The original post: /r/gaming by /u/DeathNum on 2024-11-10 15:10:12.
All these years I've seen a plethora of posts, videos etc. online, either serious or humorous ones, about EA being greedy as hell while putting the lowest effort possible. I always thought that people were just being overdramatic or said all that so they can make their joke. But yesterday I realized that behind all the memes, articles there was truth to be found. And they weren't just true, they were VERY true.
I had bought Mass Effect Legendary Edition during the Steam Summer Sale for 6€, installed it, but didn't try it until yesterday (the same thing I do with most of my Steam games to be honest). The second I clicked "play" and realized I was being directed to the EA app, I didn't particularly like it but I didn't think much of it. I started to think much of it when my game turned out be unplayable though.
It just said "preparing game" on the EA app for a while and then shut down. No big deal, I'll just close Steam and the EA app and try again. Didn't work. Tried it many times, it just didn't work. I went ahead and restarted my PC, but it also didn't work. I verified integrity of the game files and there was no problem with them. I then tried to launch the game via the EA app, the same "preparing game" and shut down combo. Same thing happened when I tried to launch it directly via the Launcher in the game files.
Now it really started to piss me off. I just wanted to play the game I had already paid for, nothing more but also nothing less. I searched online for possible solutions. I deleted the registries of the game in Registry Editor, it didn't work, I used Task Manager to close any EA related app before launching the game, it didn't work. I went as far as installing the discontinued Origin with a patch called Fuck Off EA App (which I totally relate to) because it makes it actually usable and it doesn't force you to install the EA app as it would normally do. Then, I started the game using the Launcher found in the game files and I finally managed to launch it! But after closing the game I couldn't get it to work anymore, it was a one time thing. I was getting mad, it had been an hour and a half up until that point.
I decided to take a look at EA's forums but they didn't help me at all. Since I was already on EA's website though, I thought "why not use their support page?". So after some digging I managed to create a case about my problem (they even made it difficult for me to create a case compared to other game companies' support pages I had used in the past), with little faith in them helping me. After a few minutes, a "specialist" replied to me in the most generic way possible, even though I had explained what my problem was. I tried to write back to him but my case had been paused for some reason and it didn't allow me to resume it. When I pressed "resume" it redirected me to another page, where I received a notification about my current case, and when I clicked on it, it prompted me to resume the case, and it was just an infinite loop. I still haven't figured out what's wrong with the game.
All in all, 6€ isn't going to put a dent in my wallet. But I paid for Mass Effect and I can't even play it. It isn't even my fault, EA doesn't let me play a game on the platform I used to buy it, and instead they make me use their platform that isn't even half good, it's straight up terrible. That is 100% on them. Likewise, their support page is also really not user friendly. I never had problems with EA before, and other games like NFS Heat, which I own Steam, run properly on the EA app. That's why I always doubted the fact that EA sucks. I spent money and several hours of my life trying to figure out the problem they themselves have caused. I apologize for doubting you all.