EA sued over Battlefield PS3 promotion - Report

In June, Sony announced at its Electronic Entertainment Expo media briefing that Battlefield 3 for the PlayStation 3 would come packed in with Battlefield 1943. When the console-maker's third-party partner Electronic Arts did an about-face and pulled that bonus from the package, it acknowledged the change on Twitter the day Battlefield 3 launched.

EA's handling of the situation has prompted legal action, according to a report on Kotaku. Edelson McGuire, a law firm specializing in class-action litigation, filed suit against EA Friday on behalf of PS3 owners, taking exception to the timing and manner in which EA revealed that the Battlefield 1943 PS3 promotion had been scuttled.

According to the report, the suit claims EA "misled and profited from thousands of their customers by making a promise that they could not, and never intended, to keep." The firm was also unimpressed by EA's supposed make-good offer, a one-week exclusivity window for PS3 owners on Battlefield 3 content, saying it was an unrelated promotion publicly announced significantly in advance of the game's shipping.

In an interview with EA Games' Patrick Soderlund earlier this month, GameSpot asked why the change wasn't communicated to consumers prior to launch. A PR representative stepped in to answer for Soderlund, saying only, "We announced this on launch day, communicated through our community channels. In lieu of Battlefield 1943, we wanted to give them something new, which was one-week early access to the Battlefield 3 expansion packs, including the Back to Karkand digital expansion pack."

As of press time, EA had not responded to GameSpot's request for comment on the suit.

For more on the game, check out GameSpot's review of Battlefield 3.