@holger1405 wrote:
Aelther wrote:EA_Jason
Why don't you TEST your advice before posting it!?
He did.
The EA app could be installed on a customized path up from @EA_Jason post to mid-November this year.
Well then here's a reason to maintain old, preferably offline, installers. That way we could use the old setup that worked, instead of this crappy new online installer that blatantly ignores user choice.
I would love to go back to a time where you could install a game and play it just like that, without a additional software needed.
Problem is that this ship has sailed a long time ago.
I also think that EA app is not remotely ready to be the main client for EA games and that they should have stuck with Origin at least until EA app has functional equality to Origin.
But Origin was not more of an "offline" installer than EA app is.
Cannot change the client install location. But force me to use a (beta) EA app when I try to play EA game on PC game pass ☹️
@holger1405 wrote:I would love to go back to a time where you could install a game and play it just like that, without a additional software needed.
Problem is that this ship has sailed a long time ago.
I also think that EA app is not remotely ready to be the main client for EA games and that they should have stuck with Origin at least until EA app has functional equality to Origin.But Origin was not more of an "offline" installer than EA app is.
I think you may have misunderstood what I was trying to say. I was not referring to clientless games, I was referring to the setup of the launcher (EA app) itself. There are generally two types of installers. One that contains the files it is trying to install (aka you can install them offline) and an online installer (very small in size, because it downloads the files it is about to install). For example you can download Chrome via an online installer which is very small in size and will then download and install the latest version, but if you dig deep enough, you can also download an "offline" installer of Chrome that will contain the browser itself. These are usually intended for enterprise deployment and usually come in msi format.
That is what I was asking for. If, as you say, an earlier version of the installer did have a working path selector, then I would like to have that, so it could be installed and then update post-install. Usually companies that offer offline installers keep several older versions available for download. Right now we only have a choice of the latest build, with all of its bugs.
Origin was indeed, far superior to the new EA app and it also clearly distinguished between origin native copies and steam copies. Now everything is smushed into one and I'm not sure which is which and if they started overriding keys again, the way they did when they first returned to Steam.
Now, since you did go on about how the time of being able to simply install a game and play has passed, I will say that i disagree completely and I'm sure than you know it's untrue. There is nothing "modern" about launchers, nor anything "legacy" about simple installers. It's everything to do with DRM. There are DRM-Free stores, one of them is even quite popular, where you CAN just download a game and play. A launcher is either optional or not available at all, depending on said store. EA even sells some of their older games on one of those DRM-Free stores, but, again, there is nothing stopping modern games from being launched there and many consumer-friendly publishers do. It's just that EA thinks that DRM is somehow stopping certain illegal activities, which it obviously does not. It only makes the paying customers jump through hoops and pointless online authenticators. Too bad that they can't even get the basics, such as installing their DRM/Launcher to a custom path, right.
True, I misunderstood you there.
But the fact that the EA app now no longer allows a custom path for installation is most probably not a bug but by design, (For reasons unknown to me.) so a offline installer would have been modified as well.
@Aelther wrote
Now, since you did go on about how the time of being able to simply install a game and play has passed, I will say that i disagree completely and I'm sure than you know it's untrue. There is nothing "modern" about launchers, nor anything "legacy" about simple installers. It's everything to do with DRM.
Where did I stated that it was a "modern" thing?
I said "Problem is that this ship has sailed a long time ago." and that it has.
Of course it is about DRM.
I buy games I love on GOG again, even if already have them on Steam, EA or at other companies, because I want them without DRM.
But most developers will not go without DRM measurers, at lest not on new AAA games, and it is not the developers who are to blame, but people that pirate games.
This is as far OT as it gets here, so this is the last thing I will say about this topic.
Have a nice day. 🙂
@holger1405 wrote:the fact that the EA app now no longer allows a custom path for installation is most probably not a bug but by design, (For reasons unknown to me.) so a offline installer would have been modified as well.
"Offline installer would have been modified as well" Yes, but we'd be able to grab an older version if we wanted to. With online installers, it's always the latest one.
If I had to guess, I'd say it's a lot more likely that they were too lazy to fix the bug, so they opted to simply rename the text.
If it is a design decision after all, then it's an utterly stupid one. Why on earth would anyone remove the most basic of features that has existed in Windows for decades? Did Apple buy EA when I wasn't looking? That company always thinks they know better than anyone.
I have the EA app on my older PC installed to a custom path and it still works and updates. No update has moved it to the C Drive, so it's not like it requires to sit in Program Files. It really must be this misguided pursuit for simplicity that actually ends up complicating everything in reality.
I will NOT let this go.
In the mean time, I will try to see how portable the EA app is and copy it from my old PC to the new one to a custom path. It may lack the registry entries for uninstallation, but whatever. I will place the .lnk shortcuts in my Start Menu myself. Thanks for the "Simplicity", EA.
