[EU Herald] - Open Beta and the Standard Preorder

[IainC_Goa]

I just wanted to clear up a few points of confusion about the open beta program in Europe. When the US pre-order program was announced, it was mentioned that the EU program would not include Open Beta access. At that point we hadn't officially unveiled our program, but as we were getting a lot of enquiries about this, we confirmed that this was the case. Since then, some of you have seen the EA Store in Europe and Direct2Drive advertising the pre-order with Open Beta access.

It's important to note that our official announcement regarding the Standard Edition pre-order is coming on Thursday 28th which is when the program launches. At that time we will provide you with all the details of the pre-order package as well as a list of partners. Some of our partners have preempted that announcement which has led to a bit of confusion.

The situation then is basically as follows:

Pre-ordering a standard edition from most of our partners will not automatically give you Open Beta access as we have said previously. We will however be announcing a list of 'preferred partners' who will be selling the pre-order with Open Beta access. A full list of these partners will be included with the main announcement this week, I can confirm that both the EA Store and D2D are preferred partners and so those of you who have already placed an order need not worry that you won't get what you were offered.

Hopefully this will put some minds at rest and, as I have said, all the remaining details will be unveiled this Thursday.

[Zaeni]

ok, thanks XD.

I was wondering if i should cancel my EA store pre order to be honst. Tank you for finally updating us on this issue. Was there some non-disclosure hoop you had to jump through to give us this information? Or is is because both the EA store and D2D jumped the gun?

Originally Posted by IainC_Goa

I just wanted to clear up a few points of confusion about the open beta program in Europe. When the US pre-order program was announced, it was mentioned that the EU program would not include Open Beta access. At that point we hadn't officially unveiled our program, but as we were getting a lot of enquiries about this, we confirmed that this was the case. Since then, some of you have seen the EA Store in Europe and Direct2Drive advertising the pre-order with Open Beta access.

It's important to note that our official announcement regarding the Standard Edition pre-order is coming on Thursday 28th which is when the program launches. At that time we will provide you with all the details of the pre-order package as well as a list of partners. Some of our partners have preempted that announcement which has led to a bit of confusion.

The situation then is basically as follows:
Pre-ordering a standard edition from most of our partners will not automatically give you Open Beta access as we have said previously. We will however be announcing a list of 'preferred partners' who will be selling the pre-order with Open Beta access. A full list of these partners will be included with the main announcement this week, I can confirm that both the EA Store and D2D are preferred partners and so those of you who have already placed an order need not worry that you won't get what you were offered.

Hopefully this will put some minds at rest and, as I have said, all the remaining details will be unveiled this Thursday.

[Henrik112]

Thaks for clearing things up Iainc now of sleep untill Thursday for me hehe and keep up the good work.

P.s why Quote the post right above ya own nr.2 ?? makes no sense at all LOL.

[cripling]

Good that you've cleared it up about the SE mess Ian, I think the US gave them too much, the headstart for the SE will do just fine (as I payed load for my CE codes :P).

I'm wondering more about the open beta client release, but I GUESS it will come at te 28th, thanks again Ian!

And not using the word "soon", quite nice

[theocracy]

Finally.

Thanks for the clarification.

[Nexx]

Thank you.

[Dreadneck]

And how about the Collector's Edition pre-orders? I have my codes for over a month now, but there's no place to enter them. There's not even a site where we can create an account! In US they even get Closed Beta access, we get absolutely nothing. And not alone that, we are also just left in the dark.
Not delivering what you promise, coupled with a lack of information gives me AoC flashbacks and that can't be good, can it? GOA will screw up, Mythic will claim they can't do anything about it, and EU will get shafted once again.
It's a bloody outrage, and everybody acts like it's normal. Unbelievable.

[Jeronas]

EDITED for content

[IainC_Goa]

Originally Posted by Dreadneck

And how about the Collector's Edition pre-orders? I have my codes for over a month now, but there's no place to enter them. There's not even a site where we can create an account! In US they even get Closed Beta access, we get absolutely nothing. And not alone that, we are also just left in the dark.
Not delivering what you promise, coupled with a lack of information gives me AoC flashbacks and that can't be good, can it? GOA will screw up, Mythic will claim they can't do anything about it, and EU will get shafted once again.
It's a bloody outrage, and everybody acts like it's normal. Unbelievable.

No-one is being shafted. Your CE pre-order was advertised with Open Beta access and you will of course receive that. We have already announced the dates for open beta and we have also confirmed that you will be able to download the client and create your open beta account in plenty of time to take part.

Nobody is breaking any promises here.

[palleon]

Thank you for the update Ian.

Please can you also let us know when we can enter our codes into your site? We have had them since April 2008, the US have been able to enter them since April, and yet still we have no account management here in the EU.

Also, with Open beta officially starting in 11 days, we need a way to download the EU client in the next few days, or most of us will not be able to participate (9 gigs is not small for the UK to download!!).

Thank you

[CatValentine]

I know how AoC was handled isnt a good way to judge how WAR will be handled but I didnt pre-order that, I went out to the store, bought the box, brought it home and it was a good 4 days b4 i could log in and create a character, this was due to monumental problems with downloading and installing patches.

Being told that the client will be available in plenty of time to download for the OB is just scary, 1st of sept would be plenty of time, 3rd may very well not be. Every day counts and this close I would have thought there would be a pretty fixed date when things would become available.

Xxx

[Paragonn]

Jeronas, please read Iain's post again.

Certain stores' SE will get open beta access. they'll be officially announcing them on the 28th, but d2d and the EA store jumped the gun. It's not false advertising...it's just not waiting till the 28th to put it up on their sites.

[Bluefish]

Originally Posted by IainC_Goa

We have already announced the dates for open beta and we have also confirmed that you will be able to download the client and create your open beta account in plenty of time to take part.

Nobody is breaking any promises here.

I'm away from Sept 1st to 7th, will I have plenty of time to also d/l open beta? (in other words, before Sept 1st!) Thanks.

[palleon]

Originally Posted by IainC_Goa

No-one is being shafted. Your CE pre-order was advertised with Open Beta access and you will of course receive that. We have already announced the dates for open beta and we have also confirmed that you will be able to download the client and create your open beta account in plenty of time to take part.

Nobody is breaking any promises here.

Thanks again.

Although in reality, you do only have about 4 days left in order not to break those promises, as "download in plenty of time" means about a week to get it at standard UK ADSL speeds (if we got it run at max).

[Irishgotgame]

* Edited for Content *