
Amazon stops selling Sim City V over game issues - mrcharles
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B007VTVRFA?ie=UTF8&force-full-site=1&ref_=aw_bottom_links
======
cryptoz
This could be a very big moment. EA is selling a completely broken product -
and I mean that from the perspective of the average consumer, not the nerd who
thinks all DRM is broken - and they're doing it for _absolutely no reason_. If
this lasts long enough and gets enough press, it could actually be a turning
point against DRM like this.

That would be so wonderful.

~~~
TillE
Oh, there's a reason. Like Diablo III, the point is that it's effectively
impossible to crack. With enough processing offloaded to the server, would-be
pirates need to write something that's almost a whole new game.

This is the future that big videogame companies are rushing to embrace, one
where customers do not and cannot own games, merely rent them for an uncertain
period. Indies and smaller studios with Kickstarter funding are going to
continue eating a bigger part of their lunch.

~~~
bearmf
The irony is that it is not only impossible to crack, it is now impossible to
play as well. Unplayable games are impossible to crack, but this does not make
them any less absurd. DRM has come to its logical and absurd conclusion, it
seems.

~~~
fusiongyro
It worked out the same way with music. For a short time the labels were
experimenting with selling CDs that weren't actually audio CDs, but had been
damaged in various ways to make them unplayable on a computer. The result of
that experiment speaks for itself. Hopefully it will play out the same way
here.

~~~
mmatants
The result is that we are increasingly switching to renting our music via
services like Rdio and Spotify.

And I can't say that this trend is all bad. I know what I pay for (temporary
access), and I'm OK with that.

~~~
fusiongyro
Apple seems to still be doing alright selling digital music, and they
voluntarily stopped using DRM.

~~~
pwthornton
Apple didn't voluntarily stop using DRM; they convinced the labels to stop
requiring it. Piracy isn't Apple's concern, but the user experience is.

This is in service of saying that DRM isn't in the user's best interest and
even big companies that care about user experience don't like DRM. Apple
didn't ship DRM on its OSes when they were DVD based either. Yes they probably
lost some sales due to piracy, but not having to deal with serial numbers is
big for users.

~~~
ariwilson
No, Amazon stopped using DRM to have a competitive advantage versus Apple, the
music companies went along because it gave them a real competitor to iTunes,
and eventually Apple managed to renegotiate their contracts so they could also
remove the DRM.

~~~
arrrg
Juicy, juicy revisionist history!

------
kevinalexbrown
I feel bad for the game devs who got to see their hard work turn into
something they don't intend.

I suppose this is a great advertising technique for small firms, startups,
indie shops, etc. "Don't want this[<http://amazon-pulls-sim-city>] to happen?
Work for our small team. We won't destroy your work."

I know it's standard to say "you get a part in the decisionmaking process!"
That's part of it. But a lot of people are willing to let go of the big
decisions if they get to be a part of something great. But they have to trust
that it will come out well in the end.

~~~
amitparikh
Isn't this just a technical error (bug) that is a game dev's (or
infrastructure engineer's) responsibility? I understand the frustration at the
DRM concept, but you can't blame this on the larger entity as a whole when it
was likely just a bug in some code or a small oversight.

Things were clearly working when it was in beta.

~~~
cbs
No, its not that simple.

 _Isn't this just a technical error (bug) that is a game dev's (or
infrastructure engineer's) responsibility?_

Isn't mandating the constant involvement of otherwise unnecessary tech that is
known to be error prone and unreliable just the result of a poorly thought out
buisness requirement?

No, its not that simple either. Because they probably did think it out, knew
they were choosing the riskier technical option and expect/expected failures
to happen.

My read of the situation is that they expected the rest of the game to get a
better reception overall and blunt the bad PR from the inevitable failures
caused by the always-on/centralized aspects.

~~~
dalore
Yep. There were probably tech guys who said you shouldn't do it, but the tech
guys that said you can probably got the promotions.

~~~
LandoCalrissian
It kills me a little inside to know this is probably 100% correct.

~~~
badloginagain
It's actually very unlikely. What is likely is that all the tech guys will be
laid off because SimCity didn't meet financial expectations.

~~~
bluedanieru
This isn't a bad thing. EA should fire all it's developers, designers, sales
people, management, liquidate its assets and distribute the proceeds to its
shareholders, and quietly go out of business.

Really, the tech guys that got laid off will almost certainly go to find
better jobs. Almost by definition, since they won't be making games at EA
anymore.

------
mortenjorck
EA needs to pivot this game, fast.

Even in the best case scenario, where the servers all get fixed _this evening_
and the game works flawlessly for everyone for a month straight, the damage to
the game's name has been done. The meme is hatched: SimCity 2013 has a highly
brittle dependency on poorly-planned cloud infrastructure.

There's a private region mode in the game (that you nonetheless can't use
offline in the current architecture). EA needs to have Maxis crunch for the
next couple of weeks to make this work offline. Yes, I've read the nebulous
quotes about "part of the sim happening in the cloud." Whatever that is,
they'll have to move it to the client.

Once offline play is possible, if EA wants any chance to make back its
investment on this game, they're going to have to first promote the new
offline mode, and then spend the next couple of months doing some post-launch
rescoping of the multiplayer aspect. They can still make it work; it could
still be fantastic – but they have to move fast.

~~~
AlexDanger
Remember EA is a business, not an offshoot of Reddit/HN. Imagine you're the
SimCity product manager and the choice was between a massive refactor or
provisioning a bunch of new servers. Which would you choose?

I'd love to agree with you, but I just dont think its plausible.

~~~
pdubs
One-time cost vs. ongoing cost for years to come? It's not as simple as you
make it out to be.

~~~
johnward
yeah it. EA shuts down the servers when they are tired of paying for them.
Game dies. Sim City get puts on madden schedule.

~~~
estel
Or, slightly less cynically, demand is always orders of magnitude higher for
the first week or two after release, so it's only a short term investment in
servers if they can be merged later.

~~~
johnward
The point is at some point they could pull the plug. I still play older
version of SimCity to this day.

~~~
estel
Sure they could. But if I get £40 of value from my game before they do, I can
live with that. It's not ideal, but it doesn't make it a poor purchase.

~~~
jiggy2011
I think there is a broader cultural loss though.

In the future years when "study of video game history" becomes a thing, people
will be able to examine and analyse old games like SimCity 2000 by actually
playing them as they were. Since they have been archived and preserved by wide
distribution.

Then as you get further into the future maybe you start to come across games
where you have to say "sadly the only existing copy of the server code was
lost in the great github fire of 2020, so all we can show you is this archived
footage".

~~~
mmcnickle
> so all we can show you is this archived footage.

You mean the tens of thousands of videos that will be posted. Historians will
have no shortage of source material.

I'd actually argue that the videos are more valuable as they show first hand
how the game was played at the time. Think a recording of a long-forgotten
instrument compared to the actual instrument, which is more valuable?

~~~
jiggy2011
I think there's quite a difference between playing and watching. Think of it
like trying to understand Shakespeare based on clips from Baz Luhrmann's
reinterpretation of Romeo and Juliet.

------
spartango
Can we talk about this more clearly?

This isn't strictly "evil DRM" as people are highlighting.

Unlike some other games, it's not like SimCity is just phoning home to figure
out if it is licensed or not, and preventing unlicensed copies.

SimCity depends on EA/Maxis' server infrastructure for a great deal of storage
and computation related to the macro-scale components of each game. Not only
is city state synced there and shared between players, but regional dynamics
and macro-scale economic systems are continuously maintained in the EA cloud.
There's plenty of other features that are done server-side, and in total they
represent a substantial piece of this game.

We can argue about whether these things should be computed and stored in the
cloud, but I think there is a plausible, if imperfect, argument for doing so;
Many players are involved and system resources are scarce relative to
simulation complexity.

Regardless, the use of the cloud in this game is for more than just to deter
pirates. That much is clear. And it's also clear that EA cannot "simply remove
the DRM" and expect people to have a full offline experience; this is a
primarily multiplayer game.

Indeed, this seems part of a trend in the games industry--that of bringing
MMO(massively multiplayer online) experiences to more games. Call it social or
something else, more games are working to get people to play with others. It's
good business and actually creates some special experiences.

In any case, EA/Maxis have clearly not executed the launch for SimCity well.
With 10 years of pent-up demand, it would have been wise to provision more
server side resources to keep the experience good. It's hard to keep up with
so many users, and perhaps a longer beta period would have helped.

But as a SimCity player and vet, I'll say that stripping out the online piece
of this game doesn't make sense, and that piece was certainly designed for the
benefit of gamers.

It's not strictly DRM or EA milking their customers.

~~~
reitzensteinm
I don't think you're adding clarity here.

People are upset about the lack of a single player offline mode, which
_absolutely is_ about preventing unlicensed copies. There is no technical
reason for its absence.

The cloud based stuff sounds great, and if it were an optional extra that was
unavailable at launch due to technical difficulties, I doubt you'd see a
hundredth as much bad PR.

~~~
aeturnum
>People are upset about the lack of a single player offline mode, which
absolutely is about preventing unlicensed copies. There is no technical reason
for its absence.

I see this sentiment expressed pretty often, but in this case it seems flawed.
From what I understand, you can't build a city that does everything, instead
you rely on the other cities in your 'region.'

The new Simcity is no more single player than World of Warcraft. The previous
games were single player, as they focused on a monolithic city. This game is
designed from the ground up with the assumption that you will play with other
people. There's no technical restrictions preventing Blizzard from offering
single-person servers for WoW, it just doesn't follow from the game design.
The same is true here.

~~~
rdw
It's possible to have a single-player experience, where one player controls
all of the cities in a private 'region'. It's alluded to here:
<http://kotaku.com/5988848/tips-for-playing-simcity> Ironically, if they
hadn't included that feature, arguments such as yours would have a lot more
weight, but as it is there is a purely-single-player experience, and you still
needlessly connect to a server for it. (I don't own the game, just going off
what I've read on the Internet)

~~~
lotyrin
And even if this were lacking, I for one would still be demanding it, and that
it would work entirely offline.

------
jader201
The fundamental problem with Sim City is that it is historically a single-
player, offline experience. And it didn't help that this is the first true Sim
City we've seen since 2003 (Sim City 4) and many media hyped this game to be
possibly the best Sim City yet, and the most realistic city simulation
experience.

Yes, there may be technical limitations that required processing to happen on
EA servers. And yes, they make it clear on the front of the box that an
internet connection is required to play the game.[1]

But most people purchasing this game expected that for the most part, this
would be primarily a single player just like the previous titles, and that the
internet connection is only required for DRM and/or occasional online
interaction. They don't realize that a lot of the engine lives in the cloud.

So there is a different level of disappointment because of the expectations
that were there. If this had been a follow-up to an MMO, they would have known
that the game heavily depended on server performance, and it may have been a
little more forgivable.

But most people don't understand why the game doesn't work. "Just disable DRM
for now. Or disable multiplayer interactions. Make it offline only for now."

What I can't believe is that this isn't just minor hiccups with the launch --
this is catastrophic failure. Why couldn't better load testing simulate and
predict what they're seeing today?

Regardless, as many have said, this will ruin the name of Sim City, at least
for a period, and will cause even more bitterness with EA than what already
exists.

[1][http://ecx.images-
amazon.com/images/I/815mDnNUDhL._SL1121_.j...](http://ecx.images-
amazon.com/images/I/815mDnNUDhL._SL1121_.jpg)

------
speeder
As a game author I am very ashamed of what the industry has been doing in the
last few years.

It started with FPS mania... Then crazy DRM that destroyed your PC (Starforce
I am looking to you).

Then... more crazy DRM! (SecuROM, that for example refused to launch Spore on
dual-GPU laptops).

Then online only DRM...

Then DLC mania (Horse Armor, I am looking to you... unfortunately as the
harbinger of something much worse past you).

Then Diablo III (and now SC5) managed to be the first games I don't want to
play even borrowed, pirated or given to me. If someone give me a DIII CD, I
won't even re-sell it and inflict something evil on someone, I will just throw
it on the trash, because online-only DRM for Single Player game, transforming
the game into a sort of cloud-based service, is one of the most evil things
that companies could invent, specially because they can just yank the game
from you when they wish (also you cannot have fun cheating alone or modding,
cannot play when you are deployed in some war without internet on the HQ or
live in the third world, cannot play if you deride EA/Activision/Ubisoft on
the forums and they decide to ban you...)

~~~
InAnEmergency
Can't play when the company decides to stop spending money on
servers...meaning your game will actually expire and stop working one day.

------
KevinEldon
The title of the 5-star review Amazon highlighted as the helpful is
delightful: "Got me off my video game addiction!"

If there isn't some kind of anti-DRM movement surrounding these review this
game might break some kind of record for worst reviews. As of now there are
737 1-star reviews.

~~~
lost_name
Spore (the last Big Game released by Maxis through EA) is currently holding
that record, I believe.

    
    
       By September 14, 2008 (ten days after the game's initial Australian release),
       2,016 of 2,216 ratings on Amazon.com gave the game one out of five stars,
       most citing EA's implementation of DRM for the low ratings. [1]
    

Spore's DRM issues were different, however.

[1]:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spore_(2008_video_game)#DRM_con...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spore_\(2008_video_game\)#DRM_controversy)

~~~
treeface
I actually legitimately hated Spore for its gameplay. So much promise and
hype...such poor execution.

~~~
MartinCron
Spore was really great in that different people could learn to hate it in
completely different ways.

------
nerdo
The dev team did an IAMA on Reddit a few months ago, where this was all
foreshadowed:

[http://www.reddit.com/r/SubredditDrama/comments/14v8er/drama...](http://www.reddit.com/r/SubredditDrama/comments/14v8er/drama_in_riama_maxis_video_game_developers_run_an/)

~~~
johnward
This sums it up <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KLYLmsEBGug>

------
anon1385
When a game requires an internet connection to work we call it DRM and slam
it. When a text editor or spreadsheet requires an internet connection to run
we call it innovation.

~~~
dragondilesh
The situation isn't as simple as you put it. This time, there is single player
game that shouldn't need forced interactivity with an internet connection.
Compared to a text editor where the internet connection allowed multiple users
to operate on it at the same time.

~~~
scarlson
That and I'm not spending 60$ for Google Docs access.

------
Fargren
EA is offering refunds but only in some cases, with a very haphazard criteria:
[http://img.gawkerassets.com/img/18gs2vgs50fjijpg/original.jp...](http://img.gawkerassets.com/img/18gs2vgs50fjijpg/original.jpg)

~~~
zcid
I think that has to be the most amazing customer service interaction I have
ever seen. I hope EA's payment processor hits them hard over all those charge
backs.

~~~
Aissen
Unlikely. If you're on Origin and ask your bank a chargeback, they'll block
your account and hold all your legally bought games hostage.

That would be the same as any cloud service(PSN, Steam, Google Play, App
Store…), which is a shame, and should be forbidden by law since the consumer
gets zero protection in this case.

------
cmelbye
I was initially apprehensive about the server-based architecture of the game.
However, after playing it for a few hours and being pleasantly surprised, I
can now see why they did it. There's a concepts of multiplayer regions with
cities that contact each other, and it's more than simply visiting the city.

It's a full economic simulation in which you can sell excess electricity
supplies to other cities, lend them public services such as police or fire
protection, build mass transit like commuter rail between cities, etc. Long
story short, I was surprised to find that there are a lot of features that
legitimately need a server. I initially expected the server-based system to be
purely for the purposes of DRM, but anyone playing it can probably determine
that it's a bit more than that.

Now if they can wrinkle out the bugs and get the servers running (which is,
don't get me wrong, a huge huge _huge_ issue right now), I'll be happy.

~~~
hkolek
> you can sell excess electricity supplies to other cities, lend them public
> services such as police or fire protection, build mass transit like commuter
> rail between cities, etc.

That was already possible in Sim City 4. Even in older versions (Sim City 2000
iirc) you had neighbor cities and could buy and sell utilities. Those features
work just as well when controlled by AI. There is just no reason not to
implement it aside from the DRM benefit.

------
samstave
I'm not going to lie: I will buy this game as soon as someone cracks the DRM
and allows single, offline play.

~~~
criley
You mean, when someone reverse engineers their massively multiplayer server
scheme and rewrites an entire server wrapper for a game that follows the
client/server paradigm?

This isn't a case where a client-only software package is locked by a remote
server.

This is a case where core game logic is stored on servers and will have to be
reverse engineered or emulated on some level to play truly offline.

~~~
deoxxa
I kind of started poking around at the backend protocol this morning. It's all
websockets over HTTPS (very trendy stuff) and is hosted on EC2. I'm yet to dig
much further than "let's see what this looks like in wireshark", but the
behaviour and some of the errors I've observed in-game point to some kind of
sync-every-now-and-then architecture. I wouldn't be surprised if it was really
easy to do up a custom server for it.

I'm going to keep poking at this thing, so I'll document what I find here:
<https://gist.github.com/deoxxa/5111644> \- feel free to join in!

~~~
nwh
The "hidden" servers are probably due to the game not being released in Europe
yet. I'm assuming they are reserved capacity for when hundreds of thousands of
new users join.

~~~
deoxxa
That makes a lot of sense, I hadn't thought about that.

------
pale_rider
I don't understand why people buy games from EA? I mean, seriously, why buy
it?

They have been pulling this crap for years and each new release just gets
progressively worse.

About a year ago I decided if it's not on Steam I'm not buying it. It really
sucks to miss out on some of the games, but I refuse to support such an
asshole of a company.

~~~
estel
As a consumer: If my £40 game gives me £40 of entertainment, I will buy it.

This held for Mass Effect 3 and Battlefield 3. And considering the reviews it
has been receiving, I'm confident this will be true for SimCity once the early
server issues have been ironed out.

------
jiggy2011
I'm going to disagree slightly.

The primary "DRM" in this game is not DRM in the sense of something that
attempts to control your computer in such a way as you can not make copies or
run an unauthorised version.

The DRM here is about moving game logic to a server under EA's control. I
think this is the correct way to do DRM in that it works and does not require
locked down client platforms or invasive rootkits.

I would much prefer to pay for something as a service than have some third
party try and take control of my computer. After all, people don't complain
about 37 signals , google or World of warcraft for their business models which
essentially amount to the same sort of "DRM".

The issues here seem to be that:

EA didn't plan for the demand and make sure that enough servers were
available.

Since there is no monthly service fee, there will come a point at which it is
no longer economical for EA to run the servers. This will make the game
unplayable unless there is some plan by which they will release the server
software for download after X years.

There are certain expectations built around the SimCity brand, mainly that the
games have high and timeless replayability and that they can be played in
isolation. I wonder if the game had been named "Simcity online" would have
changed the reception?

------
DigitalSea
"Guess what? If you'd love to experience the nonstop thrills and excitement of
SimCity, then please remove $60 from your bank and promptly pay someone to
kick you repeatedly in the friggin' mouth." - Ouch! Once again EA fucks up
another great gaming franchise that could have made them a lot of money by
implementing DRM that doesn't work. I know Blizzard did this with Diablo 3 and
Starcraft 2, but at least their servers could handle the load...

Not surprised. EA is a failure of a company being run into the ground by
greedy and paranoid CEO's who essentially treat their customers like
criminals. I feel sorry for the developers who obviously did an amazing job,
the new Simcity seems like a well-built game with smart AI developed by no
doubt some of the smartest minds in development, such a shame most people will
never get a chance to play the game before demanding refunds.

The uninformed will blame the developers but it's the fault of EA itself, not
the developers who did an amazing job. I want to play this game, but I'm going
to download the cracked version when it's released instead because it'll
actually work.

~~~
omni
What was wrong with Starcraft 2?

~~~
DigitalSea
Nothing. That is my point. Starcraft have always on DRM, but they did it
right. You need an internet connection for single play in SC2 as well as
Diablo 3 and they did it right at least. There were a few teething problems,
but it worked.

------
goatforce5
Where's Steve Jobs when you need him?

> Steve Jobs summoned the MobileMe team to the Town Hall > auditorium on
> Apple’s Cupertino campus for an obscenity- > laden dressing down. ‘You’ve
> tarnished Apple’s reputation,’ > he told them. ‘You should hate each other
> for having let > each other down.’ Then he named a new executive on the spot
> > to run the team.”

[http://macdailynews.com/2011/05/08/steve-jobs-to-those-
respo...](http://macdailynews.com/2011/05/08/steve-jobs-to-those-responsible-
for-mobilemess-you-should-hate-each-other/#Gb5gk9Qr5v3TWy0M.99)

~~~
NoPiece
Although it is more likely in this case that the EA executives mandated online
only to the developers.

~~~
goatforce5
No doubt. Doesn't mean you have to implement it badly though.

~~~
NoPiece
Agreed! But having worked at a company similar to EA, I know the developer may
have wanted to implement certain things a certain way, but may not have been
able to due to corporate mandates. For example, they may have wanted to deploy
using AWS, but their CTO demanded they use the in-house infrastructure he has
been working on. Obviously just speculation, but things like this happen all
the time at large companies where internal factions put their own agendas
ahead of the product and users. I would just hold off blaming Maxis or the
development team until more is known.

~~~
alcari
Here's the thing though: they DID use AWS (one of their EU servers is
46.137.165.11). They have no excuse besides poor architecture design for not
simply doubling server capacity.

~~~
NoPiece
Right, but I'm just saying that there isn't nearly enough information to claim
the devs let down the CEO (as the parent comment implied). We don't know why
things are failing, or or who made the decisions that let to the problems. We
don't even know if they have tried to throw more servers at the problem (I
hope so).

I agree that given the narrow scope of the online plain in SimCity, they
should have an architecture that scales easily. I hope they do a public post-
portem.

------
ececconi
Amazon is still selling the physical version. Why would they pull the digital
download and not the physical copy? Is it because there are different people
responsible for it?

~~~
tantalor
I thought it might be an automatic block based on 1-star reviews, but both
products have the same 88% 1-star reviews right now.

Digital: 765/866 = 88.3%

DVD: 912/1038 = 87.9%

~~~
estel
If there's an automatic block, it's more likely to be related to refund
requests.

------
BklynJay
The box-art says, "Winner of 26 PC Game awards". Is that for the series or for
Sim City V? I have a hard time believing its the latter.

~~~
arkitaip
Probably for the entire series but it's still false marketing.

------
ericcholis
Overall, this games seems like a good example of how not to launch a product:

<http://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/simcity>

Fanboy perspective: [http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2013/03/simcity-
impressions-we...](http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2013/03/simcity-impressions-
we-waited-ten-years-for-this/)

------
mcintyre1994
Seriously, how is this legal? They're obviously very open about it requiring
online, and the extent to which the servers are involved, and the fact you
need Origin.

However, this isn't some cheap game, some small company, some inexperienced
producers who didn't know what to expect. That their servers aren't up to the
job is inexcusable, and clearly their fault.

Even if Origin has Ts & Cs that boil down to you don't actually have the right
to play games you buy, even if you buy them on a disc - which I'm sure they
do, how is this possibly legal? The game is unplayable, it's their fault and
they could have made it work if they'd chosen to.

~~~
goatforce5
It would depend on your local consumer laws. Under UK law, for example,
Simcity would not currently be considered 'fit for purpose' and they're
clearly obliged to give you a refund:

[http://www.adviceguide.org.uk/nireland/consumer_ni/consumer_...](http://www.adviceguide.org.uk/nireland/consumer_ni/consumer_common_problems_with_products_e/faulty_goods_e/what_is_meant_by_goods_not_fit_for_purpose.htm)

...assuming you're buying it from a UK(/EU?) subsidiary.

Local laws will vary. IANAL.

------
jlarocco
SimCity and SimCity 2000 were such great games, it's a bit disappointing to
see how EA screwed up the rest of the series.

~~~
mhurron
The only thing bad about SimCity 4 was the performance was less than stellar.
Other than that, 3000 and 4 were just as good as 2000.

~~~
khuey
A decent size SC4 city can bring today's hardware to its knees, and the game
is 10 years old.

~~~
kbolino
It would be more accurate to say that SC4 is not optimized for today's
hardware. It relies entirely on single-threaded performance, which has not
improved appreciably since the days when it was released. Furthermore, it is
32-bit and not large address aware, which means it is limited to about 1.5GB
of memory. Needless to say, this would max out a Pentium 4 single-core system
with 2GB of RAM circa mid-2000s, but it will leave your (not too) modern
4-core desktop with 8GB of RAM sitting mostly idle with lots of free memory.
The game may run slow with large cities, but that's because it doesn't know
how to take advantage of modern tech, not because that modern tech is being
pushed to its limits.

------
adventured
Three things

1) remove the online DRM 2) significantly expand the size of the ridiculously
small city area (let users push the bounds of their system by choosing how big
of a city to work on) 3) enable a save/load to go with the offline mode

Do it as fast as possible. And then suck up to users by providing some free
DLC here and there.

Anyone taking bets that EA will do the opposite of these obvious steps?

------
overgard
I wish I had read about this before I bought the game. I feel screwed over, I
would have never bought the game if I knew it was like this.

There's something the game industry doesn't get in their zeal for control over
users. (And lets be clear, this is about control, not just about piracy.)
Here's what the game industry doesn't get: your barrier to entry is already
exceptionally high. You might be able to get away with this in the short term,
but it's a bad long term proposition, because I'm almost always going to
choose convenience over quality (and I'm not alone). Asking me to pay $60,
wait for a 12GB download, and have a very powerful rig is already a huge
stretch. When you factor this mess in it's just not worth my time. I'd rather
go get an indie game, or play a flash game. It's just not worth my time to
deal with this, even if the game itself is impressive.

~~~
dman
Not too late for a refund

------
ericcholis
Side note, it's a little odd that the additional images for a video game are
all concept art.

------
zachinglis
I can only speculate the designers said "Oh man, if we can interact with each
other's city that'd be awesome" and someone higher up said "It'll always be
on!"

Everyone saw this coming. Everyone. I don't understand how they couldn't
prepare better?

~~~
IheartApplesDix
Because EA doesn't care about their customers that much. There's no reason on
doubling your launch fleet for a few days when it will hardly effect the sales
of your game. Save money and let customers bitch for a few days, just more
free press about your game.

------
iuguy
After the Tetris debacle[1] on iOS and putting obtrusive adverts into their
iOS games for new ones despite me paying for them (a cardinal sin IMHO)
combined with endless DRM debacles and horror stories about how employees were
treated, I took the decision to never buy or install another EA game again.

Electronic Arts (which EA is the mutated-gollum-like growth of) was actually a
software developer that was based on the idea of the developers being artists.
They shared lavish profits with them, put the developers' faces on boxes and
made some amazing games. If you want to see some highlights of Electronic
Arts' back catalogue, take a look at these:

* M.U.L.E - <http://www.worldofmule.net/tiki-index.php>

* Desert Strike - [http://www.mobygames.com/game/desert-strike-return-to-the-gu...](http://www.mobygames.com/game/desert-strike-return-to-the-gulf)

* Populous - <http://www.mobygames.com/game/populous>

* The Bard's Tale - <http://bardstale.poverellomedia.com/>

* F/A-18 Interceptor - <http://www.mobygames.com/game/fa-18-interceptor>

* Indy 500 - [http://www.mobygames.com/game/indianapolis-500-the-simulatio...](http://www.mobygames.com/game/indianapolis-500-the-simulation)

* Road Rash - <http://www.mobygames.com/game/road-rash>

A lot (but not all) of these were games developed when Trip Hawkins was in
charge. Trip Hawkins went on to found the failed 3DO console, which is where a
lot of the modern 3D versions of the popular franchises (NFS, FIFA etc.) first
started out.

If you don't like DRM, being nickel and dimed, or scummy company practices. I
highly recommend you boycott EA and spend your money on the plenty of City
building alternatives on Steam[2] instead.

[1] -
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetris_(mobile_video_game)#App_...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetris_\(mobile_video_game\)#App_Store_removal/)

[2] - <http://store.steampowered.com/>

------
SkittlesNTwix
The servers being down, I can _almost_ forgive, but this whole affair with the
DRM is very puzzling. EA has a history of angering users who buy their games.
And yet, for apparently no good reason, they have incorporated into their
latest offering the one element that is guaranteed to anger virtually everyone
who buys their game.

It's pretty simple - I paid money for your game. Now, I own it. EA, maybe you
need a tutorial on how money works. Let's not get side-tracked and start
talking about whether or not I own my songs on iTunes or any of these more
entrenched markets. If I buy a video game, I should be able to play it 10
years later, even if the EA Sim City Servers are long-gone and now devoted to
keeping track of whatever the latest terrible incarnation of Madden does.

I didn't buy Civ V (not EA) because of DRM. I haven't bought other games
because of DRM. I wanted to buy into the Sim City franchise again but I'm not
buying Sim City V because of DRM. You just lost a sale and likely a future
customer.

------
littlegiantcap
It's been fun while I've actually been able to connect to EA's servers. (which
is rare). I'm not going to beat the anti-drm drum, but I will say this. If EA
is going to go this route they had better have the resources available to make
it happen. I for one actually don't mind it, if it was able to work.

~~~
Andaith
This is all an assumption but:

With the amount of stuff that gets simulated on their servers, the sim city
servers are probably more resource intensive than even really popular FPS
servers.

That means they're also more expensive per person than most other game
servers.

What happens when it's no longer profitable for EA to keep them running? I
doubt they'll release the source code.

------
blaines
I'm not sure if this will work but there's a petition for EA to remove the
server requirement... [http://www.change.org/petitions/electronic-arts-inc-
remove-a...](http://www.change.org/petitions/electronic-arts-inc-remove-
always-online-drm-from-simcity-and-future-games)

------
srehnborg
I am waiting to see what comes of this before I buy. However, They had
overloaded server issues during the 1 hour beta AND the extended 4 hour beta
leading up to the launch.

Hoping they can get this resolved quickly. I think we're dreaming if the fix
will involve a non-DRM offline mode.

------
danso
I haven't been paying much attention to SCV except that it seemed to be
generating a lot of hype and excitement...so I'm kind of confused why the game
has to be so intricately tied into whatever (apparently faulty) online service
that EA has setup.

I mean, besides the DRM. I don't get why my fake city has to be attached to a
world of fake cities if all I want to do is play in the sandbox. Didn't the
designers/executives consider that many people would be perfectly fine playing
alone? And then slowly rolling out the multiplayer features?

I doubt we'll see it, but it'd be great to see a post-mortem of the actual
bug. Was it load-related or just something extremely boneheaded?

~~~
robinh
"I mean, besides the DRM."

But that's the core issue, really.

~~~
danso
No, the core issue is: the game doesn't work. Lets face it, gamers would still
be buying the game with DRM if it didn't crash.

If what you mean is: "Crashing (to the point of unplayability) is an inherent
consequence of DRM"...the many wildly successful games that have DRM would
indicate otherwise

~~~
robinh
I didn't mean any of that. I meant that DRM is _the_ reason one would
implement constant-onlineness into a game that should also (mostly, even) work
as a single player game. My apologies if my use of the word 'issue' suggested
something different.

------
cstrat
I really, really wanted to buy this game. Since I was young I've always loved
the SimCity series and was hoping this would be great... I was even going to
buy a new PC just to play it.

Fuck you EA - you're disappointing my inner child!

------
Osiris
Most single-player games that have an multi-player or online component also
have an offline mode for single-player use.

This game should have been a combination of a basic single-player mode
(campaign style, maybe with goals to accomplish, etc) in addition to a multi-
player mode that would allow for online play with other cities.

At least with a single-player mode you know there is a part of the game you'll
always be able to play, long after the online components have been
discontinued.

Conceptually, the online mode sounds pretty intriguing but, obviously, was
poorly executed.

------
gimeq
SimCity 2000/3000/4 still work perfectly, and are available for free.

~~~
estel
Since when are they available for free?

~~~
ardacinar
I think SimCity 2000 was considered abandonware, or was it only the first
SimCity game? I'm not really sure about it. But the first 4 games are
definitely playable without any internet connection whatsoever.

~~~
calebegg
According to Wikipedia, original SimCity is available on Wii (virtual console)
and iOS, and 2000 is still available on PSN. Hardly abandoned. And playable
without an internet connection is far from "available for free".

~~~
jiggy2011
Available for free in practical terms vs available for free in legal terms..

------
throwaway420
The programmers will probably be thrown under the bus for this instead of the
suits who dictated the game's stupid social direction and always-on DRM, but
I'm glad that this game is so far looking like an epic failure. Gaming
companies need to be punished in the marketplace for rampant stupidity.

They deserve this game to flop, and it's good for gaming as a whole if this is
an epic failure so EA will learn a lesson.

(Though I have doubts that a company as thick-headed as EA will learn anything
positive from this)

------
stusmall
My copy is on its way in the mail. I'm a huge SimCity fanatic and was slightly
worried that when it got here I'd sink too much time in it and get behind on
my work.

Thanks EA!

------
Maven911
NO Longer Valid - Amazon smartened up (in terms of running a profit making
business) and decided to resell the game, its the number 1 seller now after
all

------
kaoD
Well, that's what you get for buying a DRMed game.

Stand for your rights.

------
CognitiveLens
Looks like it's available now - any confirmation that they stopped selling it
over 'game issues', or if that was just conjecture to get more clicks?

------
meisterbrendan
Here's a thought: if you can't get your act together with servers during a
launch, stagger the launch. IE, when you buy your game, you have a place in a
queue, and when there is enough server capacity to support you, you are let
into the system. That way, you can change gamers expectations such that they
are being let into an exclusive party, not that the game that they purchased
is defective.

------
maerF0x0
And this is why I basically do not pre order anything. If I do, its pretty
much considered charity in my mind (eg a kickstart -esque situation)

------
dalacv
But they promised...<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KLYLmsEBGug>

------
trothamel
To me, the problems we see today will pale in comparison with the problems
people will experience years from now. If the game is unplayable today, what
will it be like when EA decides that keeping the servers running is
unprofitable, and turns those servers off?

(I think there's some sort of analog to historical preservation of art and
buildings here.)

------
josephv
I have played the last couple nights (since release) on the West Europe 2
server though I'm on the East Coast. Not ideal I guess but I've had to do the
same thing for other games. Hopefully it still works when I get home in a few
hours :)

Speaking of "broken" memes.

I used to play SimCity like you, until it got an arrow in the cloud. Improve
on that please.

------
apapli
Reading the comments below it sounds like there is an infrastructure scaling
issue going on down at EA (I'm no DRM specialist).

If that is indeed the case: Methinks the AWS sales guy/gal on the EA account
has just been handed the easiest ROI they could ask for. "Buy my cloud, and we
will be able to start selling your game again."

~~~
hga
Unfortunately the way this often goes is that someone who was responsible for
not using AWS correctly blames AWS instead of himself and EA stops using them,
or using them for future games.

Although that won't tend to work if EA is already using AWS a lot.

------
jpwright
Nitpicking: The name of the game is just "Sim City". They dropped the
numbering scheme and went for a total reboot.

~~~
cryptoz
> The name of the game is just "Sim City"

No, it's not. If you're going to nitpick, get it right. The name of the game
is SimCity.

~~~
JTon
If you're going to slam his comment, at least offer a reason why it's
incorrect

~~~
programzeta
The title is 'SimCity', all as one word.

------
bane
I was thinking of buying this, but meh, never mind.

(may as well just wait for the cracked version and enjoy the game with more
convenience)

<http://www.reddit.com/r/simcity> seems to be summing up the problem pretty
nicely with some clever use of the curved roads.

------
michaelrhansen
I have been amazed at the interest level in this game. I shared in the
excitement and could not wait for the Mac version. Now the bad backlash, bugs,
and generally horrific reviews have significantly deflated my interest. Gaming
startups - make a better one!! ;)

~~~
rabbidrabbit
like this [http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1584821767/civitas-
plan-...](http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1584821767/civitas-plan-develop-
and-manage-the-city-of-your-d)

------
junkilo
Its sad they didn't use the playfish devops team that flawlessly launched
simcity social.

------
Mahn
Looks like Amazon sells it again.

------
bdesimone
Short of asking for a refund, and not buying the game in the first place, who
at Maxis and EA can customers write/call/etc to let them know what I feel
about the business decision to force online only DRM?

~~~
PeterisP
Short their stock.

------
smsm42
I still see "buy and download" button and it says "Available". It has a
warning about connectivity problems but the game seems to be still available
for sale.

------
masklinn
Not really game issues (though they definitely seem to exist as well, unstable
games is just par for the course these days), broken DRM and server issues.

------
salahxanadu
I wonder if this is just a way to get around all of those horrible reviews.
They'll probably put it up again soon with cleared reviews.

------
fennecfoxen
So did they not even bother to look at the debacle of a launch that was
_Cities XL_? Or did they imagine themselves immune?

~~~
arkitaip
EA has a very long history of anti consumer practices. Pretty much everyone
expected some kind of fubar on launch but even this level of incompetence
surprised most jaded gamers.

~~~
Natsu
They sold server-side processing as a "feature" for what should otherwise be a
single-player game. Did anyone not see this coming when it was last discussed
on HN?

I remember thinking that the servers were guaranteed to melt on launch day.

~~~
Natsu
Interesting. I guess one person didn't see this coming.

------
weixiyen
EA for the most part does not respect the player experience.

How is it 2013 and NFL 2K5 is still the best NFL sim?

------
pkorzeniewski
It would be hilarious if a cracked version allowing offline play would appear
on TPB :)

------
jasonlingx
When torrenting your game offers a better user experience than paying for it,
well...

------
cedricd
Looks like it's available again

------
anigbrowl
Oh dear, looks like the virtual rioters have broken out into the real world.

------
smogzer
dwarf fortress is the new simcity.

------
dakimov
The brain-dead corporate douches in gray suits pulled the trendy social
bullshit into the legendary single-player game and ruined it. That's
unbelievable!

------
ryangripp
I think the real reason Amazon stopped selling it was the Amazon Buyers looked
at the game and said: "What? No subways? Small City Size? We can't sell this!"

------
openforce
Wow, Upwards of 800 amazingly dumb people on the review page. Didn't they see
the first 100 reviews <i>before</i> making the purchase?

~~~
DanBC
Perhaps they bought in advance?

~~~
openforce
Thats even worse

