Want To Play Battlefield 3 Without Origin? Do This!
Origin is a controversially "Steam-like" distribution and gaming platform by Electronic Arts. The service has recently received bad press because of its end user license agreement which EA in the meantime has updated several times. Regardless of that, it is still heavily criticized by privacy organizations and end users alike for its abilities to crawl a system and collect data about it.
Computer gamers who wanted to play Battlefield 3 without Origin hat two options until now. They could get the Xbox 360 or Playstation 3 version of the game, both of which shipped without Origin. Or, they could download a modified executable that would render Origin useless. Depending on the jurisdication, the latter method may have been outright illegal.
There is a third option according to the German computer magazine Golem.de that allows players to play the online shooter Battlefield 3 without Origin. Best of all, it does not require third party programs to be installed on the system.
All that it takes is to block Origin from accessing the Internet. This can be done in the Windows Firewall or any other software or hardware firewall available on the system.
The game can then be started by loading the following url in a compatible web browser: http://battlelog.battlefield.com/bf3/gate/.
According to Golem's information, that's exactly what Origin does. Playing Battlefield 3 in multiplayer worked but only after disabling two features in the Origin configuration. Enable Origin In Game needs to be disabled under the Settings > In Game tab.
Second the Cloud Storage for supported games needs to be disabled as well.
Users can then open the Battlefield 3 Battlelog website manually in their web browser, log into their account and start joining servers just as they did before. The only difference is that Origin is not communicating with EA servers in the background anymore.
I'm not a Battlefield 3 player, which means that I cannot vouch for the method. It should however work with other games as well. I still hope that Star Wars The Old Republic will not force users to use Origin though as I'd prefer not to have Origin on my system at all.
Have you bought Battlefield 3? What's your Origin experience so far?
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i have tried this method and it works, the only method that worked for me and its totally legal too. Everybody should use this.
i just got the game today by snail mail june 21, 2013, everyone here already knows how upset and irritated i am after realizing i have yet to even play the game due to a 9gb “update” and you all know the painful steps installing orgin and its update that i have already been forced to comply with or i cant install/play the game i have paid my money for already,,, i feel this process is in direct violation of my constitutional right to privacy,, i am forced to violate my own right to privacy in order to install and play a video game,, i will be calling the aclu monday morning to see if there is any basis for legal action on consumers behalf. this is appauling. the sole purpose of ordering the game in dvd version was so i wouldnt have to go thru online authorization to play my game. this is still the United States of America and YOU have violated my right to privacy by forcing me to take un-American steps to play a dam video game. over the past 20 plus years i have enjoyed ea games dating back to my c64 computer. i have between 25 and 50 ea games,, YOU WILL NEVER GET ANOTHER SINGLE PENNY FROM ME. and you can take your orgin and your online sharing pc snooping right violating software and shove it up your A$$.
GOd damn it, you are one of the biggest fucking retard on the internet. It wouldn’t be so bad if you had kept all that in your puny head. Go outside and chop some woods, you videogaming fag, it faggots like you that ruined mankind, when they have to make videogame a priority. And just to add insults to your fucking complaint, I just gave them a penny. I know insulting your oppenent is a very bad in making internet comments, but the flaws and opinion of your comment made an exception.
And don’t bring nationalism with you. Your precious “America”, they don’t have your back, and they won’t give a rat ass about your 1st-world-gaming problem.
Gamers of the world Unite! Boycott all games that use Steam/Windows Live/Origin etc. When the game companies start losing megabucks from loss of sales they will eliminate these intrusive installs. They are going to tell me I can’t re-sell my possessions? If I had a pair of pliers they are mine I paid for it and if I wanted to sell said pair of pliers at my garage sale I should be able to. Imagine if they applied something like this to new cars. You buy a new car and register it to your driver license and now the car can’t be re-sold because it won’t start anymore if someone else tries to register it. Does this sound correct? Is it fair? Is it American? No. I say boycott and when they start losing more money than the old way they will go back to the old way. Someone needs to start a website that lists all games that do and do not use these login systems to inform gamers purchases.
“tony says:
January 17, 2012 at 11:36 pm
I have no problem with origin I think is just fine no diference comparing to steam
Dos not take that mutch space on your pc witch I’m not woried cos I have a fenomenal gaming pc its fast . Don’t really understand why u gyes complain so mutch just go with it”
Should read
I have no problem with Origin. I think it is just fine and no different compared to Steam.
Does not take up much space on your pc which I’m not worried because I have a phenominal gaming pc. It’s fast! I don’t really understand why you guys complain so much. Just go with it.
Fast pc slowed down by the brain of the operator no doubt.
I have BF3 and, unfortunately, Origin and I have to say even after all the updates it is still a buggy, hard to use and one of the most un-user friendly systems around. EA and Dice are doing themselves no favours persevering with this system and eventually people will boycott the franchises future games if requiring Origin due to their past experiences.
Me? Well I have got it working although not without it’s problems. And after all is said and done I prefer BF2BC.
I’m with Aza.. bought bf3 because it was on sale and I can’t even launch the game without installing a browser plugin so it can run through a webpage? Garbage. Let me launch the game and play the way I’ve played for the last 10 years without having to install extraneous programs and get involved in stat sharing. I couldn’t care less about that shit, all I want to do is play the fucking game.
I just bought the game because its cheap on their 10th yea anniversary. Installed and now I have to go through this shit to be able to login? Fuck this… Money down the drain im not going to be jerked around by EA just because they w3ant data about me and what im doing with their games.
Fuck em and let that franchise die for all I care.
your all right orgin is absured an rude those of your considering it apparently have not checked your firewall logs even though you disable settings in origin it still persist to connect so i have disabled it from the firewall an the notification of that program you guys should invest to a good FW it sounds like you dont have one i play solo for security reasons tata if want online play use xbox or understand inbound an outbound comms
also dont use steam i had constant virus removals from my sons pc tracked to that crap!
When you select the server you want, join the game and when BF3 starts in the taskbar, just right click the origin symbol in the system tray and exit it, then click on BF3 and your good to go. You do not need origin running to play BF3.
Today I was getting hella lag, so I did this and no more lag.
Fuck electronic arts. Youve wasted enough of my life.
so..does option 2 or 3 works??anyone tried??
Do you think this would work for Mass Effect 3 as well, when it comes out?
switch to offline…
start bf3….
alt tab out….
close origin….
thats it
I noticed this the day I downloaded the game. You only need Origin to start the game.
The problem with Origin is during installation of Battlefield 3 itself. No clear and specific instruction on how to install BF3 from DVD instead of download. Casual gamer will have hard time figuring out how to install. Especially these people paid money and is EA’s hard earned customers. They are supposed to make things easier for users. And the software uses system resources and takes 100mb of space?! The plus side, i can play with my account anywhere in any PC with BF3 and Origin installed.
I’ve been searching for a shooter game to play on my eyefinity set-up, but after everything I’ve read, I’ve decided to avoid EA/Origin games altogether. It’s lose/lose but I am public opinion shows EA/Origin are paranoid, greedy and can’t be trusted.
I have no problem with origin I think is just fine no diference comparing to steam
Dos not take that mutch space on your pc witch I’m not woried cos I have a fenomenal gaming pc its fast . Don’t really understand why u gyes complain so mutch just go with it
I will tell you one reason why I don’t like Origin then one paranoia.
The reason I don’t like Origin is this (and I never hear this mentioned): Currently I have my video cards fans to run at MAX speed when playing any 3D game and idle down to 50% when I’m doing anything 2D. When Origin launches it instantly triggers some 3D API or platform and my fans go to MAX. Why should a simple distribution platform use a 3D API, that means its just using more memory and putting more strain to my hardware which is not required. Then it leaves them stuck at MAX even after I close Origin. This the only program I have this problem. Annoying and not needed, especially for a system that is distributing AAA titles. Now the paranoia: According to the word on the web is that Origin searches your hard drive to see what games you have to supposedly work with Origin. EA claims that it only scans its own folder but people have reported that it scans your whole hard drive. Now this might be ok if it had an internal list to check against, but no it takes the information it scans and sends it back to EA. So that would mean EA could see I have Steam on my computer and all the games I have in Steam, it also could see all the programs I have installed that have nothing to do with games. So the bottom line is WHAT RIGHT does EA have to see what programs I use or have installed on my computer. NONE! so that’s why there is so much bad press about Origin. Its not that were just Steam fanbois and hate EA because its EA as many people use multiple distribution platforms and don’t complain as much as they do with EA.
So obviously I could write about more bad things about Origin but those are my two main complaints. If both those were gone then I like you and many others would just live with Origin and while we didn’t like it would live with it. I hope that sheds some light on why and not that were just a bunch of Steam fanbois.
:)
Your all missing the point!
NO! I havent played BF3 – because I cant get it to “initialize”
This, in my lay-mans opinion is caused purely by the fact that I have to log into Origin to start the game.
I dont care about the teamwork, online, wank off at how good my system and internet connection is. Want to prove yourself! Go sign up!!
All I want to do is play the campaign – for which I have PAID to do, and I cant!
Forcing users to login through a web browser to play a game they have paid for is STUPID.
They dont sell audio cds and then tell you it only works in an ALPINE system!
Fix the problem – send out the update and get the single player game back to a stand alone system for &%@! sake!
Yes, you also have to pay the additional 8 bucks to play online on console its BS
I brought bf3 havin played all da cods, want to give it a chance but even after creating an account at the battlelog.com page my ps3 keeps saying no acount activated?? when i try feed still nothing? i can play some on line but really wanted to see the veichles that cod lacks, but can only run around? If a pay 7.99 in ps 3 store will that activate my account and can i play this game!? HELP xXx christopher141085@hotmail.co.uk
Origin makes me furious. It is the most pointless, worthless, and atrocious thing to ever happen to gaming.
ROFL at someone who brags about spending “thousands of dollars” on his custom system AND still has autorun enabled.
Was thinking the same thing when I seen his post… LOL
this article deals with “playing” the game w/o Origin. However, you must install Origin first in order to install Battlefield3. Once Origin is installed you can set it to “offline” mode from the settings wheel about right of center. But my questions is how do I NOT install Origin.
i have to wait 72.56 hours to download it!. i hate origin and iam sad about that bf3 cds are like origin installing crap u pay 500$ for. its the same.
It’s rubbish, it won’t work!!!!! I just can’t play the game, it just sits there telling me it’s finding a game or loading a campaign. Absolutely crap!
I also have a custom pc… And I downloaded a torrent and multiPlayer crack and installed this game in under 3:21 seconds…. For FREE
Yes, this workaround does not work anymore. It is necessary for origin to be online in order to join servers.
And the crack, which is running through the web, aint working anymore too.
We are fucked.
It does, Origin is a requirement for ToR, you can read it it right off their FAQ.
You do not need to run Origin for the game:
“While Origin will be the exclusive digital retailer for Star Wars: The Old Republic (in other words, if you want to buy it online and download it, you’ll do so through Origin) that does not mean that Origin is required for you to access or play The Old Republic. Origin is a digital storefront, and the desktop application is there to give you quick access to Origin exclusives and deals. However, you won’t need to launch the Origin application to run The Old Republic, nor will you patch the game via Origin. Once the game is on your hard disk, you’ll be connecting to our servers to patch and launch the game, and Origin does not have to be running to do that. To answer another question – boxed versions of the game will include the client on DVD(s).”
via: http://www.swtor.com/community/showpost.php?p=6823172
Well let’s see were to start, I finally decided to load up BF3 today and give it a shot I got both MW3 and BF3 the same day but have not had time for BF3 as I been having too much fun with MW3.
First off you need to understand that my computer is not some DELL or HP, it is a custom system that I have spent thousands of dollars on and has the newest hardware on the market.
Ok well I inserted the disk into my drive and right off it had a problem starting the autorun that is never good and very, very rare on my system.
Well needless to say I had to navigate the CD and manually click the autorun; ok I can live with that. After spending time creating an account and then finally installing Origin, I now get to the point where it installs the game it walked we though more hoops game key and location etc , etc.
It (Origin)finally came up and said it was preparing install, I thought to myself I will go get something to drink then come back as there are 2 CD’s and at some point I will have to change CD’S so I just let the install continue. Not really looking at the time but next thing I know 30 minutes had passed and it still said preparing install I look at the cd rom and no data was being transfer look over at my router and bam downloading like crazy I open my network meter and what you know Origin was downloading the game and not installing from the band new cd’s that I had in front of me.
I tried to stop the install by closing Origin but it would not let me only an error saying It could not close Origin as it was installing BF3, well at this point alone I was about to abandon the game but I am not a person to give up so easily. I then killed the process, (Origin) in the task manager “Got love TM†and then thought I would browse the cd again I found the accrual setup file and clicked on that and what you know right off it started the install coping data from the cd.
After about an hour it had finally installed the game and download updates and I thought I am going to get to play this thing now, NOPE it had more hoops to walk through the online login and verification and agreement etc.
Eventually I did get to play but after 1 ½ hours of my time, just the headache of It was too much I played about 15 minutes then closed the game and went back to MW3 as it pissed me off so much.
It just seems if they are going to release and new distribution system like this and try to copy steam they would want to make sure it works before publishing it. Not sure where I will go from this point with this game they already have my money and are already starting on their next release I am sure of that, one thing for sure if they use this distribution system again I will not be purchasing any more game from EA..
Peace
That is funny, you spent an hour and half installing it from CD? it toom me less than an hour through origin online. Maybe if everyone stopped tripping about it and gave it an honest chance they’d see its not nearly as bad as all the steam fanboys wanna say. I play tons of steam games, and i dont mind origin, it doesnt take up hardly any resources, and ppl who say its bloated, are themselves bloated in their heads.
Im sorry but considering EA long ago cleared up the fact that the info collected is anonymous and only has to do with bf3 and the processes it involves, the fact that people spend more time writing these posts than playing bf3 and then saying their going to play mw3 says it all.
MW 3 is a shitty game on an old hardly updated engine, seeing it made me want to laugh and cry, laugh cuz the creators made bank off of a something that should of been a 20$ DLC. And cry cuz my friend actually paid for it, and not one feature in the game makes me feel like anything at all about it is new. Not to mention graphically its looks like crap.
Sorry but BF3 is awesome, and if your too into MW3 to give it a chance, then go post it on a MW3 board, this was talking about origin. I don’t see how you choosing the wrong options during install is anyones fault but your own homie.
Well hope yall keep tripping while i am enjoying BF3. I am sorry some ppl are stuck on the small stuff so hard they couldn’t see the big picture even if their face was smashed against it.
Blizzard has been doing the same for ages with WOW. Dos,nt make it right but with Blizzard it stops exploits. BF3 is ripe with cheats and aimbots!
You do not know how happy I’m that Star Wars The Old Republic will not force users to use Origin.
Since the game is so new I think if we’re patient someone will find a way to completely remove origin and still let us play. It is bloated and useless but I haven’t had any big problems with it yet, it really just doesn’t need to be on my system.
where is the cloud storage option?
No, see, I want to play it without installing Origin at all. I guess the third party software option will have to do, because I’m certainly not installing Origin, and playing FPS games on console isn’t happening either. I like actually being able to aim.
Same issue here…
Keeps trying to re-validate itself. Damn, was hoping this would work.
I confirm it works but you still have Origin running (and re-activating itself “in game”)
What I don’t get about the integration of Origin and BF3 is that.. Origin does nothing except hold a link to starting the game. “Chatting” and Partys are all done through Battlelog, even Voice chat is done through battlelog. You can’t invite players from Origin, only through Battlelog. Heck the friends in Battlelog and Origin are different.
It’s like they mushed BF3 in Origin, but didn’t want to build anything USEFUL into it.
It’s useless, sure. The thing is, Origin is supposed compete with Steam. They have to introduce it somehow, and there’s no better way of doing that than with the release of such an overhyped title as BF3.
Origin is terrible.. so to get rid of it is a very good idea.
Or just boycott the game and let it rot. Lack of money tends to alter a company’s stupid policies.
agreed!! pissing me off now
Somehow I don’t see that happening. The level of fanboism around this entire franchise is simply ridiculous and the stupidity / hypocrisy among its fanbois simply astounding. These people will tell you that Activision is the devil, that COD is a regurgitated POS, then they’ll turn around and spend another $60 on one of the most milked and uninnovative FPSes in the history of gaming. They’d install Origin if it required them to insert an additional peripheral in their behinds and then they’d proceed to tell you how much they enjoy the experience.
I’m guessing you probably haven’t played Battlefield before/are not a big fan of this type of teamwork-based fps’s? And to be honest, I believe you’re right, a boycott isn’t likely an option for anyone with an eye out for the BF games.
HOWEVER (!)
– Although I’m a “fanboy” of these, I don’t consider Activision the devil – Blizzard on the other hand… ;)
– And even though I agree with you on most points – you’ve misinterpreted the issue: Battlefield fans are fans of the Battlefield games and their creators, i.e. DICE – NOT EA!
I am sure that almost every BF3 player would be more than happy if we weren’t forced through the sluggish process which is Origin – I know I would – but since BF3 is EA’s only selling point for Origin, I doubt that this will change. I just hope that EA would get their sh’t together and stop spoiling the fun for anyone who wants to play this amazing game that DICE made… Otherwise I will truthfully consider that boycott..!
P.s. I can’t help mention that there exists a “very slight” fanboyism for the COD series too, just so you know ;) d.s.
i couldn’t get this to work myself. origin keeps popping up and tries to validate – as it can’t get online it takes ages, and eventually informs me it’s going into offline mode, so it takes a lot longer to start up a game. it doesn’t remember the ‘enable origin in game’ setting and keeps turning it on. *sigh*
my version of origin is different from the screenshot above, and doesn’t have a ‘cloud storage’ setting – maybe that’s my problem?
i’ve not had any bad experiences with origin so far, although i don’t like nosey software nor do i like having to run too many background processes. to play b3, you need at least three programs running: bf3, origin, and a browser. AND there’s another program (sonar host) that runs if you want to chat with friends too.
bloaty bloaty bloat – good thing i have 8 gigs of ram!
My experience with Origin and Battlefield 3 is that the Origin client is useless and annoying (you can only exit Origin with a right click/left click/confirm in the tray. What a design!).
I’ll try this tip as soon as I’m back at home, but I’m afraid Origin still need to connect to the Internet to allow login. When you launch bf3.exe, it launches Origin if it’s not already running. Could BF3 run with the Origin client only asking for credentials?
I think this method has you origin running in the background, but not sending any data to EA.