14 DAY TRIAL // Electronic Arts has revealed a few more statistics about Origin, its new digital distribution service for the PC, saying that it's a huge success and promising that more features will be implemented into the experience in the future.
EA's Origin hasn't exactly been welcomed with open arms by gamers, as many believed the service was just a lackluster copy of Valve's Steam, and didn't want to install and use another service just to access games from EA.
Even so, the service went on to become quite popular, according to EA's Senior Vice President of Global E-Commerce, David DeMartini.
"We've got 12 million downloads of the application. We have 50 partners: independent game developers and publishers who are publishing on the platform. We've generated over $150 million in revenue, which represents huge growth on a percentage basis versus the previous year. In every numerical dimension it was a huge success," he told GameSpot.
Even if the numbers are good, DeMartini is the first to admit that the company still has a long way to go before it can convince gamers of Origin's quality.
As such, he pledged that more features would be added to the service in the future and highlighted that the first year had seen the company laying Origin's foundation.
"That said, the Origin feature-set last year was very foundational. When you start one of these services, you can't leap to the glitzy features. You have to get the meat and potatoes down first."
Due to Steam's constrictive terms of service, quite a few big EA games, including Mass Effect 3 or Battlefield 3, are exclusive to Origin, at least for now. As such, it's likely that Origin will continue to increase its user base.
Have you started using EA's Origin or are you still loyal to Steam, no matter what big games you can't get?