July 30, 2018 Origin Access Premier is now available.
EA’s new subscription service, Origin Access Premier, is now live. Expanding on the existing Origin Access benefits, the new, pricier Premier tier offers full access to new EA games on (or before) their release date, including massive titles like Battlefield V and Anthem. Origin Access Premier is available for $14.99 / £14.99 per month, or $99.99 / £89.99 annually.
That’s a big jump over the standard Origin Access price of $4.99 / £3.99 monthly, or $29.99 / £19.99 annually, but it does provide access to newer titles than the base subscription does. Existing members who upgrade to Premier will have their remaining balance on the existing subscription refunded. You can compare tiers and sign up at the official site. Either way, you get access to full downloads of every game available – this is separate from the streaming service EA confusingly presented next to Origin Access at their E3 presentation earlier this year.
There are currently nine games listed for Premier that aren’t available in basic Origin Access. Right now, your subscription will get you access to Star Wars: Battlefront II, A Way Out, Unravel Two, and Fe. Access to a Sims 4 bundle (the base game is already part of Origin Access), Madden NFL 19, FIFA 19, Battlefield V, and Anthem are all “coming soon.”
The 10-hour ‘Play First Trials’ you get as part of Access are replaced by complete access to the game in a Premier subscription – so if you want to play a whole lot of Battlefield V ahead of the release date, this will let you do just that.
At a $14.99 monthly asking price, Origin Access Premier is certainly pricier than the similar Xbox Game Pass service, and it doesn’t have the allure of big-name series like Gears of War and Halo. Microsoft’s service offers only a handful of titles on PC, so EA certainly has the stronger offering on this platform.
At the very least, it’ll be a cheaper way of sampling new games once we head into the Anthem release date or Battlefield 5 release date, particularly if you just want to check out either game for a limited amount of time.