All right. We are in 2019, and it is at least 8 years since I first saw the Origin client.
There has been countless updates, but the core functionality of the client is still much the same old buggy self.
My biggest issues with Origin (as of lately) has been the following:
* Login Credentials Expired - Password Reset
This has been happening a lot lately for many users. Out of all users that's present in my Discord channel (80+ and myself included), at least 60% of them has needed to change passwords once or twice (maybe even more) during the past week. And there seems to be no fix in sight!
* Friends list not populating / being straight up broken
This has been a recurring issue over the past years that I have been active on Origin. Both in my case and the case of my friends. Even though we have clearly been online at the time (chatting with eachother in Discord), the friends list in the client keeps showing us/them as "offline" even though we were all sitting in a game lobby.
* Client being very slow / hangs up completely after opening a game
Another issue I've had happening a lot!
* Game overlay being very slow / not responding
This has happened much more frequently lately. The game overlay refuses to load conversations, and friends list.
* Some older multiplayers appear broken, or not performing like before.
In my circle, we play a lot of Dragon Age Inquisition MP, and up until last week, it has performed as expected.
Last week though, strange things has occurred such as enemies / large creatures missing from the sessions. Enemies are vanishing in thin air. Game hosts are taking phantom hits from non-existing enemies, or simply gets knocked down out of nowhere.
And the RNG is completely broken.
* P2P Hosting over dedicated game servers.
This is the worst of the worst offenders. It does not take into account player's upload speeds, connection qualities or hardware used (example: how fast the hosting player's CPU is)
A simple solution would be to set up dedicated game servers, even for the older games. Of course one player would have to be the lobby's leader in order to start the game, but instead of routing the playing parties' connections through that one player, have it so that everyone connects directly to a proper server instead. This would eliminate problems such as players getting stuck in an infinite loading screen.
Services like Steam has been doing this for a long time.
And by the way. Look at a game like PLAYERUNKNOWN'S BATTLEGROUNDS. It has dedicated servers where you can customize a game experience to your liking. You host the game through a dedicated server, set the rules and everything else that needs to be set, and it just works perfectly.
* General client improvements.
1. Clean up some clutter in the game library. Instead of a drag-out menu, bring up a full page related to the game (similar to the way Steam handles this). This would make it a lot easier to navigate features and to track stats or other things.
2. Have a much easier to access "Options" tab for the client. Not hidden away in a sub-menu. Also add the option to select "Download Region" in case one region experiences slower speeds.
3. Make the game updates controllable at a per-game basis, not having all under the same umbrella. Would tie in with my suggestion to remove the drag-out menu.
4. Fix the memory leak issue regarding the notification sounds. A solution would be to use a different audio format.
EDIT:
* Have future games being less dependant on RNG and loot boxes.
This is highly important, as many of us as gamers doesn't like to spend our hard-earned money on premium currency in a full-price game. It would be understandable if the game was F2P (Free to play), but a full retail price game should have all features unlocked, or available through progression.
One game developer that has been understanding this would be Digital Extremes, and their game; Warframe!
All weapons and playable characters are available through progression. Only cosmetic items cannot be bought without spending real money!
* Do not abandon older games completely. There is still a lot of bugs or things that needs to be sorted out. Having a small team of game devs working close with the community would be amazing.
