Like Ubisoft did at some point last year, EA Sports has eliminated physical game manuals from their packaging and will be proceeding with in-game manuals instead.
The change is “an effort to support more environmentally friendly production of games” and officially began on March 1 with the release of Fight Night Champion, according to a statement given to Kotaku by EA Sports spokesman Rob Semsey.
Axing printed manuals will also decrease costs for the company,which I’m sure is nice, considering the rise of development costs on certain platforms.
What say you? Will you miss your physical manual when you buy your next copy of EA Sports Active? Or Madden? I know I will — not necessarily for the manual itself, but game boxes with manuals in them have a satisfying heft to them. It’s a heft that I certainly miss when I hold my copy of Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood. Bring back the heftiness!
Source: Kotaku
I agree the manuals do make you feel like we are getting more from our purchase. They are functional as well. I am torn though. I have become a punk when it comes to my sensitivity to excessive packaging and added materials. Worked at the land fill for 8 hours a year ago (not saying why) but it was an eye opener to the volumes of crap we just toss out needlessly. The “Cradle to Cradle” concept is not widely thought about in the package design segment of the life cycle. For instance there is a green packaging solution for mailing envelopes that have a Plastic Bubble Liner that is not laminated together with the paper thus can be recycled separately. My point is that being mindful that custom packaging can connect the dots of sustainability prior to production. Im sure we will get used to looking the info up on our IPhones, Pads, Droids, etc….