Xbox One Gets EA Subscription Service For Games, Discounts And Early Access
Electronic Arts announced a new exclusive subscription service Tuesday for the Xbox One. EA Access will allow members to download and play older EA published titles at no additional cost and provide discounts and early access to upcoming titles.
Welcome to EA Access, a new membership kicking off on Xbox One! Access to The Vault, discounts, & more! Learn More: http://t.co/laaY10bpTf
— EA Access (@EAAccess) July 29, 2014
The EA Access subscription service is part of a partnership with Microsoft that is available at a monthly price of $4.99 or an annual price of $29.99. It includes access to The Vault, EA’s collection of older Xbox One titles to download. The initial offering in the beta will include FIFA 14, Madden NFL 25, Peggle 2, and Battlefield 4. More titles are expected to be added later.
Those that subscribe to the service will also receive 10 percent off digital purchases of EA games such as the upcoming Madden NFL 15 and Dragon Age: Inquisition or older titles from the Xbox Games Store. This discount also applies to other EA subscription services like Battlefield 4 Premium.
Finally, EA Access subscribers will also be able to download trial versions of new games five days before they are released. How much access to the game you get depends on the title. Some will only let you play for a limited time (a Eurogamer report suggests two hours), while others will be more open.
Here’s the official language about the pre-release trials from the EA Access FAQ.
What will the pre-release trials include? Will my progress carry over?
Each game is different, so each game’s trial will be, too. In some titles you’ll be able to play one of the game’s modes for a limited time, while other times you can jump right into the full game. And since you’ll always be playing the real game, any progress you make will carry over so you can pick up where you left off on launch day.
Microsoft’s Larry “Major Nelson” Hyrb further stated that, “You’ll be able to try the game for at least two hours and then save your progress.”
A release date for EA Access has not been announced yet but the beta is currently rolling out to select users. Those interested will be able to purchase it straight from the Xbox Games Store or through GameStop in the United States and GameStop and Amazon in Europe.
Awesome new way to play more @EA games coming to players on @Xbox http://t.co/XbBzfr2QzE. Great to have @GameStop on board as well! — Peter Moore (@petermooreEA) July 29, 2014
This appears to be part of the special Electronic Arts and Microsoft partnership that was announced at the 2013 E3 convention, but was never given any additional information. Do you agree with the above sentiment from the EA Sport head Peter Moore? What do you think about this being exclusive to the Xbox One? Let us know in the comments below.
