Origin just deleted 200-odd GB of data from my Games directory

[Huw the Poo]

Fuck Origin.

Like many, I was finally suckered into downloading it today due to the offer of The Sims 2 ultimate pack for free - something my daughter would enjoy immensely.  I downloaded it and set it installing in I:\Games while I had my dinner.

After dinner it was still installing.  The progress bar had barely moved but my hard drive light was permanently on.  That can't be right, I thought, and killed the program.  I started it again and it installed in seconds.  Oh well.

It was then that I noticed some of my shortcuts were blank.  Sure enough, they no longer pointed to any games.  Steam wouldn't launch either.  I looked at the hard drive properties and noticed it was ~200GB lighter.  Yep - Origin had been having a lovely time, wandering through my games directory, just deleting stuff.  It looks bare compared to how it used to look.  All the MMORPGs I play are gone - that's literally days of re-downloading I'm going to have to do.  Anger is not the word.

I'm "lucky" it was "only" my games directory.  Imagine I'd put it somewhere where real, unrecoverable data was?  Imagine it had gone in a system directory, or among my photo albums or something?!

Fuck Origin.

[Rayfer]

This is quite strange....I'm scratching my head. How could this happen?

[Nefaro]

How could this happen?

It's EA.

I recall trying to uninstall one of the COD games a few years ago.  It had no uninstaller packaging.  What kind of goddamn half-ass bullshit is that?! 

Had to delete the install folder and the F'ing registry entries manually!  Worse than amateurs!

[-budd-]

damn...how is that even possible. I pretty much stop at steam for DRM. Sorry about your "should never have happened troubles"  ...Damn.

[Huw the Poo]

I'm not the first person this has happened to, either.  I found a thread a year old on the Origin forum where someone reported exactly the same problem.

It's EA.

I recall trying to uninstall one of the COD games a few years ago.  It had no uninstaller packaging.  What kind of goddamn half-ass bullshit is that?! 

Had to delete the install folder and the F'ing registry entries manually!  Worse than amateurs!

Heh.  I remember that Derek Smart's games didn't come with uninstallers either.  I was completely unsurprised.  I mean, who would ever want to uninstall the best games in the universe?!

[bbmike]

Not saying it wasn't Origin but just to be safe I would check out the entire system for other possible issues. That sounds really, really odd to me.

[Huw the Poo]

Not saying it wasn't Origin but just to be safe I would check out the entire system for other possible issues. That sounds really, really odd to me.

I will, but the facts point to Origin:

1. The first time it was run, the installer was doing a lot of stuff to my hard drive without actually installing anything.
2. The damage was contained to the very same directory the installer was working in.
3. I'm not the only person to report the exact same problem.

I think the burden of proof is on Origin, really.

[Nefaro]

I'm not the first person this has happened to, either.  I found a thread a year old on the Origin forum where someone reported exactly the same problem.

It's EA.

I recall trying to uninstall one of the COD games a few years ago.  It had no uninstaller packaging.  What kind of goddamn half-ass bullshit is that?! 

Had to delete the install folder and the F'ing registry entries manually!  Worse than amateurs!

Heh.  I remember that Derek Smart's games didn't come with uninstallers either.  I was completely unsurprised.  I mean, who would ever want to uninstall the best games in the universe?!

Oh... I eventually decided to check and see WTF was up with that nonsense, after spending the time cleaning that crap out.  Turns out people had (naturally) complained about it. 

EA's solution:  A text list of how to manually delete the files and entries for the game, as I had done.  There should be absolutely NOBODY modifying their Windows Registry if they're not sure about exactly what they're doing.  Yet these dipshits listed this as the solution on their Support FAQ as a solution for everyone.  ::)

I've had some doubts about their competency since then.

[Jarhead0331]

I think the burden of proof is on Origin, really.

Not to sound like a dickhead, but the burden is actually on you. You're the one making the claim against EA, so it's on you to establish their software caused your problem. Also, bbmike raises a good point, it's to your benefit to make a full check to make sure there is nothing else that may have damaged your system.

I'm not suggesting it wasn't origin that caused this  but it can't hurt to keep looking for other explanations to make sure. I have several games installed through origin for years and have been fortunate enough to not have any issues. (Knocking on wood)

Seriously though, I feel your pain and if I was in your shoes, I'd be really pissed too. Hope you get it sorted soon with minimal headache and fuss.

[Swatter]

It sounds like some buggy code got caught in an infinite loop while changing your registry. When you shut off your computer, the registry was left in a bad state and got corrupted. Good luck with EA customer service.

I bought one game for $10 from Origin. After I made the purchase and after about an hour of research I found out the game will not run on most computer systems (including mine). No solutions, no refunds. EA is a giant monstrosity where things like this can slip through the cracks and one simply has no reasonable recourse. The is one recourse, don't buy their stuff. That is exactly what I have done.

[Nefaro]

There was reportedly a similar issue with a specific version of the old D&D Ruins of Myth Drannor PC game back around '99. 

For a rare few people, it would erase their whole hard drive when they uninstalled it.

I never experienced that problem.  It was later addressed in a patch. 

[Huw the Poo]

Yeah, I think Pool of Radiance was similarly bugged wasn't it?

Someone suggested I perform a system restore.  I don't know whether it will actually restore the data.  However since I do almost all my gaming in Linux now I'm not sure I can be arsed anyway.  I haven't lost any personal data.  It's more the fact it was allowed to happen at all that pisses me off.  I mean, it originally wanted to install itself in Program Files; if I'd let it do that, my weekend would be spent reinstalling Windows.

[Nefaro]

Yeah, I think Pool of Radiance was similarly bugged wasn't it?

Same game.  Full title was Pool of Radiance: Ruins of Myth Drannor.

I actually quite enjoyed playing that one, back then.  Between being the first to use the (then) new 3rd Edition D&D ruleset and having pretty sizable dungeons to crawl through for the time, it was underrated.  Of course, NWN showed up a couple years later.

[Space6ghost]

I read on a sims 3 message board that the free sims 2 ultimate version contains SecuROM. Didnt this program cause problems for folks in the past? Maybe this is the culprit causing your problems?

[Huw the Poo]

Nah it happened during the install of Origin itself.