Are EA taking the pi$s?
Monday, July 9, 2012 at 2:45AM From Patrick- "Back in February Electronic Arts released Real Racing 2 on Google Play. It was free, for the first few races and then an in app purchase opened up the rest of the game. I duly bought the in app purchase and merrily played the game on and off for a couple of months. Then Ice Cream Sandwich arrived and broke RR2 on Android. No problem, I'd wait for the upgrade... I waited, and waited, and eventually uninstalled the app as my gaming wanderlust took me elsewhere.
Today (July 6th) EA has released a new version, with no details of what's new on the app page (so I still don't know if it works on ICS), plus it has a £4.75 price tag from the off. Now this isn't an upgrade to the existing app as all comments and download info have been wiped, plus if I want to try, I now have to buy, despite already buying the game once. I emailed the developer only to get the standard, check our website help section for answers. What gives? Here's the link to the uninformative app page.
Reader Comments (3)
email google, actually very helpful.
and game loft are no better imo
agreed, started avoiding both.
I hate freemium games too, to a level that I've bought I think 1 game for android this year, and it's a long standing one (machinarium).
I enjoyed Machinarium a lot too; I hope they do more like that.
I've seen a number of titles initially say they were compatible with my Prime and then change to be incompatible. The upshot is that if I've already bought and installed it I can't get updates, and if I need to reinstall it I can't. Eventually they usually become compatible with my Prime again but it can take a month or two.
EA is by far the worst for doing it.
With Gameloft I had that issue with NOVA 3, and they're also known for putting very little effort into optimisation meaning I get second-rate graphics and poor framerates in NOVA 3 on my Prime because it's 'only' Tegra 3. There are far better-looking titles running far better on my Prime so it's not a limitation of the hardware.
The S3 gets significantly better graphics in NOVA 3, probably because it has far more raw power rather than because Gameloft has optimised for it.
By the way, completely off-topic but I reckon someone here will know the answer: if I buy an S3 from a German website (only way I can get a 32GB blue SIM-free for the forseeable) is the price they charge the final price I'll pay? I shouldn't think I'd have to pay import duty but how about VAT? Cheers.