PSA: Origin downtime scheduled for tonight, no Mass Effect 3 or Battlefield 3 multiplayer
Origin servers will be taken down for maintenance tonight from 10 PM to 1:30 AM PDT. According to EA's notice , Origin will be available in offline mode during those hours, and the single-player portions of EA/Origin games will still be accessible. The multiplayer modes in games such as Mass Effect 3 and Battlefield 3, however, will not be playable. Additionally, any purchases made via Origin will be added to a queue and delivered after the outage ends.
GameSpy will also be down for five hours starting at the same time, so games which use the service, such as Battlefield: Bad Company 2 and Red Alert 3, will go dark as well. According to EA, the downtime is needed to "improve and prepare for bigger changes in the weeks and months ahead."
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Tyler grew up in Silicon Valley during the '80s and '90s, playing games like Zork and Arkanoid on early PCs. He was later captivated by Myst, SimCity, Civilization, Command & Conquer, all the shooters they call "boomer shooters" now, and PS1 classic Bushido Blade (that's right: he had Bleem!). Tyler joined PC Gamer in 2011, and today he's focused on the site's news coverage. His hobbies include amateur boxing and adding to his 1,200-plus hours in Rocket League.