General Discussions

I recently fired up Origin again, and I was in for a big shock. This is the first time that I have opened it since moving to Thailand. It seemed to default to the Thai store, and there was no way to change this. I contacted their "customer support" and this is a synopsis of what was said.

Origin - Your IP address is from Thailand? Well you are getting our Thai store with Thai Language.

Me - I do not speak Thai, can I change the language to English? My credit card is from the US with a US billing address, can I change the store to the US store so I can use it?

Origin - No, you must use the language and store of your IP address. If you need to make a purchase, then you need to find someone with a Thai address who can make the purchase for you. We hope this solves your problem.

Fortunately, the games I have in my Origin Library will run without a hitch. It only affects the purchasing of new games.

I would really like to purchase some titles from there, but the above prevents me. Any ideas??

Thank you all in advance!

Origin is region locked, it's EA's policy, and as far as I can tell there's no legal way to circumvent it.

You could get a US vpn which would allow you to access the US Origin store.

Mine defaults to the Russian one with most game only having the voice over in English and everything else in game being in Russian.

Thanks for the reply. It is too bad that they are region locked. Fortunately Steam works great. So I guess purchasing games from Origin just went lower on the priority list!

Shame games are usually cheaper over there.

Buddy of mine just gave Origin another spin, after not launching it after over a year. He had a craving for Sims, and gave in. When he couldn't log in, he found out his account had been locked. Seems that someone had gained access to his account and EA billing info. From Italy. They were attempting to charge over $800 USD worth of games and micro-transactions to his account, after having just successfully charged over $500 USD. EA just locked his account once his entire bank account was out of money. They didn't seem to find it in their time to attempt to contact him or his bank, and didn't find it odd that even thought all his info listed him as living in the US, he was account was trying to purchase everything from Italy.

They did, out of the kindness of their hearts, offer to set him up a fresh account devoid of any software whatsoever. Keep in mind, the hackers didn't get his billing info from him. They managed to pick the info from EA's database.

He cheerfully told them they could go copulate furiously with themselves. I do believe he's in the process of finding a lawyer now.

Valve has plans to region lock Steam in some areas. Link

[Edited by Medco88, 2/9/2015 1:28:05 AM]

Hmm, says effective immediately too.

@Linesma

Will that effect you bro?

I saw that. The difference between Steam and Origin is that Steam is willing to work with you. All I did was contact the Steam customer support to let them know that my location IP and billing address were different. They annotated my account and gave me a web address for purchases. While I can't purchase games through their desktop client, and I am limited to the US prices, I am still able to purchase and play games.

The fun part comes in when I look at my wishlist. All the prices are listed in Thai baht, but when I go to the game's store page, the price is then listed in USD. For example, "South Park: The Stick of Truth" is listed at 899 baht or about 27 USD on my wishlist. When I go to the store page, it is listed at 40 USD.

Does it make me want to change my account over to the Thai store? NO!! There are games that are available in the US that are banned in Thailand. The biggest example is Tropico 5. It was banned for its "content" (something about a military junta type government) after the coup here in Thailand. I can still purchase it when I go to the US store, but it is not even listed on the Thai side. Paying more is a small "price" to pay to be able to purchase the games I want.