Peter Moore: EA Still Undecided on Used Game Fees for Xbox One, “Online Pass Was a Mistake”

When Microsoft announced before E3 2013 that they would leave the task of deciding on fees for lending and selling games between users up to publishers, it took several people off guard – and not in a good way. Till date, several publishers are undecided on what stance to take, and now that Sony has announced no fees for used games or connectivity for the PlayStation 4, things have gotten even messier.

Electronic Arts chief operating officer Peter Moore, for his part, revealed to Polygon that the company was undecided on their stance. “Sony have announced what they are going to do which is, y’know, business as usual, and then Microsoft are looking at allowing a publisher to opt-in, should they choose to do so.

“But if we opt in, do [Microsoft] charge a fee, and if so, how much? We have not internally even begun to sit down and answer those questions.”

He also denied that EA was pushing for any kind of system to stop the sale of used games and that they need to work out what to do in light of Sony’s announcement. “EA has never had a conversation, and I have been present at all of them, with all of the manufacturers, saying you must put a system in place that allows us to take a piece of the action or even stop it. Absolutely incorrect.

“We will figure out what we need to do. I’m not trying to back-pedal but this thing just happened and we need to reconvene and hear what people think and talk to our retail partners and our first party partners. We had no idea what Sony was going to announce. We’ll reconvene next week and figure it all out.”

Moore also admitted that the online pass system, which has recently been removed by EA, was a mistake and “more trouble to the consumer than it was worth.”