EA Sports Season Ticket Announced

EA Sports has announced a new “Season Ticket” initiative, a program for sports nuts to get exclusive benefits accessible across five different upcoming EA Sports videogames, for a price (natch). Thankfully it’s only $25 bucks a year.

For 2000 Microsoft Points on Xbox Live Marketplace or $25 on PlayStation Network, subscribers will receive the following benefits, which apply to all the upcoming Madden NFL Football, NHL Hockey, FIFA Soccer, Tiger Woods PGA TOUR Golf and NCAA Football franchises.

List of EA Sports Season Ticket Benefits:

Free Premium Web Content: Premium web content extends the game experience beyond the console to a web browser. All participating titles will feature premium web content that will be free to EA SPORTS Season Ticket members. Beginning with the premium Creation Center packs for FIFA Soccer 12. These packs provide a deeper set of customization tools and abilities within Creation Center to build your own teams and tournaments, and will be available to the consumer until the membership to the program has expired.

Full-game Digital Download Three Days Before Retail Launch: The digitally downloaded game will time out when the game is available at retail and consumers have the option to purchase the same full game on disc at retail.

20% Discount On Downloadable Content: Downloadable content, which enhances and refreshes the core game experience, includes such items as Ultimate Team packs, accelerator packs and gear upgrades.

Membership Recognition: Subscribers are easily identifiable with an exclusive membership recognition badge displayed both in-game and on their EASPORTS.com profile.

GameStop will introduce EA SPORTS Season Ticket in North America with an innovative multichannel marketing campaign that includes its PowerUp Rewards program of more than 11 million members.

Here’s a trailer for EA Sports: Season Ticket.

“EA SPORTS Season Ticket is an exciting program for our core fans – it lets our biggest fans play earlier, play more and play better than anyone else,” said Peter Moore, President, EA SPORTS. “EA SPORTS Season Ticket is an important step in our vision for transforming how deeply fans connect with the sports games they love through digital products and services. We’re excited to continue evolving EA SPORTS Season Ticket as we listen to what consumers want most in their gaming experiences.”

GameStop President Tony Bartel added, “We are excited to be selected as the exclusive retail marketing partner for the roll-out of EA SPORTS Season Ticket. GameStop is in a unique position to deliver this digital product utilizing its multichannel network. We will continue to work with progressive publishers to bring great gaming experiences to our customers.”

Will you be signing up to EA Sports Season Ticket? What do you think of these types of paid, “premium” programs and services? Good or bad?

Here is a video of Madden NFL 12, which releases on August 30, 2011.