EA makes online pass content free in existing games

Electronic Arts is dropping out of the Online Pass racket, and several of its properties already reflect the decision. Games like Battlefield: Bad Company 2, Dragon Age II, and Mass Effect 2 have had their pass-gated components priced down to free on Xbox Live (via NeoGAF), and EA says more are to come.

"Players will see it first with some EA Sports titles, where a prompt to enter an Online Pass code will no longer appear in-game; with other titles we are simply making Online Passes available free of charge online."

The rolling updates will take effect over the next several weeks, until the used-game monetizing initiative is no more. At least, no more from EA--how Microsoft and Sony plan to deal with used games on their respective next-gen consoles remains hazy.

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Connor Sheridan

I got a BA in journalism from Central Michigan University - though the best education I received there was from CM Life, its student-run newspaper. Long before that, I started pursuing my degree in video games by bugging my older brother to let me play Zelda on the Super Nintendo. I've previously been a news intern for GameSpot, a news writer for CVG, and was formerly a staff writer at GamesRadar.