UPDATE: Thanks to CAP who posted this excerpt from PAGE 6 of his EU Army of Two manual.
“NOTE: The online game modes in Army of Two are not cross region compatible and is only supported between PAL discs”
I was thinking maybe it should say this on the OUTSIDE of the box, since I can’t think of another title off the top of my head that came with this seemingly retarded pointless restriction.
Details are sketchy at the moment, but players across Europe are writing in to tell us that their copies of Army of Two will not interface with their American friends. The game shows up in XBL as Army of Two (EU) and attempts to connect across the pond have, so far, come up fruitless. More after the jump!
As someone who quite enjoys the company of our friends from the motherland, I can’t help but wonder what on Earth would possess EA to pull something like this? Global gaming is a must for online play. Having non-interfaceable products heading to each side of the Atlantic is just dumb.
I hope this is a glitch in the system and NOT an indicator of things to come from EA. It also begs the question, What’s the difference in the two versions? Which continent is getting screwed here?
No word yet on whether PS3 owners will face the same problem, however something tells me the semi-open platform may fare a bit better on this issue. Not sure why… I can just feel it.
Let’s have some answers EA. If not, we’ve got a few thousand EU gamers in our audience that would like to have a word with you, in about 20 languages.
DISCUSSION QUESTION: Is intercontinental multiplayer important to you? Why or why not?
Spread the word. Share a Digg!
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
47 responses so far ↓
1 mallavu399 // Mar 10, 2008 at 5:41 pm
The reason that you can’t play is probably because EA doesn’t have any companies there. They figure if they’re don’t have a company there those people don’t deserve a game.
2 Doc // Mar 10, 2008 at 5:51 pm
No but those people have money… and EA is drawn to money like a bee to a hairy stamen.
3 NoneOfYourBusiness // Mar 10, 2008 at 5:52 pm
Or to keep people from buying games over seas and shipping them to thier country. It gives EA a bit more control.
4 Doc // Mar 10, 2008 at 5:56 pm
It’s going to bite them in the butt… just a guess.
5 1Colin1 // Mar 10, 2008 at 5:58 pm
Wow that’s bs to the face…
That’s a great quote to do by Doc “EA is drawn to money like a bee to a hairy stamen.” rofl!
6 haydenkayne // Mar 10, 2008 at 6:03 pm
hey in rainbow and cod4 i would be glad to not have any brits lagging out the game. not to mention if i hear the word wanker one more time im gonna stick a scone right up their tail pipe
7 ShooterFan // Mar 10, 2008 at 6:48 pm
I still can’t figure out why they would do this. If it were a latency issue, how come other developers can make it work. Ive played Halo and CoD4 matches with oversea’rs, and had little to no problems. It’s a shame really.
8 BeeBop // Mar 10, 2008 at 6:50 pm
How are PS3 user’s going to fare better? All EA games run on EA servers for both the 360 and PS3. If it’s blocked on one platform I assume they will be doing the same. If not, then EA is due for a boot to the side of the head!
9 Doc // Mar 10, 2008 at 6:52 pm
If it’s on purpose it’s stupid.
If its a network glitch (doubtful given the alternate game name on XBL) that marks like the 5th title released in the past 4 months that suffered from big network connectivity issues.
10 Cube // Mar 10, 2008 at 6:55 pm
Nobody can understand the british accents anyway.
I think that japanese are more easy to understand.
11 TheCap007 // Mar 10, 2008 at 7:34 pm
taking from the UK manual page 6 at the botom
“NOTE: The online game modes in Army of Two are not cross region compatible and is only supported between PAL discs”
12 Doc // Mar 10, 2008 at 8:17 pm
PAL is not my Pal.
WTF is up with PAL anyway? Why can’t there just be one kind of stupid disc?
13 1Colin1 // Mar 10, 2008 at 8:25 pm
I don’t get how that stops there being EU-US play… But I don’t no s**t about all that stuff.
And ya it’s stupid having all these different discs and formats
14 RK1 WhiteKnight (NZ) // Mar 10, 2008 at 8:31 pm
So what about pacific player??? I wasn’t planning on buying this game and this just confirms it. European players wouldn’t cause any lag for Americans on this game because EA uses dedicated servers. I didn’t get any lag when using there servers to play against Europeans and I’m in NZ!!!!!
15 Doll // Mar 10, 2008 at 10:30 pm
Thank you for posting this! I currently live in America but i play with a lot of people from the UK, and was planning on buying Army of Two to play co-op with them. I now will have to pass up this game. Stupid EA. Can’t believe they would do this.
@RK1, you’ll be able to play with the EU since you guys both use PAL, you just won’t be able to play with yanks.
16 Clstirens // Mar 11, 2008 at 12:38 am
Likely has to do with the programming end (and the multi-language function). Someone in the networking department probably couldn’t find a way for the these slightly different versions to communicate properly.
17 Phoenixdive // Mar 11, 2008 at 2:18 am
That’s what you get when you have a company which game developers and net coders are badly payed chimps (real chimps, not an insult).
18 RabbitFly // Mar 11, 2008 at 5:44 am
I can confirm that this is also the case with the PS3 version of the game. And for me it is extremely annoying, as I purely bought the game to play it with some of my American friends (I live in europe).
19 DougB45 // Mar 11, 2008 at 7:04 am
well cant u have the game from the other side of the pond and have it shipped 2 u and play wih hte ppl u want 2
20 UKGamer // Mar 11, 2008 at 7:15 am
I wouldn’t be surprised if it were simply to supplu localised servers to minimise lag issues. EA’s servers are renowned in the UK for being laggy and of low spec.
It’s not exactly a bad thing in my opinion… especially with the likes of haydenkayne and Cube who simply have to show their true Americanism with ignorance and racism. This is why online gaming needs to be monitored and why most Europeans will probably celebrate the PAL/NTSC divide!
21 R A LEE202 // Mar 11, 2008 at 7:39 am
Its not the the first time EA has done this, Medal of Honor: Heroes 2 on the Wii is the same, its only PAL to PAL and US to US disc’s for online play, which sucks, EA wants to own every game developer under the sun and they still don’t know how to make online games work right. And this is why EA is a rubbish company.
22 Clstirens // Mar 11, 2008 at 7:52 am
@R A LEE202: Yeah, I know what you mean. But their ****ty online service is just the first few worms in the can.
23 Adamski UK // Mar 11, 2008 at 8:56 am
Probably due to the fact that we have Pavements, Jam, Lifts, Holidays and Motorways.
Gamers in the US have Sidewalks, Jelly, Elevators, Vacations and Freeways.
I guess EA Montreal thought it would be too tricky to deal with these translations in the game code…hang on…aren’t they FRENCH?!
Oh, and for your reference, both the UK and the US have plenty of wankers.
24 Schism // Mar 11, 2008 at 11:55 am
I find it quite offensive some of the lovely anti-Brit comments so far. Some Brits aren’t too pleased with the US either so keep your mouths shut next time.
This really does suck, considering that one of the main attractions towards Army of Two was that anyone could play together…
Just as an afterpoint, racism isn’t just against ones race, it can be against religion, language, and country… *hint hint* heydenkayne and Cube */hint hint*
And anyways love you guys over here at SG
25 Chris "Lefty" Brown // Mar 11, 2008 at 12:36 pm
Schism,
I think it’s called Xenophobia and not racism, but I do echo your sentiments. I don’t call where int he world a person if from, as long as they keep the name-calling/singing/rapping/epitaphs to minimum and keep the game fun and challenging I don’t care one iota what part of the world they reside.
26 RK1 FaMiCuS // Mar 11, 2008 at 1:17 pm
Why can’t I play with Whiteknight, my red ping buddy. I guess it they might be trying to eliminate lag any way they can, which sucks for people like Whiteknight and I. We have people in our RK1 group live all around the world, our two big region groups are US and UK, which basically makes us now RK1/2.
27 Doc // Mar 11, 2008 at 1:18 pm
Why would there be lag in Army of two and not lag in CoD4 when we play with HALF OUR CREW being from the UK?!???!?
28 Schism // Mar 11, 2008 at 1:40 pm
It is rather strange that only Army of Two has had this to be honest. Surely as mentioned, CoD4, which was always going to be a bigger hit would have more of a problem with lagging…
And anyway a lot of lag doesn’t just come from where people are from in the world, being a PC gamer, I’m not sure about connection speeds when people join XBox or PS3 servers, but that’s the main problem for PC games… Some of my favorite servers for games are in the US I get brilliant connection to, and some that are only a few hundred miles away in France I get a bad connection to :\
And thanks for backing me up Lefty
29 TOO KINGS // Mar 11, 2008 at 2:08 pm
One of my best friends couldn’t play with me when he got his copy, he’s from the U.K. We planned to play it as soon as he could get his hands on it but alas we couldn’t.
On aside note we decided to play some burnout and there was absolutely no lag whatsoever. So I really don’t think it’s connectivity. That burnout is EA as well.
I love those limeys!!
30 SoulAssassin // Mar 11, 2008 at 4:26 pm
i hoped ea would bring out a good game
seems i wasted another € 65 at least R6:V 2 isnt gonna let me down
31 Army of Two online = region locked - Xbox, PlayStation and Nintendo gaming blog - Geekpulp.co.nz // Mar 11, 2008 at 4:29 pm
[...] titles, EA have locked the online play in Army of Two to people with the same format disc as you. Sarcastic Gamer were the first to break the news which will disappoint many people accustomed to playing whoever [...]
32 Jim // Mar 11, 2008 at 5:00 pm
I’M REALLY FRIGGIN’ ANGRY!!!!!!!!
WTF??!!!!!!
33 Cube // Mar 11, 2008 at 9:59 pm
I can’t be racist towards the British language.
British and USA speak the same language only the British throw in funny words.
See here is what happened last time I was playing a game with a British guy.
^British guys drives up in car and hanks the horn next to a shoe shop.^
*get in the boot!!>!! hurry an air strike is coming*
^As instructed by British team mate all the long way run towards huge shoe shop and get in the huge boot shaped sign^
^British guy^ following me in car. *what are you doing get in the boot!?!
^ME jumping up and down in huge 3d boot^
*I am in the boot see I am protected from sniper fire and bombs by huge footwear known as a boot.*
^British guy^
*No the back of the car with the gun you bloody idiot*
^me^
*Why did you not just say the back of the car?*
^Air strike hits^
^This ends in our death as the base is bombed since we took to long to make it out alive thanks British guy and his accent with funny words for a back of a car^
…………………….
and PAL is the video format that eroupe uses that runs at 50hz rather than USA 60Hz, it made old games on the SNES slower and look horrible.
think ZELDA on nes then add twice as much slowdown and junk and you have the PAL format.
In fact older consoles was slower than the USA or japanese models because of ther PAL TV’s
34 Cube // Mar 11, 2008 at 10:07 pm
And I am sure there is a good reason it’s called Latency between eroupe and USA and japan xbox’s online is much higher.
The best I ever see a eroupe guy ever connect to an USA server is about a ping of 160.
35 Cube // Mar 11, 2008 at 10:11 pm
see to prove my point i give you this video with out the subtiles I have no idea what they are saying.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PgPH0tYXJrA
36 Manuva // Mar 12, 2008 at 12:02 am
I’m from the UK and PAL is inferior to NTSC.
It runs at 50hz and some games have been known to run up to 17.5% slower. There is PAL60 which is more similiar to NTSC, most games these days include the 60hz option.
And Cube, shut the hell up.
37 Army of Two Has Region Protected Multiplayer [Ea] // Mar 12, 2008 at 2:02 am
[...] Needless to say, it’s an unpublicized annoyance that we hope does not become a pattern. Army of Two: No EU-US Play (CONFIRMED) [SarcasticGamer and EA Forums] Thanks [...]
38 No EU-US play for Army of Two - Hustlin’ Games // Mar 12, 2008 at 4:02 am
[...] between PAL discs.” So says page six of the European Army of Two manual, as reported by Sarcastic Gamer. Or, to put it a different way, Europeans and Americans won’t be playing any Army of Two [...]
39 IM FROM ENGLAND // Mar 12, 2008 at 9:41 am
i really gotta say this after seeing some posts about the brittish accent, we dont have the accent u dumb asses as we are english = the english language, americans = english language.
so u have the accent n i h9 it when americans say O MY GASH! LOL
40 Charles // Mar 12, 2008 at 1:37 pm
All English accents are different. Just like different American accents - some of which I find very hard to understand.
Americans complaining about the accent is like complaining about a French person having a French accent.
Not everyone wants to conform to American diction just for their convenience.
41 Schism // Mar 12, 2008 at 1:44 pm
Cube, stop talking crud, even my old TV can run at 60Hz, that’s nothing to do with countries, that’s just to do with your TV, and that in no way effects the connection between you and the server, it just takes longer for the image to show properly on the screen if running at 50Hz…
And sure there are words that we use that Americans won’t understand, but remember it’s the other way round as well.
There is nothing wrong with the British accent, their is nothing wrong with the American accent, and their’s nothing wrong with someone speaking English with a French accent, or a German one. Theirs really been no need for this conversation, face it, we have different accents and that’s that, we are just gonna have to live with it.
Also I’ve been talking to friends about this (Ao2) and they have really been put off when I told them, mostly PS3 owners, but they really are put off of buying the game. Strange idea in the first place… :S
42 her majesty's loyal subject // Mar 13, 2008 at 5:11 pm
last time I checked the English language was actually created by The British Empire.
and those who think NTSC is superior to PAL, think again… There’s a common saying within the TV tech community that NTSC stands for
Never
Twice
Same
Colour (yes.. it’s spelt with a U!)
43 Cube // Mar 13, 2008 at 6:17 pm
Brittish Empire ?
Is that like darth vader and the storm troopers?
So that makes americans Jedi rebel scum since we did that in 1776?
Oh my god that is what star wars really is Brittish Vs americans rebel scum in space.
see reason as I was saying ping and keeping the peer to peer console connection sync over that distance is the reason why. the game is not hosted by a server. (why are people paying for xbox live again when microsoft will not give you a server in all the games?)
The game will run like quake from 1996 over dial up they even tried in peer to peer with that distance.
http://www.g4tv.com/thefeed/blog/post/683522/Army_of_Two_Wont_Play_Across_Regions.html
Though I have no idea when I said PAL was the problem I was just sating how sucky games look at PAL 50 hz.
44 Midnight Sun // Mar 14, 2008 at 4:40 pm
British vs American Star Wars wouldn’t work. Who would they use for the smart Jedi? They can’t all be muppets, or Sam Jackson.
BTW - glad to see Hayden is back on top with his new hit film Jumper! Critics can’t stop raving about it! Do I smell an oscar at last for our brave galactic friend?
45 EU Player // Mar 23, 2008 at 6:51 pm
Im speechless, really.
What is EA thinking ?
Is it because of the latency ?
No, I dont have any kind of problems playing CoD 4 with US friends. Ofcourse depends on what kind of connection your using, but modern ones are enough.
I just bought this game today and wanted to play it with a friend, but no, no and NO !
It DOESN’T make ANY kind of SENSE !
Now I have to sell the game because playing a coop game by yourself is kinda boring.
I really hope that they make some kind of miracilous patch. AND that no other game will follow the same pattern. Because this is just stupidity.
46 Sega Fan Club Podcast Show #2! This Time With Better Servers! « Sega Fan Club Blog! // Apr 13, 2008 at 11:56 am
[...] http://sarcasticgamer.com/wp/index.php/2008/03/army-of-two-no-eu-us-play.html [...]
47 Doll of War » Army of Two not PAL/NTSC Compatible // Apr 21, 2008 at 9:16 am
[...] it for one reason, this game does not support gameplay amongst PAL & NSTC systems (thanks to SarcasticGamer.com for posting this). I don’t understand what the hell EA were thinking when they didn’t [...]
Leave a Comment