When most people think of EA’s Origin service they think of Valve’s Steam. More specifically, they’re thinking about how Steam is a superior program, from its large library to its deep discounts. It was thought that Origin was just a way for EA to ride on Valve’s coattails a little bit, despite the insistence from EA that they don’t want to be known as an “also-ran”, but rather they want to dominate the digital distribution sector.
Up until this point EA has basically been copying Valve when it came to features, but now it looks like they’re trying their hand at one-upping Steam. It was announced yesterday that Origin is partnering with Twitch.tv, and will be adding broadcasting straight from the Origin service. I’m not going to lie, this is probably the first bit of news about Origin that actually makes me a bit excited.
Essentially, all you have to do is while in a game hit Shift+F1, and you can hit the Twitch Video Broadcast button. After creating/logging into your Twitch account you can adjust the different settings you need to adjust to make a good stream, and that’s all you really need to do to start streaming! What’s more, in this upcoming update you’ll also be able to add non-Origin games to Origin, and yes, you’ll be able to stream those games as well. I’ll admit, I’ve always wanted to do a bit streaming, even if it’s just for fun, and now I feel like I have an incentive to do it. There is something to keep in mind while you’re streaming, however: it will take up bandwidth, so you might need to reduce the resolution of the broadcast and/or upgrade the CPU.