EA: Wii U Origin plans match how the service works on PS3, Xbox 360

Electronic Arts' use of Origin on the Wii U will be similar to how the publisher currently uses their online service for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360, officials told Polygon.

Questions about how EA's online Origin service and how it will work on Wii U first popped up last month when the company updated their Privacy Policy to include a paragraph about the new console.

The paragraph reads:

If you sign up to play EA games through a Nintendo Wii U console, your Nintendo account information will be provided to EA so that we can establish an Origin Account for you. You need an Origin Account to play EA's titles online. By signing up to play EA's titles, you agree that limited user account information can be transferred to EA. Information transferred to EA includes your Mii information, email address, Nintendo Network ID, friend list, country, language and date of birth but does not include credit card number or other financial account information.

But reached for comment this week, EA Senior Director of Corporate Communications John Reseburg said the wording, and the service, matches what Electronic Arts has been doing for Xbox Live and the Playstation Network for more than a year.

"What we added to our Privacy Policy for Wii U players is very nearly the same as existing terms for Xbox Live and PlayStation 3 users concerning the need to register for an Origin account if you want to play EA games with online features and content," he told Polygon. "That's no different than the user experience of the past several years of Internet-connected game consoles and online services for games. To play the online features of our games, users need to create a user ID and account with EA. Since Origin was launched in June 2011, creating an EA account means you are creating an Origin account."

Earlier today, Nintendo president Satoru Iwata said that the Wii U's Nintendo Network will be able to interact with third-party publisher networks, but didn't detail any examples.