

The policy change were actually implemented on March 8, but EA has been ensuring that all documents have been properly updated to adhere to the new guidelines.

"If you find yourself with a disabled account," reads a statement on EA's site. "Please note that you can still play EA games in single-player mode. For PC games you will need to enable Origin's offline mode to play games with a disabled account. Go to the settings tab in Origin (the gear icon) and select Go Offline."

Previously, receiving ban in an online multiplayer match or breaking the rules of an EA-owned forum could have resulted in a temporary or permanent banning of a player's account and loss of access to the games they had purchased.

CinemaBlend reports that, despite the loosening of rules, Origin still allows EA to delete any accounts and the data associated with them, after two years of inactivity.

9 Comments

Morville O'Driscoll
Games Blogger & Journalist

Yeyyyyy... Origin isn't quite as lame as it used to be. Woooo.

Posted:A year ago

#1

It should never have been unavailable in the first place...

Posted:A year ago

#2

"Origin still allows EA to delete any accounts and the data associated with them, after two years of inactivity"

Does that mean if you don't play any of your Origin games for two years they'll be lost? I hope you can re-activate your keys at least.

Posted:A year ago

#3

Morville O'Driscoll
Games Blogger & Journalist

Actually, looking at the most recent ToS for Origin (which is dated November 2011, and thus doesn't have the updated "singleplayer content even for banned users"), and EULA (undated) the deletion of account after 2 years clause no longer appears. Unless I'm missing something?

http://tos.ea.com/legalapp/WEBTERMS/GB/en/PC/

and

https://download.dm.origin.com/eula/en_GB.html

Edited 1 times. Last edit by Morville O'Driscoll on 16th April 2012 4:58pm

Posted:A year ago

#4

Mats Holm
Senior Agent

Used to work there, won't ever be deleted unless the account is clean (no games or entitlements attached) and has not been accessed for two years. This is to free up emails to prevent people from having a problem creating an EA account when they get a new EA game.

Posted:A year ago

#5

I still won't post any techinical support problems on their forums. I'm too scared to get my account banned.

Posted:A year ago

#6

Barrie Tingle
Live Producer

It is a ToS that has never been implemented in all the years Origin has "existed" all those years ago as EA Downloader, EA Link, EA Download Manager. I wouldn't expect an account with content assigned to it to be deleted even after inactivity.

Posted:A year ago

#7

William Usher
Assistant Editor

Well I hope you're right. Given a lot of decisions EA has been making lately it's hard to tell just how far they will go.

I mean, these are the same people who have Online Passes expire.

Posted:A year ago

#8

I think so, since you still have the keys in your mail :) unless you loose that too xD then you're screwed

Edited 1 times. Last edit by Chris Madsen on 19th April 2012 4:47pm

Posted:A year ago

#9

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