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Anonymous's avatar
Anonymous
12 years ago

Playing Offline?!

Since there seems to be no easily found search option, I guess I have to slug another Q on the board and hope for the best. I just spent an obscene amount of money on buying the Mass Effect trilogy and the collectors edition of 3 for PC, DISKS, NOT AN ONLINE DOWNLOAD, and now it wont even let me play offline... wont even start the game unless I log into the freaking spyware, origin. I let that filth onto my computer, but now I have to deal with it spying AND preventing me from playing my games?! Does anyone know how to FIX THIS or is it another unavoidable case of EA unrightfully taking people's money and ruining everything it touches? SO LIVID.

**P.S.: I have searched the web and found only posts regaurding ME3... ME3's online feature obviously requires online. That doesn't bother me, I'm more concerned with 1 & 2,- which, again, I have disks for and have no reason to require internet. Sorry, forgot to clarify on original post.

4 Replies

  • Anonymous's avatar
    Anonymous
    12 years ago

    I've read through your post a couple of times. I can't quite discern what your issue is.  If the game runs and requires Origin / a lit Internet connection, this is (unfortunately) the way of things for the law abiding customer.  If, otoh, you are unable to start but have jumped through the usual hoops, you'll have to go into more detail with regard to what's happening.  

  • Anonymous's avatar
    Anonymous
    12 years ago

    ............................... I need to know how to play the games I just spent over $100 on even when I dont have access to the internet.

  • I don't have the trilogy editions, but did register ME1 and 2 on Origin. I never even have to have Origin running. Once they were downloaded and installed through Origin, I could just locate the games in the installation folder and double click the executables to play. This may be different from the Trilogy edition.

    Mass Effect 3 can be played offline if you launch Origin in offline mode and disable your internet devices (LAN and wifi adapter) as long as the DLC has been authorized at least once. The same may be through for ME1 and 2.

    Note that Origin no longer "spies" on its users. It used to scan your entire hard drive for data mining purposes, but the scanning is now limited to the Origin folder.


  • @11ArchRyder11 wrote:

    ............................... I need to know how to play the games I just spent over $100 on even when I dont have access to the internet.


    As fredvdp said, (and the information on the packaging/web-site indicates) you must  have an internet connection at least once to validate/authorize the initial install of the base game, and again whenever you add  any official DLC for the first time.

    Once that authorization is done, you don't need an internet connection again.  But when launching the game you must set EA/Origin to "Offline", and disable your network adapter.  Otherwise, it will attempt to re-validate your install and fail when it can't reach the EA servers.

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