Amazon suspends sales of SimCity video game

[woodyear99]

The latest Simcity is crippled with DRM, has gotten really terrible reviews on Amazon. The online retailer has now decided to briefly suspend sales of the game. This is an example of how NOT to do a game launch.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-21712910


Ongoing problems with the latest version of SimCity led Amazon to briefly stop selling the game.

The web retailer stopped sales late on 7 March as players reported continued problems with the city building title.

The latest version of SimCity was launched on 5 March and, like many current games, demand players stay online as they play.

EA has also taken steps to fix login delays by turning off some features to lighten the load on game servers.

Prior to this latest release, SimCity was a stand-alone game, but EA has added the online element to infuse the title with more realism.

Now player cities exist as part of online regions and share some characteristics of those virtual environments such as pollution, crime and essential resources.

The online requirement is also seen as an attempt to curb piracy of the title as a web connection is required even if a player shuns the chance to connect their cities to others.

However, the requirement for all players of the game to be connected has led some to wait 30 minutes or more to play. The server problems have led to sluggish response times, crashes and other bugs.

Amazon's sales suspension of the downloadable PC version of the game only lasted a few hours, but it has put a warning note on the product page about the "issues" with the game. These have contributed to the one-star score purchasers have given SimCity on Amazon.

In official discussion forums and on its Twitter feed EA has apologised for the trouble players have had.

In one of its latest messages, an EA spokeswoman said it had added server capacity and rolled out a quick fix to SimCity servers to speed up game play and get more people into the game.

To lighten the load on its back-end servers, EA turned off some features including leader boards and achievements. It has also removed the option to run the game at its fastest setting, known as "cheetah speed". Instead, all cities will now run at the lower "llama speed".

In a message posted to the official EA discussion forums, SimCity's senior producer Kip Katsarelis said the launch week had been "challenging" for the company.

'Growing pains'
However, he added, there was a positive side to the delays.

"What we saw was that players were having such a good time they didn't want to leave the game, which kept our servers packed and made it difficult for new players to join," he wrote.

Games journalist Nathan Grayson, writing on the Rock Paper Shotgun website, praised EA for keeping players informed through Facebook, Twitter and discussion forums about the problems. However, he wondered why games firms were still so unprepared for the launch day deluge of players.

Games makers may laud the always online requirement as the future, he said, but so far no studio had got it right or used that permanent link to do more with a game.

"I haven't seen a single one of these things stick their initial landings or catapult a pre-existing series to new heights," he said. "I have quite a bit of trouble declaring these things 'growing pains' when I barely see any, you know, growth."

[Arcmanov]

Ah...those Sim City tears... I can taste them.

...and allyuh like this kinda DRM, and willingly voted for it with other titles?

Reap now what you have sown...where gamers can't play a SINGLE PLAYER component, because of this ludicrous 'always online' requirement, coupled with online connectivity issues.

...but I guess it's not a problem, because it's not Diablo III, right?   



SwiftKey 3 | Samsung Galaxy Note 2 | Tapatalk 2

[Arcmanov]

This one should make for some interesting reading: http://www.forbes.com/sites/insertcoin/2013/03/08/ea-employee-chastizes-company-over-simcity-in-public-letter/


Still convinced that this type of DRM is the 'way to go'?
I find the deafening silence of the proponents on this forum to be rather telling. 



SwiftKey 3 | Samsung Galaxy Note 2 | Tapatalk 2

[shivadee]

http://kotaku.com/5989630/ea-will-give-a-free-pc-game-to-anyone-who-bought-simcity

Here’s a quick update on the problems we were experiencing with SimCity – and a little something extra for people who bought the game.

The server issues which began at launch have improved significantly as we added more capacity.  But some people are still experiencing response and stability problems that we’re working fast to address.

So what went wrong?  The short answer is: a lot more people logged on than we expected.  More people played and played in ways we never saw in the beta.

OK, we agree, that was dumb, but we are committed to fixing it.  In the last 48 hours we increased server capacity by 120 percent.  It’s working – the number of people who have gotten in and built cities has improved dramatically.  The number of disrupted experiences has dropped by roughly 80 percent.

So we’re close to fixed, but not quite there.  I’m hoping to post another update this weekend to let everyone know that the launch issues are behind us.

Something Special for Your Trouble

The good news is that SimCity is a solid hit in all major markets.  The consensus among critics and players is that this is fundamentally a great game.  But this SimCity is made to be played online, and if you can’t get a stable connection, you’re NOT having a good experience. So we’re not going to rest until we’ve fixed the remaining server issues.

And to get us back in your good graces, we’re going to offer you a free PC download game from the EA portfolio.  On March 18, SimCity players who have activated their game will receive an email telling them how to redeem their free game.

I know that’s a little contrived – kind of like buying a present for a friend after you did something crummy.  But we feel bad about what happened.  We’re hoping you won’t stay mad and that we’ll be friends again when SimCity is running at 100 percent.

SimCity is a GREAT game and the people who made it are incredibly proud.  Hang in there – we’ll be providing more updates throughout the weekend.


*********************

No responses? Yep, its IS because it isn't Diablo.

OMG I cant play! I cant do stuff like this!

http://kotaku.com/5989483/now-that-simcity-has-curved-roads-it-also-can-have

[Arcmanov]

EA's response...in a nutshell...

The consensus among critics and players is that this is fundamentally a great game. 
But this SimCity is made to be played online, and if you can’t get a stable connection, you’re NOT having a good experience.

[shivanandrs]

This whole DRM/Online requirement thing in this game isn't as bad as people make it out to be. I like what they have achieved with it. I have six other random players in my region and being able to specialize our cities and share resources is a really great addition to the game. Forcing this on to players who do not want to be part of a multiplayer region is another story.

I haven't had much connection issues since release though, on Tuesday I couldn't connect to any US server then this evening there was a 20 minute queue. Now that's all fine, there are other available servers. The stupid thing about it is the fact that your saves are not synced across servers, so if you decide to log on to another server you will need to start an entirely new city just to be able to play.

I just hope EA gets their servers in order...or probably implement some sort of save synchronizing across servers.

[Arcmanov]

That may be so for you, Shiv, but there are many, many players who aren't having such a stellar experience.

If this debacle doesn't demonstrate beyond a shadow of a doubt why this type of restrictive, invasive DRM is bad, then I don't know what will.

Ubisoft walked this road already, and I really  thought EA would have learned from their transgressions.
Sadly, this has not been the case.  That so-called 'apology' is just another way of saying 'we really, REALLY need to have this DRM in our game, and we're sorry that YOU, the gamers, are getting so many issues'.

Still, the offer of any free game from their stable is a pretty awesome gesture.




SwiftKey 3 | Samsung Galaxy Note 2 | Tapatalk 2

[shivadee]

That may be so for you, Shiv, but there are many, many players who aren't having such a stellar experience.

If this debacle doesn't demonstrate beyond a shadow of a doubt why this type of restrictive, invasive DRM is bad, then I don't know what will.

Ubisoft walked this road already, and I really  thought EA would have learned from their transgressions.
Sadly, this has not been the case.  That so-called 'apology' is just another way of saying 'we really, REALLY need to have this DRM in our game, and we're sorry that YOU, the gamers, are getting so many issues'.

Still, the offer of any free game from their stable is a pretty awesome gesture.




SwiftKey 3 | Samsung Galaxy Note 2 | Tapatalk 2

Depends on the game. I eh taking no happy potter hermione adventures 2 bs.

[Spazosaurus]

Fans of the game that actually got to play seem to like it. For all intents and purposes, its a great game, completely ruined by greedy and illogical people in charge.

Just reading through the Amazon comments, the sheer volume of people that have refunded the game is astounding, not counting the number of 1 star reviews and people who indicated they wish "0" stars was an option...

To anyone that says piracy is the cause of such a move, I say gtfo. Seriously. Look at the amount of lost sales and bad image generated that would be very difficult to recover from. Look at how many potential sales lost, not to mention (further)damage to company reputation. Was it all worth it to block a few people from pirating?

Blasted idiots. All DRM like this and their purporters should die a horrible, fiery death. It should also be VERY slow. They should be allowed to die ONLY if they have a constant internet connection to their brains and a valid credit card available.

[UltimateGamer]

Fans of the game that actually got to play seem to like it. For all intents and purposes, its a great game, completely ruined by greedy and illogical people in charge.

Just reading through the Amazon comments, the sheer volume of people that have refunded the game is astounding, not counting the number of 1 star reviews and people who indicated they wish "0" stars was an option...

To anyone that says piracy is the cause of such a move, I say gtfo. Seriously. Look at the amount of lost sales and bad image generated that would be very difficult to recover from. Look at how many potential sales lost, not to mention (further)damage to company reputation. Was it all worth it to block a few people from pirating?

Blasted idiots. All DRM like this and their purporters should die a horrible, fiery death. It should also be VERY slow. They should be allowed to die ONLY if they have a constant internet connection to their brains and a valid credit card available.

Well Said

[Arcmanov]

Awww...'poor' EA: http://www.tomshardware.com/news/EA-SimCity-Marketing-servers-problems,21441.html

Things so bad they have to tell everybody stop. Marketing. The. Game.




*recovers*




*recovers again*


Do not worry EA...this too shall pass, and hopefully, like Ubisoft, you'll have learned your lesson by then.

[TriniXaeno]

lol, they will cry all the way to the bank.

I find arc real passionate about this issue yes.....but I not taking the bait.

Internet DRM is here to stay and grumpy cat said it best.....IT GOOD!



Everyone on this forum knows why.

[shivadee]

DRM is indeed (spoke to Arc about this last night)

To add to grumpy cat, he would also like to add

[Mez]

#cptawesomevoice "It Good"

[Spazosaurus]

By all means, protect your game. I don't expect a game to be released completely without it.

Make no mistake, any countermeasures can be bypassed, even this so it's not like they stopping pirates.

Thing is they making themselves look bad and shafting their customer base in one fell swoop with this particular drm method.

Now if it makes sense to them to maintain this current nonsense then they deserve all the failure in the world.

Sent from my Nexus S using Tapatalk 2

[UltimateGamer]

[woodyear99]

More companies will be going this route?

Sent from my GT-N7100 using Tapatalk 2

[Arcmanov]

Well that 'EA Pizza' pic had me ROLLLLLING. 

[TriniXaeno]

that rofl pic had me rofl

lol

Epic

gg internets

[woodyear99]

Wow this is starting to get interesting.....wonder how they will respond?

****Modder proves SimCity can run offline indefinitely****

http://www.geek.com/articles/games/modder-proves-simcity-can-run-offline-indefinitely-20130314/

Ever since SimCity launched, there has been a suspicion that the need for the game to always be connected to a server was mainly a form of DRM, not for social game features and multiplayer. Then a Maxis developer came forward to confirm the game doesn’t actually need a server to function, suggesting the information coming out of EA wasn’t the whole truth. Now EA and Maxis have some explaining to do as a modder has managed to get the game running offline indefinitely.



The video above shows the game being played offline. The modder states that this can be done for as long as you like without issues. The only real downside being you can’t save the game because it utilizes cloud saves. However, if you reconnect the game it does save, so you can play all day then just go online to save your progress at the end of a session.

In order to achieve this offline state, modder UKAzzer had to edit the game code to enable debug mode. This exists so the developer can play around with additional features and test the game. Most of those features are disabled unless you have a developer build of the game, but apparently enabling it on a consumer version removes the need for a server connection while retaining everything you need to play.

In fact, it actually improves the game in some ways. City populations are actually tracked correctly and you can edit outside of your city boundaries. Those additional edits are also saved when you reconnect.

This revelation will put EA and Maxis in a difficult position. They’ve been adamant all along that the game won’t work without a server connection and offloads a “significant amount of the calculations.” That’s clearly not true, so why has it been used as a reason to explain why an always-connected game was necessary?

Now read: EA admits SimCity launch was dumb, offers players a free game