This Friday, Electronic Arts will unveil its own take on the popular online PC shopfront Steam, with the launch of a service called Origin.
According to a report on the Wall Street Journal, this service will function much like Steam, as a single store and gaming platform on the PC that will let customers "purchase, download and keep track of" their games.
It's even lifting Steam's social features, and will also feature cross-platform notifications that will "let gamers on a variety of devices broadcast messages to online friends when they defeat online opponents or accomplish other gaming goals."
So I can be eating dinner and an asshole friend message me on my phone saying he scored some mad Dragon Age loot? Wonderful.
A "hypothetical" example of this cross-platform integration would be Battlefield, with EA saying players could rack up experience points on a mobile version of the game that will count towards unlocks on the PC edition.
With the full reveal not due until tomorrow, expect more details (and a better idea of how it'll all work) then. One thing I can say now is, that name? That's one unfortunate brand revival if ever I've seen one.