SimCity Developers' Reddit AMA Swiftly Turns Into WTF With The Online-Only DRM?
from the unsurprisingly-unpopular dept
The developers of the latest SimCity learned a valuable lesson Friday during a Reddit AMA, one that will hopefully be passed on to other developers: people -- you know, the downstream consumers you're hoping will purchase your software? They hatehatehatehatehatehatehateHATE DRM.EA, the publisher of SimCity, has seen fit to up the annoyance factor on legally purchased copies of the game by requiring an internet connection to play the latest title in the series, even in single player mode, and funneling the users through its horrendous Origin "service." Not only that, but players' games are saved online, so if you lose the connection, not only will you be prevented from playing your purchased game, but you'll be back at whatever point you were at when your service died.
The top voted question/comment digs right into the heart of the DRM issue:
What will happen to the game if I am playing and lose my internet connection - will the game still be playable and update the servers when my internet connection resumes or will it pause and wait for the connection?The first answer back, from Kip Katsarelis (Senior Producer) was far from comforting:
As I have unreliable internet at times if I were to lose a connection and play for a while longer (assuming I would be able to continue to play) would my changes be saved locally in case my internet connection does not come back up before I need to stop playing (and then be uploaded when I next start the game).
I love what the game is looking like and look forward to the multi-player region games, but as you can tell I am concerned about what happens if my internet connection decides to drop for a few hours.
Sorry, I replied to it below. Not avoiding. Here was the reply...At least Katsarelis somewhat acknowledges that the term "short" is woefully undefined. And whether or not players "notice a thing" isn't really the sort of issue that should be getting sorted during an informal Q&A. While that answer was less than satisfactory, Kip's followup was downright laughable.
"I actually just ran over to our online engineering team to get the latest info. We do handle "short" internet outages gracefully. Meaning, if your internet goes out while you're logged in and playing the game, we can can recover gracefully. You shouldn't notice a thing. "Short" is still being defined."
We will allow you to play for as long as we can preserve your game state. This will most likely be minutes.The response to that bit of "online imagineering" was full of win, however.
My computer happens to have a hard drive that's suitable for preserving game state. Should I consider buying your game, or is it crippled to online-only?It's not as though the "paying customers hate DRM" is a new development. It has been this way for years and paying customers have expressed their displeasure with being handed crippled software in exchange for perfectly functioning money, while those who have acquired the same software for free use the software much in the manner you would expect the paying customer to be able to: on his or her own terms, online connection or no. It's gotten bad enough that even EA's own employees are annoyed with DRM "solutions."
A helpful Redditor compiled all the anti-DRM comments from the AMA into an easy-to-read, linked, multi-author screed on the unpopularity of online-connection-required DRM. Perhaps SimCity's devs can run this up the chain to EA in the small hope that a list of disgruntled potential customers might persuade the publisher to drop the online/Origin requirement before SimCity's release in March. It's highly doubtful this will work, as EA's president has stated that all EA games will include "online applications and digital services." If one was optimistic and a bit naive, it almost sounds like EA wants a connected community that expands the fanbase through social media. If one is firmly grounded in reality, however, it's just another way to say "all games will include some form of online-only
So, very possibly, no lessons will be learned. People will go and pirate themselves a working version of SimCity, which will lead EA to believe that EVEN MORE DRM is required for the next iteration, which will piss off the next set of gamers, leading to more cracked, functional versions downloaded, and so on, until either a.) all piracy is eradicated (thru some sort of black magic[k] ceremony involving Chris Dodd, Cary Sherman, the remaining members of the BSA and the exhumed corpse of Sonny Bono) or b.) EA (and companies like it) stop dumping crippled software on customers in hopes of making absolutely no discernible dent in piracy levels.
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Jaws X : It's really personal this time.
What does yet another rehash of a 30 year old game concept really bring to the table?
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Why should I pay for a cripled game when I can get a cracked one that is not cripled.
I want to pay and give money to EA and other publishers, but when I pay I WANT THE GAME ONLY, NO DRM SHIT, or you can keep your game I will keep my money and only EA will loose out.
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I got one DRM heavy online only game a year ago, Heroes of Might and Magic 6, and I've yet to install it despite it being a totally legal copy. And despite the fact that I have a great Fios internet connection from Verizon, simply because I've read too many stories about Ubisoft's own servers crashing frequently, rendering the game useless. And Heroes 6 is a game that's not even that popular compared to their other titles, which made the whole thing more pathetic for them.
Think I'll be buying expansion packs to Heroes 6 that Ubisoft released? Nope, not if I haven't even played the original yet. If Ubisoft releases a patch that undoes the DRM I'd instantly install and play it however, and almost certainly buy the expansion packs since I've been a long time fan of the series from before Ubisoft bought it up.
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In fact, I haven't bought EA games for years now. I don't even bother to download the pirated versions. I did the stupidity of buying Assassin's Creed from Ubisoft a while back. Never again. I don't even bother downloading their games anymore, just as with EA. Blizzard has also joined the Ranks after Diablo III. I wonder, who is losing here, the file sharers or the companies?
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They could have has hundreds of $$$ from me by now but because of their stupidity with DRM they loose out and I can play other games like Dirt which has a lot less intrusive DRM and I don't need to be online to play it.
Ubisoft has lost a lot of my $ as well, but then again most of their PC ports of Splinter Cell and ghost Recon are complete shitpile of bugs, so not missing a lot there either. And I will not buy Anno 2070 until you remove Uplay crap from it.
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So yeah, not all companies are evil creatures from Hell. At least our Polish one isn't.
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http://gog.com
http://desura.com
Humble Bundle also sells a lot of them.
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In comes the "only-online" shit that need EA's cloud service to remain alive. As soon as EA eventually closes due to their bad decisions, every single game they sucker you into buying will be worthless.
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Can you name a game on these services that actually requires those for a single player game? Not online play (because, durr, an online requirement for an online game is common sense, not DRM), but a requirement where none should be? Because I can't think of one, and I played my 360 quite happily for several months when I didn't have a home internet connection.
There is DRM involved with games, but I'm yet to come across one that either installs spyware that stops me using other programs, or prevents me from playing a legitimately purchased game altogether - unlike PC DRM.
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the pc and console versions of this game REQUIRE sign in to WindowsLive/XBL to play, you can do anything in them till you sign in, I have it on steam and 3 people I know have it on 360, honestly, you made it to easy...there are quite a few games out there you cant get to play without logging in.
now, they may have patched it so you can do SP without login but I REALLY doubt it, since the games more designed for co-op play then anything else.....
note: i wouldnt have bought it, but it was gifted to me by a good friend, who didnt realise the game had this kinda bs till after we started playing.....
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I'll have to take your word for it, but suffice to say that if I ever was in the market for that game, I'm not now, and there must have been some people left completely unable to play the thing when it was released. The fact that it's designed for co-op may have reduced the numbers of people buying it but unable to play because they weren't online, but I'm sure there were still some, which is the same problem I'm talking about regarding the PC titles.
But, this isn't a common thing, and I'm yet to come across this myself. There may well be DRM on console games, but such an online requirement is not a regular thing on console games that I've encountered, as I've said. Maybe your experience is different, but I find PC-based DRM far more restrictive and intrusive, which is why I'm no longer in the market for PC games.
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* I've actually bought SC4 four different times over the past 8 years, the latest being back in August via Steam.
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I say all of this as a loyal Steam user. I've bought so much from them over the years, I'm somewhat appalled at how far I have to scroll to look through my library. My point is that /maybe/ online-only SC5 is no big deal after all.
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What this is about is that this game in particular stores your saves online regardless of if you want to play online or not. Which you'd know if you'd bothered to read the article.
What EA is trying to do is put every city in a "region" next to other players cities and then have interplay between those cities. Which is a neat idea but they are forcing it on you, there is no real single player (you'd have to take up every city in the region to do that) and if you are not online you can't save your game and will in a "short" time not be allowed to keep playing.
It's an attempt, much like Diablo 3, to mask an always on DRM system behind a game play system that does nothing but remove choice from the player.
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But not only does it mask DRM, it also masks the DLC-milking that is behind "region play": They deliberately clamp down on moddability to make you pay for very cheap-to-make new "exciting" regions and core game features (subways, larger cities).
All i ever looked for in a sim city game were these:
1) Rebuild my hometown.
2) Rebuild and modify an existing town.
3) Build my dreamtown (including finding clever solutions for highway intersections and difficult terrain, etc.).
Last and very much least:
4) Play an economic simulator and show off my achievements online.
Neither of the first 3 requires "social play" and all of them require a decent map editor and large cities.
All the features seem to be driven by marketing considerations, as if they are geared to show up in "teaser trailers" and "previews". Look here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SimCity_%282013_video_game%29 The game already won numerous awards and the praise of various "magazines" - almost half a year before release. It's all part of the marketing machine - and sadly it works.
It shows that the people in charge do not care about making the best game they can, but the best cashcow they can get away with.
Already i am reading apologetic pieces about how a missing region editor somehow "adds value" by letting them release "high quality DLC regions" that are absolutely going to be worth 2$ per region or whatever it's going to be. Already i am hearing excuses how DRM-server-failures are no big deal and how i should go for a walk instead of complaining about it.
Unfortunately the kids will buy it - they don't know how good their game could be (like in the old days when every game could be modded and none required always-online) and how not boycotting the worst offenders in the DRM- and DLC-milking-business is going to make it worse in the future.
So the game is doomed to be a shallow yet commercially successful reminder that our favorite franchises will never reach their full potential - mostly because gaming has become a mainstream activity and the publishers don't have to rely on the enthusiasts anymore.
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For being such a loyal Steam user you don't seem to have a full grasp of their service.
Steam has this little thing called offline mode which does...can anyone guess? No?
It allows you to play your games offline.
All you have to do is make sure Steam and your game are updated, load a game once online to finish the install, and activation then just restart Steam in offline mode to be able to play your collection offline. It can't be much simpler.
To me, that says "activation only DRM."
My point is that /maybe/ online-only SC5 can't be compaired to Steam after all.
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I believe you have to set your account to 'save log in details' or whatever and restart. then you can launch in offline mode and play your games
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I had rather liked Sim City.
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The next big thing going on here!
Yeah! This will be all the rage! It's not DRM! It's what all the 'cool' kids want nowadays. How could you possibly not want that??? You'd have to be a terrorist or a communist or something to not want that. And you don't want to be labeled a terrorist now, do you?
And if you internet connection goes down? Well, no need to worry. The company has your money so they can develop a new system that won't need internet connection in the future. Hell, by then, you won't need a keyboard, mouse or monitor. You can just calmly sit in your desk chair and *think* about playing. And no DRM there!!! Wow! DRM is almost a miracle!!!
-_-
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Re: The next big thing going on here!
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Who would have known? My Certified Novell Netware Administrator cert is finally useful again! Thought I'd never be able to use that cert again.
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Re: The next big thing going on here!
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Re: The next big thing going on here!
Oh, wait...
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3rd choice is as usual left out.
Assuming the implicit notion that this is essential to life, THEN, BUY the game, BUT use the pirated version. Neither your conscience nor DRM will bother you! ... What's that? Some people will STILL not PAY for it? -- THEN, YOU supporters of piracy must stop providing them with excuses! There are legal and moral alternatives. Why are YOU, Tim Cushing, always presenting ONLY the same two failed views?
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Re: 3rd choice is as usual left out.
1) Define "legal"
2) Define "moral"
Look I know there are alternatives out there, but not all of them are agreed upon with the general public.
And for the love of God, please shut up and use whatever brain cells you have left in that head of yours! Think before you type!
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Those times are gone. :(
/s
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Re: 3rd choice is as usual left out.
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But if YOU get to pick which parts of the law are applicable and which are not, why can't others?
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Re: Re: Re: 3rd choice is as usual left out.
Because others didn't pay for the copyright laws...? Why would mere citizens believe that they get to participate in their own government? Didn't we pay to have that concept removed from the textbooks already? What are we paying our lobbyists for?!?
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Re: 3rd choice is as usual left out.
There's no way to EA to see that you're downloading that cracked copy after purchasing. If everyone with a problem with DRM did this, all EA sees is huge sales of their game. Thus, the next one will have the same if not worse DRM. And the next one. And the next one.
So what real, logical consumers will do is either A) Purchase the game, suck up the DRM, and try to play. B) Refuse to purchase the game because of the DRM. Or C) Pirate the game and thoroughly enjoy the single player offline, with no DRM.
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I *want* to pay for this new Sim City, I *want* to be able to enjoy it, but this online only BS... combined with the lack of a region editor, is turning me away.
I guarantee the reason why we can't use a region editor is that they want to sell us additional regions as DLC which they won't be able to if we can just make our own to our liking.
I don't care if they are putting the Maxis logo back on the game... it is still an EA game. The Soul of Maxis long since left.
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Single player games = offline content
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Sims 3 sold out and they try this scheme?
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The game is already dead...
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how's about just giving people what they pay for, ie, the full release on a disk that is fully playable, even if in single player mode only, without the need to go online at all to download 100's of megs of further content purposefully left off just to force the internet connection thing, rather than continuously pissing customers off because they have lost their games, again?
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One is never, ever, buy one without trying it first. Gaming reviews are gamed (pardon the pun). Any site that evaluates a game and gives an honest review that the game sucks is taken off the list of those eligible for early trials. This means that no gaming reviews can be trusted to give honest opinions, good or bad. I'll not buy products that way.
The second is never ever buy a game that requires on-line connections to play a single mode. The computer I game with does not connect to the internet. Full stop. It will remain that way as long as I use it for a gaming computer. No phone homes occur, no communication of data mining, and no spying on what I'm doing with it. Making it an on line requirement ensures either I will pirate it which in that case means absolutely no money to the gaming company or more likely I won't even bother with it. Either way comes up to be a no-sale.
Two particular companies that have earned my ire and hence never gets a sale are EA and Ubisoft. Both make games loaded with DRM, interested mainly in the franchise that results in a very short game at premium price and truthfully are not worth the money.
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Why bother pirating it?
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Open your mind. Understand you don't have all the numbers.
There are young kids who don't know how to pirate and will try to share the DVD.
This will stop them.
Reddit is the tiny, tiny, vocal minority.
Do you know Diablo 3 sold over 8 million copies and has always online DRM that couldn't be cracked?
Someone will have to make a private server for it, and it will never be a duplicate of Blizzard's closed source server.
It works.
Unfortunately for SimCity they will probably use a watered down version of always online DRM that won't have game logic server side, meaning it will be easy to crack.
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No it doesn't. Congratulations, wrong in one.
Open your mind. Understand you don't have all the numbers.
The level of stupid here isn't worth a response.
There are young kids who don't know how to pirate and will try to share the DVD.
What decade are you living in? DVD? Sharing physical media? I'm sure this is number one on their list to "stop" with DRM.
This will stop them.
No it won't. Congratulations, wrong in one again.
Reddit is the tiny, tiny, vocal minority.
No it isn't. But even if this were to be true, who do you think people go to for word of mouth about whether a game is good or worth getting? Their grandmother? No, their geeky friends who frequent the intarwebs, such as these particular people that were on Reddit.
Do you know Diablo 3 sold over 8 million copies and has always online DRM that couldn't be cracked?
Congratulations on pointing out something that means nothing. So what? It sold about 7.5 million of those copies on name alone. If it wasn't saddled with online only it probably would have sold 10-12 million copies. Guess what else... the game sucked. Out of those 8 million "copies" about 15 people still play it that aren't korean gold farmers or chinese bots. How many "copies" do you think any expansion or sequel will sell? I bet you A LOT less.
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Companies exist to make profit. If removing DRM from their games meant EA would make 5% more I'm sure those money grubbing leeches would do it in an instant.
When people have the option to not pay many choose not to. Simply by downloading or pirating something you place a value on it, a value that is not passed on to the developer.
So ask yourself why EA hasn't seen the light and removed DRM and Origin integration.
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Because they *think* it's more profitable. Stories like this are to inform them that not only does DRM not stop piracy, but that many of those "pirated" copies are just customers trying to use their legally purchased content in the first place.
I'm yet to see any real data that suggests that DRM has ever really reduced piracy, but I can point to many anecdotal stories of people abandoning the PC platform altogether due to DRM (the same platform that they complain is dropping drastically in sales numbers... hmmm....). Where's the proof that DRM works in either way intended?
"When people have the option to not pay many choose not to."
...and many do. Of course, you ignore those because the figures isn't 100%, right?
"So ask yourself why EA hasn't seen the light and removed DRM and Origin integration."
Dunno. Their DRM stopped me buying their products years ago. Why don't you tell me?
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No it doesn't. Congratulations, wrong in one.
---No, your wrong. The idea of DRM is not to STOP piracy completely. It is to deter it for as long as possible. Therefore, DRM that keeps a cracked version from hitting the internet for even 2 days makes a HUGE difference in sales.
I for one will be buying the full version and enjoying the game while the rest of you "Wait for the crack" people will be sitting on your thumbs.
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I've been hearing this a lot recently. Does anyone have any stats to prove this, or is this just another one of those stories people tell themselves to feel "morally superior" to pirates, rather than actually buy something from a company that doesn't assume they're a thief?
I'd love to see some figures - especially some that compares the sales "rescued" from piracy vs. those who were going to buy a game but refused to participate in the DRM. Do those exist?
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Re: They do it for a reason. It works.
I would have trouble believing pirating has gotten more difficult for young kids since then.
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Re: Re: They do it for a reason. It works.
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Do what for a reason? DRM? And does it? Can you cite a reference where it does?
"Open your mind. Understand you don't have all the numbers."
My mind's already open. And what about you? Do you have these numbers to back you up?
"There are young kids who don't know how to pirate and will try to share the DVD."
Do you have any idea what that sentence means? I don't, but unless you're trying to say that a kid doesn't know how to download a program, you're an idiot. That's basic knowledge! I'm pretty sure that if you give a kid a computer and tell him to rip a video off YouTube, I'm sure he'll find a way to do that in seconds. There's your "pirating."
"This will stop them."
Ha-ha, that's funny.
"Reddit is the tiny, tiny, vocal minority."
HAHAHAHAHA... You're an idiot.
"Do you know Diablo 3 sold over 8 million copies and has always online DRM that couldn't be cracked?"
And why should I care? If you're trying to sell me the game, that isn't working...
"It works."
[citation needed]
If you don't have anything to say, then get off the computer. You lost your ability to speak.
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Response to: Anonymous Coward on Dec 17th, 2012 @ 2:17pm
Simcity= $60.00
You pay 60 dollars to get a portion of a product.
When you buy a Big Mac meal are you forced to go online to get the fries.
Point is you should not be forced to have internet to enjoy something that is purchased. The internet is a haven for fraud.
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Boycott
And by boycott, I also include pirating the same products. I refuse to even pirate it because I don't want to give them any more reason to claim "piracy". There are plenty of decent games out there to buy at good prices that aren't full of DRM and/or Online only requirements.
Also, I refuse to use that crapware EA is pushing as a competitor to Steam.
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Re: Boycott
Congratulations.
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Re: Re: Boycott
Congratulations, no one cares about you!
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Not only that there's going to be some serious backlash when the huge majority of fans find out. In fact I almost guarantee this will hurt sales.
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Who cares about DRM...
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Re: Who cares about DRM...
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Re: Who cares about DRM...
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Me thinks thou art the TURD in the punch bowl... OUT OUT FOUL... SPOT AWAY WITH THEE.
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Stupid article is stupid
I have no disagreement that always online is a stupid idea, but here we have another Steam fanboy writing an article. How did you get your job?
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Re: Stupid article is stupid
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Re: Stupid article is stupid
CTRL F - steam - not found in articles, only comments. No words from the author to either support or detract from Steam. No mention of it whatsoever.
So, is this where you tell us what Steam has to do with the article, or are you just a dumb fanboy who assumes that someone who dislikes one service must be a fan of the other?
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Re: Re: Stupid article is stupid
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Origin is Horrible
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Beyond DRM and piracy
Right now I just buy the stuff that doesn't stuff me around. The rest can rot.
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Re: Beyond DRM and piracy
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Piracy
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Been meaning to rant on this for a while
The "cities" are about a 20th of the scale of the current suburb I live in, and about 1/100000th of the greater metropolitan area. It's more like Sim Block than Sim City.
It's lacking basic transport features and genuine modability which kept the previous game alive. Modding has obviously been subverted in favor of DLC and is going to be restricted to make nice looking houses. You'll have to pay for anything useful.
Because you're now part of an online region with other players, your city is dependent on how they manage their city, so expect lots of griefers and penisvilles. It also means you have no terraforming functionality, which has been a core part of the game since it's inception for reasons that should be obvious.
Frankly, the game is destined to fail, and good riddance. The game design was obviously cooked up by a marketing department. I shake my head in disbelief when their developers enthuse about features that are nothing more than incentives not to buy.
Whoever ends up buying this game has rocks in their head.
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That was fast.
Have to make an account for single player and be online?
Give me a break, instant no sale, plus added resentment and disappointment that I will certainly share with my peers.
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A bit on the slow side, aren't we?
It was known at that time that it would be only on-line, through Origin or OnLive, and DRM'd to death.
Where the hell has everyone been? Out to lunch?
Nothing new here to see..or read. I gave up on this game a long time ago.
EA is going to put it up as they want, and to hell with everyone's opinion. It makes them money, ok?
They don't care in the least about a minority of people who are bitching about their DRM or on-line requirements.
They have plenty of sheeple in the pipeline that don't care.
That's all they need-the people who pay them money to be suckered.
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Originally they actually stated that the online check would only happen when you start the game and you would be able to play offline for an indefinite time if disconnected. I guess plans change. If they store everything server-side, it may mean the game will never be cracked :(
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The internet isn't ready
I play games on the tube, trains, on holiday without wifi and many other places where I don't have internet access.
Some of the most successful gaming devices of the past few years (iPhone/iPad), don't require an internet connection to work, neither do the major consoles. Why should be users be forced into this? Haven't they heard of laptops?
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Re: The internet isn't ready
Eventually, these problems mount up and it's not worth buying at all. One of the few ways to get the message across is to do just that, except they usually ignore such messages in favour of "sales dropped so we need more DRM because piracy!".
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The internet isn't ready
I play games on the tube, trains, on holiday without wifi and many other places where I don't have internet access.
Some of the most successful gaming devices of the past few years (iPhone/iPad), don't require an internet connection to work, neither do the major consoles. Why should be users be forced into this? Haven't they heard of laptops?
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Love SimCity series to bits and this state saddens me. No not the Origin part. i have it and it's um... 'fine'. But the cloud game saving part? thats classic 'cloud done wrong' again. Like that mouse manufacturer who charged 100 bucks for a 'plug & play' mouse.
It's enough that Cities XL is crippled. Wont waste money on this garbage until this is un-crippled like they atleast tried with Cities XL. Which ended in limbo anyway due to stupid stupid ideas being too hard to overcome.
Seems to me Sim-games are heading the way of X-Com: Companies try to 'improve' the basic formula and completely waste the game in the process.
Cya in 10 years. maybe then there will be a good sim-game. I hope i'm just talking here...
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Re:
EA aren't going to do that, since they have Sim City Social on Facebook, and the full blown game isn't going to be filled with pointless grinding tasks like that is. Judging by some of the annoying design decisions they've made for the transparently obvious reason of annoying people until they pay money, that's not a bad thing.
But I agree, if the game had an accessible offline single player component, or was designed as a multiplayer only experience, there would be few complaints. Expect people to pay full price then restrict when, where and how they can play the game? That's asking for trouble.
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Pinstar
That screams "Disabled functionality to sell DLC". The developers, to make the main region, HAD to have some sort of tools to create the terrain. With a little cleanup, those same tools could be put into the game in a manor that average users could make it.
The ONLY reason I can see why they don't put region editing in the game is that they intend to sell new regions as DLC...something that NOBODY will buy if people can just make their own regions to their liking.
Hiding behind the "Everyone has to play the same region for networking to work" doesn't hold up, since you could do the same thing by sharing the same user-created region between players if you wanted to do a multiplayer game in a custom region.
We are about 3-4 DLC packs away from returning to Sim City 4 functionality... if they even bother to give us back a terrain editor at all.
Oh and that's Base Simcity 4... if you count all the mods that the open nature of SimCity 4 allowed, I don't think this SimCity will ever get close.
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Misinformed
I don't have a single game in my steam library that requires me to have a connection with steam servers. But I do have one ubisoft game that requires me to be logged into uplay which I no longer use.
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Re: Misinformed
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Re:
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DRM's money
"I will pay to play for as long as you can preserve your online game servers. This will most likely be minutes. Then I will expect a full refund of my 'licensed' cash (license terms on cash state that cash is only available while game is available... so when my game goes down, you give my cash back... got it).
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DRM
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NO WAY!
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SimCityReloaded.com
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not listening
I am perfectly satisfied with SC4, even if it CTDs once a day.
The lack of SUBWAYS and REAL HIGHWAYS is the biggest let down for me. I have purchased every single SimCity core pack and addon since SimCity2000, even doing my first building mods with the Urban Renewal Kit.
I wonder if the developers have truly been listening to the SimCity community. Yes, I will admit, multiplayer is an option that does appeal to me, but so do SUBWAYS and REAL HIGHWAYS. Even more so, my true love of the game concerns neighborhood deals and neighborhood commuting. What concerns me most is the unrealistic direction this reboot is steering the franchise.
The core of any good game is the actual game play. Graphics are just eyecandy, and should only be used as icing on an already moist Velvet cake.
My decision may be a bit premature, but until I see some more actual game play, or even BETA TEST, I think my decision stands. SC4 for Life.
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Re: not listening
It's a very small area to build in, with many limitations. Like a child playing in a sandbox that can't be designed. No map editing or creation like in simcity 4.
It's been simplified so that 10 year olds can play: it reminded me of City Life where I had to make sure certain types of people had certain types of jobs near their house. It's about the people more than building.
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The thing is, if I had pirated Spore instead of paid for it I would have had the game sooner and would have had a fully functional DRM-free version. I then asked them if I could just download a pirated version of the game I paid for since, you know, I paid for it. Ironically, they consider that to be identical to piracy. You'd think they would appreciate someone who likes to support the developers, you know?
So why should I pay for something even less functional like their new SimCity? I wouldn't touch that game with a 39 and a half foot pole.
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all of you....
EA sucks balls
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Suggestions for games unencumbered by DRM & online requirements?
My three home machines are kept at a rather high level so they should run anything suggested well enough. But I love to tinker with the machines, and I perform some sort of upgrade on all of them at least every year, so most any kind of machine hash-check would turn into a real pain.
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Can anyone suggest good games unencumbered by DRM & online requirements?
My three home machines are kept at a rather high level so they should run anything suggested well enough. But I love to tinker with the machines, and I perform some sort of upgrade on all of them at least every year, so most any kind of machine hash-check would turn into a real pain.
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Have you thought
All of you say you are going to wait and pirate it, but in doing so, you are destroying the very thing you are trying to get.
I doubt that pirates are going to successfully disable the online only portions. The game has been designed around that factor. To remove it would be like removing the processor from your computer...it wont be worth shit.
stop the sniveling, buy the game, enjoy the game. Enjoy the fact that it wasn't designed for Xbox/ps3 first then ported over to PC, which it very well could have been.
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Re: Have you thought
What about those of us who say they would have bought it, but the online only requirement makes it unusable or too restricted for the asking price? If I wanted a restricted Sim City I'll only play online, I'll play the free Facebook game. Needing to be online doesn't help me play the game on a bus, plane or make me suddenly want to blow craploads more money on hotel wifi just because I had the audacity to wish to play a game I own while travelling. I'll stick to what I already have, thanks - legally purchased.
"stop the sniveling, buy the game, enjoy the game."
No. I'll refuse to buy it, buy from a competitor and await to see which dumbass scheme EA will try that makes the game worse and less attractive to potential buyers, all the time blaming "piracy".
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nope
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I Concure
It seems that EA is TRYING to lose paying customers.
Drop the internet requirement, non-hard drive saves and the optical drive destroying software (EA games with DRM have broke two of my optical drives just by installing their games) or I will not buy this game.
I have played beta and its ok on its own, but not with all the limitations EA is giving it.
If they don't put out a simple, single player game (like simcity 4 was) I won't even miss this game in my collection.
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It's a very simple child-focused game that may have complex programming (like EA Claims and I wouldn't doubt) but Building and designing gameplay is very simple compared to simcity 4.
I wouldn't doubt the work they put into the programming because I could follow the ambulance to each house picking up hurt people and other complex coding details. But the rest of the gameplay was so limited.
Now I only played beta for about 4 one-hour times, but it's their own demise to limit the beta so much because I will base whether or not I will buy the game off of the beta.
I was disappointed by the gameplay AND the DRM, online, cloud saves...SO definitely not buying this game.
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Multi Play without Multi Pay
Maybe if you provided a reasonable use model for families like the old days of "up to" licenses, you wouldn't have so much piracy in the first place. (and don't give me that techno bs of multiple access to accounts, etc. You're just being greedy.
SO I will vote with my wallet and now instead of $80 you get ZERO, NADA, NOTHING.
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Bad recipe, bad meal
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FAILED LAUNCH
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*sigh* the pain! Oh the paaain!
That way I will be able to service my self incase I run into any trouble with the game.
I will however also buy a copy of the game. But I dont want to be at the mercy of EA tech support.
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account . serei_vat
pssword : 090194ke
i want to give you hack my sabay coin can you help me?
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That way I will be able to service my self incase I run into any trouble with the game.
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Good
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The Last Word
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