Yesterday we mentioned that Crysis 2 had been removed from the Steam store , and wondered if it marked the start of a concerted attempt by EA to drive people towards its new digital download service, Origin. Now EA have released a statement to say that the game was removed because of a change in the Steam terms of service, and its disappearance had nothing to do with them.
EA told Giantbomb "It's unfortunate that Steam has removed Crysis 2 from their service. This was not an EA decision or the result of any action by EA.
"Steam has imposed a set of business terms for developers hoping to sell content on that service – many of which are not imposed by other online game services. Unfortunately, Crytek has an agreement with another download service which violates the new rules from Steam and resulted in its expulsion of Crysis 2 from Steam.
"Crysis 2 continues to be available on several other download services including GameStop, Amazon, Origin.com and more."
The nature of the change in terms that prompted Crytek to remove Crysis 2 from Steam is unclear, as is the identity of the other download service. We've contacted EA and Valve for comment. People who have bought Crysis 2 over Steam can still boot up Crysis 2 and play as normal.
Initially, news of Crysis 2's removal suggested that EA might be moving towards releasing their future games exclusively through Origin. EA have already announced that The digital edition of The Old Republic will only be available to buy through Origin, and the service is currently listing Alice: Madness Returns as an origin exclusive until tomorrow. President of EA Games Frank Gibeau has been dropping hints about EA's future direction, who says "if we can use exclusive content or other ideas to help grow our audience then we're going to do that because we're growing a platform.”
