OT: EA botches Sim City Launch

[nurman]

That's because internet sucked, still does, but it's better than in it was in 2003. As the Internet evolves and fails less, online-only will become acceptable because it will be also less noticeable (for most people).

Playing WC3:TFT & Brood War back in '03. Shivers.

[Elly]

I've been playing it since Friday and it's already sucked me in big time. I'm having to make a concerted effort not to play it. There are aspects of it that infuriate me and I'm spending way too much time trying to outwit the traffic AI and the game should not be about that. I'm hoping they'll address this issue quickly.

It seems with a mod you can play it offline http://www.incgamers.com/2013/03/sim...plays-offline/ now.

They had said they were open to 'mods' before but I feel they're not so much open to this idea. The guy who has achieved it posted it on the official forum only for it to disappear.

[pulli]

Games are not released to make people addicted to them. Games are released to make money upon the sale of them. It is up to the user how much they play. If one becomes addicted to a particular game, it is the user's fault. Not the game maker's. Self control and taking responsibility for one's own actions is what is needed here.

Back on topic, PC Gamer has joined the fray last night. Here is their review from earlier this month.

Drugs are also made to make money of people's lives.

Why can't children take drugs if they want, they should have the self constraint of taking drugs in a healthy number so to prevent getting addicted.

[korialstraz]

Drugs are also made to make money of people's lives.

Why can't children take drugs if they want, they should have the self constraint of taking drugs in a healthy number so to prevent getting addicted.

Even though I'm drunk, (i'll try and reply to other stuff tomrrow), this is quite flawed. Some drugs make your body physically addicted to drugs, games afaik don't have that sever of an affect. Also an overdose of hard drugs is far more likely to kill you than games.

[Dacar92]

Here's another review.

A particularly noteworthy paragraph:

SimCity often misdiagnoses its own problems, giving you solutions that actually compound the issues. If a fire truck doesn't arrive in time to put out a blaze because it was stuck in traffic, the game may tell you to build more fire trucks--which, in actuality, will create even worse traffic. Other times, things simply break. You'll sometimes wonder why your police force or firefighters have vanished, and wonder why building new stations won't create any more. Because the game is always-online, and because there's no saved games, this can mean that your city is literally broken. Sadly, these types of problems aren't all that uncommon, and even a small glitch left unchecked can destroy hours of work.

[pulli]

Even though I'm drunk, (i'll try and reply to other stuff tomrrow), this is quite flawed. Some drugs make your body physically addicted to drugs, games afaik don't have that sever of an affect. Also an overdose of hard drugs is far more likely to kill you than games.

So you say now that physical addiction is worse than mental?

[korialstraz]

Are you really trying to argue that MMO's are on par with hard drugs? If that wasn't a joking post, then maybe consider how many people die from gaming a year, compared to people dying from doing drugs.

[pulli]

Did I ever say "equal in magnitude"?

Though I dare say it is equal in magnitude compared to things like beers for alcoholics. And beer is not unlimited either..

[marshmallow]

That's because internet sucked, still does, but it's better than in it was in 2003. As the Internet evolves and fails less, online-only will become acceptable because it will be also less noticeable (for most people).

I was being sarcastic. Steam isn't a failure, obviously, and that was 10 years ago. Although I do remember the glory that was getting HL2 to work at launch.

[korialstraz]

Children (age 14-18) are the most wealthy group of any age groups, they have the most nett money to spent on past-imes.... And just like with drugs & alcoholics: selling games with addictive aspects to these people should be a criminal offense.

Also I strictly speak about games that are build around the "you should play as much as possible" attitude. - Like violence games should get a rating for addictive substances: and based on that an age requirement can be made.. But in the end: MMO-attitude like in diablo 3 & now also sim city is EXACTLY what I am against. And I can't see how making it a positive thing to be online as much as possible is a good thing.
Yet this is the logical consequence of creating a game and advertising the "social features".

People who are 18 years old are considered adult by law where I live. I see no problems with them playing whatever the heck they want. People age 17 and below on the other hand, this is where things could be improved. For instance like you say make it illegal for stores to sell games to under-aged kids. Since with the current system, the age rating is more like guidelines than anything else, although I know several shops that enforce the age rating. However kids around age 14-15 usually don't have their own credit card do they? That alone takes care of the issue of pay-to-play games, seeing as they need their parents consent. Most of the ones I know about require an account registered with a payment method. Apart from that, as long as they're not adults, it is the parents responsibility. Imho you cannot really blame companies for bad parenting.

As for the MMO-attitude, some games it works for, others should give you options to play online or not. Good examples of this are both SimCity and D3. Both would've been excellent with both options for online play and singleplayer (as well as LAN play).

Yes! This was a slap in their face. How stupid are they? My wifi isn't great and I noticed I went offline sometimes, the game told me I was offline but I kept playing normally. It just synced the files later. It proves how they are actually trying to sell/market their games more like MMOs, but in this case they were utterly dumb to not hardcode it properly.

Exactly. Them marketing SimCity as an online only game isn't as much of a slap in the face, as them saying the game is built for online play, when clearly there was a singleplayer mode available at some point, which was crudely ripped out.

Did I ever say "equal in magnitude"?

Though I dare say it is equal in magnitude compared to things like beers for alcoholics. And beer is not unlimited either..

Without having any statistical data to back me up, I dare say that there can't be that many more people addicted to drugs than there are gamers. But my point wasn't magnitude, but lethality. Gaming addiction is far less lethal than say meth addiction. Anyhow as has been pointed out, everything in moderation. We're for the most part not built to last through extreme behavior, and just to get that point across, drinking too much water too quickly isn't just unhealthy, but lethal.