Is Origin Access Premier Worth The Price?

Whether they’re offering streaming or downloads, gaming subscription services are all the rages these days with so many publishers and big names weighing in to stake a slice of the pie. One of the most recent efforts is Origin Access Premier from EA.

Like most subscription services, you pay a monthly fee for access to a stable of games with some leaving and entering over time; you never really own any of them. If your subscription ends, so does your access to the games on Origin Access Premier.

Premier is the, well, premier version of Origin Access, a PC service that gives you access to games within a vault. Where Premier and the basic subscription differ, however, is that Premier gives you early access to their new games while the basic version lets you play six months and upwards after general release.

With EA being such a controversial name, eyebrows were instantly raised when they announced their very own subscription. Irrespective of EA’s reputation, is Origin Access Premier a subscription worth having?

 

Origin Access Premier: The Games

Below is a list of all the Origin Access Premier games. Future releases are in bold.

A Plague Tale: Innocence
Anthem
Aragami
Batman: Arkham Asylum
Batman: Arkham City
Batman: Arkham Origins
Battlefield 1
Battlefield 3
Battlefield 4
Battlefield V
Battlefield Hardline
Battlefield: Bad Company
Battlefield: Bad Company 2
Bejeweled 2
Bejeweled 3
Beholder
Beholder 2
Black
Breathedge
Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons
Bulletstorm Lite
Burnout Paradise Remastered
Command & Conquer: The Ultimate Collection
Crusader: No Regret
Crusader: No Remorse
Crysis
Crysis 2
Crysis 3
Dante’s Inferno
Dead Space
Dead Space 2
Dead Space 3
Dead Space Ignition
Dear Esther
Detention
Dragon Age 2
Dragon Age: Inquisition
Dragon Age: Origins
Dungeon Keeper
Dungeon Keeper 2
Dungeons of Dredmore
EA Sports UFC
EA Sports UFC 2
EA Sports UFC 3
Ember
The Escapists
The Escapists 2
FIFA 14
FIFA 15
FIFA 16
FIFA 17
FIFA 18
FIFA 19
FIFA 20
Fe
Feeding Frenzy
Feeding Frenzy 2
Figment
Frostpunk
FTL: Faster Than Light
Furi
Ghost of a Tale
Hacknet
Heavy Weapon
Hover
Into the Breach
Jade Empire
Lego Batman
Lego Batman 2
Lego Batman 3
Lost Castle
Mad Max
Madden NFL 15
Madden NFL 16
Madden NFL 17
Madden NFL 18
Madden NFL 19
Madden NFL 20
Madden NFL 25
Mass Effect
Mass Effect 2
Mass Effect 3
Mass Effect: Andromeda
Medal of Honor: Above and Beyond
Medal of Honor Airborne
Medal of Honor Allied Assault
Mini Metro
Mirror’s Edge
Mirror’s Edge Catalyst
Moonlighter
Mr. Shifty
Mugsters
Mutant Year Zero: Road to Eden
NBA Live 14
NBA Live 15
NBA Live 16
NBA Live 17
NBA Live 18
NBA Live 19
NBA Live 20
NHL 15
NHL 16
NHL 17
NHL 18
NHL 19
NHL 20
Need For Speed
Need for Speed: Heat
Need for Speed Rivals
Need for Speed: Most Wanted
Orwell
Out of the Park Baseball 19
Out of the Park Baseball 20
Overcooked: Gourmet Edition
Oxenfree
Peggle
Peggle 2
Pillars of Eternity: Hero Edition
Pillars of the Earth
Plants vs. Zombies
Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare
Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare 2
Plants vs. Zombies: Battle for Neighborville
Pony Island
Populous
Populous II
Prison Architect
Punch Club
Rebel Galaxy
Renowned Explorers: International Society
Rory McIlroy PGA Tour
Sea of Solitude
SSX
Shift Quantum
SimCity
SimCity 2000
SimCity 4
Skate 3
Snake Pass
Splasher
Spore
Star Wars Battlefront (2004)
Star Wars Battlefront: Ultimate Edition
Star Wars Battlefront II
Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order
The Banner Saga
The Saboteur
The Sims 3
The Sims 4: Digital Deluxe Edition
The Witness
They Are Billions
This War of Mine
Titanfall
Titanfall 2
Torchlight II
Torment: Tides of Numenera
Trine
Trine 2: Complete Story
Tropico 6
Ultima I – IX
Ultimate Chicken Horse
Unravel
Unravel
Vampyr
Vambrace: Cold Soul
Virginia
Warhammer: Chaosbane Magnus Edition
Wasteland 2
Wing Commander
Wing Commander II
Wing Commander III
Wing Commander IV
Wing Commander Privateer
Yoku’s Island Express
Yooka-Laylee
Zuma
Zuma’s Revenge

As you can see, it’s quite the huge range of games available in Origin Access Premier with there being much more than just EA’s own games up for grabs. Sure, there are way too many sports games to pad things out, but there are many fairly big third-party games that you get with your subscription, too.

Uplay Plus is probably the biggest competitor for Origin Access Premier and it has fewer games overall as it’s purely for Ubisoft games.

 

Origin Access Premier: The Price

This will probably be the biggest thing that will stop people from subscribing as Origin Access Premier certainly isn’t on the cheap side of things. At $14.99 per month or $99.99 per year, it’s in line with Uplay Plus: another PC subscription from one of the biggest publishers.

While the yearly price is easily the most economical, it’s still a lot of money to drop on one service, especially as EA’s output throughout the year is pretty spotty, and even more so if you don’t have interest in sports games.

 

Origin Access Premier: The Ease of Use

As with most subscription services, Origin Access Premier comes with its own launcher. Signing up is as simple as having an EA account and a credit card or PayPal account available.

However, as for Origin itself, it’s easily one of the worst launchers on the market. Slow, unresponsive, and full of bugs, Origin has often just blank screened during our tests and is not helped by a rather ugly, uninspired UI. As well as that, once we’d subscribed, the launcher didn’t change for a long while after to show that we were able to download the Premier games free of (extra) charge.

To their credit, there is a tab within Origin that will take you directly to the Origin Access games.

 

Origin Access Premier: The Future

Origin Access Premier certainly has an interesting future ahead of with the trajectory EA are currently on.

More and more of their games are turning into live services, and it seems that they are being monetised more and more aggressively, as is unfortunately the industry norm.

Though EA Originals are almost always welcome sojourns from the typical EA output, it seems like the times of EA as a daring publisher are long behind them. Almost every new big game they release will come with microtransactions, and their main output will always be sports games.

 

Origin Access Premier: The Verdict

As we’ve already said, how much you get out of Origin Access Premier will ultimately depend on whether or not you like EA and sports games in general, but the third-party additions do make it a much more viable service than Uplay Plus, which is really its closest competition.

However, it pales significantly in comparison in terms of value to Xbox Game Pass, which is updated more often, is cheaper, and has a broader variety of games. At double the price, the only real reason to subscribe to Premier is if you are a FIFA or Madden fanatic who wants the newest entry for cheaper and earlier.

Apart from that audience, however, Origin Access Premier is a fairly easy subscription service to pass up. Unless you have a tonne of money to burn, you may be better served putting it towards some other service.

READ NEXT:
– All PS4 Cross-Play Games: The Complete List
– Nintendo Switch Cross-Play Games: The Complete List
– PlayStation Now PS4 Games: The Complete List