EA 'Embraces' SimCity Players: Releases Useless Modding Tools And Promises Supposedly Impossible 'Offline' Mode
from the maybe-we're-just-not-hated-ENOUGH dept
EA/Maxis is reviving memories of its epicly disastrous release of SimCity back in March with a couple of announcements. The first announcement is EA's awkward attempt to embrace its community like an ex-husband trying to coax a hug out of his estranged wife during supervised child visitation.
Modders, EA wants YOU to start cranking out some compelling content for SimCity. Here's EA's lead-in:
Maxis and Electronic Arts (“EA”) have a long tradition of supporting the creativity of our community. We’re so excited to see the new ground many of you are breaking with SimCity Modding that we wanted to do something that would make it easier for you to continue to create amazing stuff. We’re putting this policy in place to ensure that our guidelines on Modding are clear and that all of our players get to enjoy SimCity their own way while also maintaining the safety and integrity of the SimCity experience. What comes next is up to you, our players. We hope the SimCity Modding community continues to grow and we’re looking forward to seeing what you create.Sounds exciting. What can modders do exactly with EA's tools? Game Politics breaks it down… to a single sentence.
According to EA's guidelines the community is basically limited to cosmetic changes, such as reskins of buildings.That noise you heard was any remaining enthusiasm being sucked out of the room. Alright, what can't modders do?
1. Mods must not jeopardize the integrity of the gameplay or harm the experience of others. Mods that affect the simulation for multiplayer games and multiplayer features, such as leaderboards or trading with other players, are not allowed.
2. Mods must not infringe any copyright, trademark, patent, trade secret or other intellectual property right of any third party and will not include content that is unlawful, tortious, defamatory, obscene, invasive of the privacy of another person, threatening, harassing, abusive, hateful, racist or otherwise objectionable or inappropriate. SimCity has an age rating of ESRB Everyone 10+ and PEGI 7, and similar ratings from other ratings boards around the world. EA requires that Mods not include any material that would not be allowed under these ratings.
3. Mods may not modify any .com, .exe, .dll, .so or other executable files.
The terms and conditions of SimCity EULA and EA’s Terms of Service are specifically incorporated into this policy by this reference. In the event that the terms of this policy are in conflict with the terms of the SimCity EULA or EA’s Terms of Service, the terms of this Policy shall supersede and govern over any such conflicting terms.
To maintain the integrity of SimCity and ensure the best possible gaming experience for our players, EA reserves the right, in its sole discretion, to revoke permission to use, distribute or make Mods at any time, to disable any Mod within SimCity and to take disciplinary action against players who harm the experience of others.It's just as bad as everyone expected it would be when the first draft of the modding guidelines indicated EA's resistance to "game-changing" elements. The final wording basically states that any mod worth playing will be either a) impossible or b) forbidden. So much for "supporting the creativity of the community." And if some modder should create a particularly crafty building skin, EA retains the right to take credit for the modder's work.
Distribution of your Mod in any form constitutes a grant by you to EA of an irrevocable, perpetual, royalty-free, sub-licensable right to use, copy, modify and distribute that Mod (and derivatives of that Mod), and use your name if we choose to, for any purpose and through any means, and without obligation to pay you anything, obtain your approval, or give you credit. You also agree to promptly execute assignments confirming this license upon request from EA.So, there's that. EA says mod to your heart's content... but hope that your heart is very easily satisfied.
EA's not quite done abusing its community. First, it gave them crude tools and hefty limitations and invited them to repaint a couple of things. Then, three days later, it made the following announcement in order to further insult the intelligence of its customers.
Let's get right to it.FOR REAL? You mean the "offline mode" that someone not employed by EA/Maxis accomplished within a week of the game being released? The impossibility of an offline mode (at least according to PR (who claimed EA's servers performed necessary gameplay calculations) turned out to be not only a complete lie but taking the game offline (via the debug mode) actually made the game better.
SIMCITY OFFLINE IS COMING!
I';ve wanted to say those words for quite some time, so my apologies that I didn't take the time to say Happy New Year first.
Yes, Offline is coming as a free download with Update 10 to all SimCity players. When we launch it, all of your previously downloaded content will be available to you anytime, anywhere, without the need for an internet connection. We are in the late phases of wrapping up its development and while we want to get it into your hands as soon as possible, our priority is to make sure that it’s as polished as possible before we release it.
In fact, it actually improves the game in some ways. City populations are actually tracked correctly and you can edit outside of your city boundaries. Those additional edits are also saved when you reconnect.We can be fairly sure EA's "Offline Mode," despite being released nine months after the unofficial version, won't contain these improvements. It will be the same SimCity except with months of extraneous software engineering thrown in. And it looks as if EA has finally cracked the "Save to..." code.
[B]ecause your saved games in this mode are stored locally, you can save and load to your heart’s content. Our team will be delivering a follow-up blog that will outline the full details in the near future so stay tuned.Fascinating. I'm really looking forward to the blog post detailing the intricacies of saving to local storage. Sure, it seems like the sort of basic thing that thousands of pieces of software have done for several decades, but I'm sure the EA/Maxis spin team has a new angle I haven't considered.
Then there's this mysterious statement which doesn't seem to cohere with the modding announcement made three days earlier.
Bringing the game Offline means big things for our wonderful community of Modders. They can now make modifications to the game and its components without compromising the integrity of the Online game.Yes, while Offline-only mods won't break the game as long as they're only used locally (another observation which ranks up there with the discovery of hard drives), those type of mods seem to be specifically forbidden by the modding ToS.
Mods must not jeopardize the integrity of the gameplay or harm the experience of others.And this:
Mods may not modify any .com, .exe, .dll, .so or other executable files.If these mods are never taken online, there's a good chance they'll never be discovered. However, the modding tools don't seem to allow for this sort of creativity. "Modifying the game and its components" seems limited to cosmetic changes. Bringing the game offline doesn't make the stunted tool set any more complete. For that matter, if modders just wanted to break the game offline, they'd been able to do so for months now.
Gamers and modders aren't going to be happy with EA's long-delayed "embrace" of its paying customers. Instead, they're going to feel like they're being talked down to by the same team that spent weeks lying about the "necessity" of an online-only game. If both the online requirements and the will-this-do modding tools are indicative of EA's future plans, more and more gamers are going to find better games (and companies) to support.
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Filed Under: drm, limits, modders, modding, offline mode, restrictions, simcity
Companies: ea
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I will celebrate!
It's been years since I played any version of SimCity, but I remember that 1) it's fun & 2) it STILL does not require to be online.
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Oh, joy! Games! -- Yet, hopeful sign of gamers beginning to object to their content being stolen by EA!
Meanwhile, EA/Maxis goes rolling along not noticing all this squawking, or if anything, pleased by it.
Visit Mike's other sites at least once a year, fanboys!
Have you clicked on it this year?
http://insightcommunity.com/
09:22:50[k-485-5]
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Re: Oh, joy! Games! -- Yet, hopeful sign of gamers beginning to object to their content being stolen by EA!
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Re: Oh, joy! Games! -- Yet, hopeful sign of gamers beginning to object to their content being stolen by EA!
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Re: Oh, joy! Games! -- Yet, hopeful sign of gamers beginning to object to their content being stolen by EA!
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Re: Re: Oh, joy! Games! -- Yet, hopeful sign of gamers beginning to object to their content being stolen by EA!
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EA fucked up big time.
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snort??
Giggle
CRY?
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No, no, and no..
I lost every single one of my accounts for charging back on Sim Shitty. I hate those sons of bitches with a passion and I hope the CEO gets raped by Martha Stewart.
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Proof is in
Our only hope are the alien modders, only they can set us free.
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Re: Proof is in
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EA "customers" are morons
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Re: EA "customers" are morons
You do realize, of course, that no company could exist without it's customers, right? Business practices, pricing, content availability, etc. are all determined by the willingness of individuals to choose. Companies are simply facilitators in this equation.
I'm sure that you fancy yourself an enlightened chap, so maybe think rationally before you post in the future, hmm?
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But... Well, I'm just going to quote it all, because you have to read this part at least twice before the full enormity of it sinks in.
Are you fucking kidding me?
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Re:
Let's pretend that a bunch of people individually create some great mods and let's say next Christmas, EA decides to release a "Best of 2014 SimCity Mod DLC". That clause up there would allow SimCity to take these mods and sell them like any other DLC for a price and not even have to so much as credit the mod authors, let alone pay them a cent. They could say in this hypothetical DLC that all of the mods were actually created by EA.
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How can they profit from mods that are available online for free (or they also prohibit uploading your own work for free to anywhere?)
Also, if that's what they want, that's what they got, and you have to roll with it but:
- WTF it means they can use your name?
- What's with the last sentence? If you create a mod, they can oblige you to do work for them uncredited and unpaid?
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Convenience. The mod may be available for free elsewhere, but that requires people knowing it's legally available elsewhere(because if they can claim to have made a mod, how do you tell what's fan-made and legally available for free, and what's an illegally uploaded copy of an 'official' mod?), knowing where to look, figuring out how to install it and get it to work, vs. 'Pay money, click link, mod installs'.
Regarding the last bit, if you're talking about this sentence 'You also agree to promptly execute assignments confirming this license upon request from EA' I believe it's 'just' making you legally bound to sign over any of your creations if they feel like claiming them, by signing any legal papers they send your way regarding such.
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I get that they don't want mods messing up the online game. Good luck to them policing third party sites for off-line playing though.
I'm a former Sims player, and user-made content (commonly called CC, for 'custom content') from third party sites is a huge deal, far expanding what comes with the game/s and the tools they contain for making your own stuff (mostly retexturing game objects, which included ingame utilities for sharing with other players registered on the official site). Play enough and you get tired of the same ol' same ol'; third partiers with some skills keep things interesting. EA seemed okay with this, keeps people buying the games and expansions.
Even modding sites, that offered gameplay alterations small and large or, bless 'em, FIXES for chronic issues never handled by EA are tolerated. Some third party stuff for those games gets not only quite complex, or even adult, but plenty cross over into what could technically be seen as trademark or copyright infringement. Toss in some sites charging for what they're doing (with EA code, with other people's materials) and a few years back it was quite a fooraw that EA never deigned to weigh in on - as long as they were selling games, they gave exactly zero fucks. Got quite ugly in the community, DDoS attacks, folks getting ripped off, false DMCAs...colossally stupid and damaging shit over game mods for shiny Sim hair.
[Must note that the most trustworthy third party fixers of the game gave those fixes away freely, maybe asked for a donation for site costs but never withheld from anyone. Those fixes kept me playing the games long after I would've dropped them out of boredom or aggravation.]
I think EA saw things like this, mostly these certain third partiers collecting a nice paycheck off of EA code with no kickback at all and started revamping their EULAs.
This verbiage is no surprise. All your creations using EA code, etc. is belong to them.
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We can't be bothered to make anymore DLCs so we'll let you do all the work so we can take it, profit off it and claim all the credit.
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Ubisoft is another I will never buy games from. No need to make statements nor token moves saying "we've changed". I simply won't believe them after all the bad customer references I've read over the years.
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Cant wait until they release sims4. Its hard to imagine how could they fuck things up even more but i expect the best from EA.
And im stocked up on popcorn.
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I was planning to buy Alice: Madness Returns, but then I learned that it needs to be "activated". They can take that crap and shove it up their asses. If I buy a game, I'd better be able to install it where, when and how I want without having to get someone else's permission to play it.
I'd download a pirated copy of it if I could find one that worked without making you jump through a dozen hoops to play it.
Maybe it'll eventually show up on GOG...
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Not buying Dragon Age 3...
I mean, each of those individually wasn't enough... buuut...
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Re: Not buying Dragon Age 3...
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Re: Re: Not buying Dragon Age 3...
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Re: Re: Re: Not buying Dragon Age 3...
The opening mission with the invasion of Earth is one of the most impressive sights I've seen in a computer game. I also spent a long time playing the multiplayer, although it was rather limited.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Not buying Dragon Age 3...
I don't know whether I like the ending or not since I never came that far. I preferred to save my braincells further atrocities about halfway in.
you've got to admit the rest of the game was pretty damn good. Not as good as ME2 sure but very good nonetheless.
ME2 had some good pieces drowned by the abysmal main plot, but 3 had absolutely no redeeming qualities.
It features no player agency, it ignores your choices and it tries to force you to watch a shitty movie with idiotic setpieces, horrible cutscenes, and a retarded story, by making you click buttons. Wait...
The opening mission with the invasion of Earth is one of the most impressive sights I've seen in a computer game.
You liked that crap?
I also spent a long time playing the multiplayer, although it was rather limited.
Oo yeah, mandatory(?) multiplayer, affecting the singleplayer campaign. How couldn't I like that...
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Well, R. Daneel Olivaw, I guess it depends on how you came to the series:
If you come from the PC RPG crowd the the game is shit, and just another evidence that bioware is dead
If however you come from the CoD crowd bioEA tries to cater to now, you will probably lack the cerebral capabilities to see the flaws inherent in it, so you can drool all over your controler while watching teh awsum spess marine walkin trough cinematics that make Micheal Bay look like Shakespeare.
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Devil's advocate post
Allowing modders to create offline-only mods could allow for gameplay changes while still following those rules.
All of this requires a lot more foresight and respect for their customers than EA has demonstrated to date, so I'm not hoping for much, but their blog post about offline play does suggest that offline mods can be more extensive than online mods.
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That's not the kind of gaming experience, or treatment as a customer, I'm looking for.
Don't even get me started on the DLC gouging. Selling games with half the content locked, causing the game's price to be doubled if you want the rest of the game unlocked.
There's a reason EA has received the Golden Poo Award for 2 years strait. They look on track to receive it this year too. That'll make 3 years in a row.
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Just check out The sims x series, with the multiplier around 10x with the EPs and dlcs (not including micro transactions)
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What this says to me...
In other words...everything was designed to look like it was being uploaded and downloaded to EA's servers...when it was really squirreled away on your computer...So what that means the "Always Online" bullshit was just exactly that...bullshit/DRM.
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Fascinating to see this
Then they expect them to come rushing back, although with both hands tied behind their backs and legal threats abounding?
How stupid is EA, anyway? Oh, wait. They're beyond stupid.
Extremely Asinine.
Oh, by the way, all the content one uploads to EA for the game is not yours ever again. Don't even bother to try to claim ownership. EA owns it, now and forever.
It doesn't matter now what they do with the game. It's a loss, and an embarrassment to the gaming community. They should just shut up while they have both feet in their mouths.
Otherwise, it just makes them look greedy and stupid at the same time.
Meanwhile, I'll happily play SC4.
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Here's me hoping at least they drove a good chunk of those clueless gamers away with this.
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The most obvious answer is the Rachnii mission.
Remember in ME1 where you ran into the last rachni Queen in existence because the Krogan had killed them all?
Well if you let the queen live they come back in control of the reapers?
Well guess what, if you kill the queen the reapers dig up another random rachni queen and you have to fight them anyway!
That, combined with the "push button get ending" is the real reason ME3 was garbage. It isn't the fact it didn't live up to its own promise, its that it outright obviously didn't even try.
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Man, Screw That Mess
I haven't touched it since, and I am now done with any SIM game of any sort.
I'll just keep playing WoW. At least they are starting to do a little bit of that kinda thing (even if it's not as much customization as I want, yet. With Ghostcrawler out of the picture, maybe we can get some more of that type of thing built in now.)
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