Together, players will address real global challenges such as climate change, the search for renewable resources and natural disasters.
Tags: the loading bar, korey, videogame, podcast, spill, spill.com, simcity, ea
March 17, 2013 at 3:44 PM, Michael Stiver-Balla said ...
I am under the (probably 100% true) belief that this game started off as a free-to-play spinoff sequel, but late in the development cycle EA slapped the name 'SimCity' on it to move retail copies at full price.Then the f2p nature will start generating cash by selling expansions, unique buildings and larger regions (all bought through their store) while in a single DRM filled stroke, killing the mod community that always springs up around these games.
Make no mistake, this is NOT as SimCity game, it is a slightly updated version of SimCity Societies. A veritable SimVille. It lacks longevity, depth and stifles creativity.
Right now a 100% offline mod has been created (to circumvent all DRM), and the community is working on emulating the server region usage to allow the full feature set offline.
What does this tell you? The server-side computation is complete bullshit. All simulation and agent computation happens client side (i.e. Everything is done by your computer), the only thing that the server does is compute the region play trading, which is only useful for multiplayer anyways. There is no reason this game does not have an offline single play mode, other than EA trying to completely fuck you. And they are getting away with it.
By buying this game, you are telling the industry that you will buy any game filled with the most reprehensible anti-consumer policies in existence. So in 10 years when you are paying 1$ for ever minute of gameplay in SimCity 6 or some crazy nonsense, it all started here.
March 15, 2013 at 11:42 PM, Sean McSorley said ...
What if they made a new SimCity game for the WiiU with the return of Dr. Wright?
March 15, 2013 at 4:42 PM, said ...
Spend $4 THIS WEEKEND ONLY and get this game instead:
http://www.gog.com/gamecard/capitalism_2
March 15, 2013 at 1:35 PM, said ...
Professor Jeff!!!
You should check this out!!!!
http://sourcefednews.com/modder-proves-sim-city-is-playable-offline/
March 15, 2013 at 8:02 AM, said ...
March 15, 2013 at 4:40 AM, Jason Straub said ...
EA's handling of this game so far has been, for lack of a better word, reprehensible. I might consider picking this up if they had done the right thing by their customers: giving refunds to those who asked, working day and night to get the servers working, and patching the game to remove the always online requirement that nobody asked for and ended up being the Achilles' heel of the whole damn project. Unfortunately, we as gamers often act like the stereotypical abused housewife and keep coming back to these publishers despite how much we cry about it. Diablo III did start this, it was terrible there, and that was the first and last game that I plan on supporting with that "feature."
March 15, 2013 at 2:48 AM, said ...
So since you guys have reviewed the gateway boring game, do I have any hope of you all playing EU IV when its released this year?
March 15, 2013 at 12:06 AM, John said ...
I think the game is fun, problems aside. Still the fact that online is NOT needed and there being a video out there of a modder who was playing the game offline (longer than 20 minutes) proved it says a lot. Not to mention a Maxis rep saying it's not needed. Then EA saying that peoples PC's can't handle the stress (trying to take fault away from themselves) makes it look that they don't seem to care.
It's ridiculous just how horrible they can be. Their only concern seems to be getting your money and then trying to put fault on the consumer when things don't work right.
Like others have said vote for change with your wallet. Don't buy anything from them until they realize people won't take their BS any longer.
March 14, 2013 at 10:16 PM, said ...
Online Only was an EA $$$ choice for DRM and micro-transactions. They purposed handcuffed this game to have excuses for why the game had to be online. The previous games, you could build MASSIVE cities instead of the tiny ones here that force you to rely on other areas of the map to help you out. This is marketing driven design to the dollar bullshit that if you buy this game, you are helping to validate these abusive decisions. Yes, video games are a business, so is lots of shit, but you learn to not deal with fuckers who are shady. The development team should be pissed that marketing forced them to make a crap game.
March 14, 2013 at 10:16 PM, Witherspoonfan said ...
@Hicks. He doesn't hate the movie. If he did, he wouldn't have made that reference.
March 14, 2013 at 9:53 PM, said ...
@Jeff - I believe a Mod came out today that places in an Offline Mode, so that might be worth checking out. ;)
March 14, 2013 at 9:06 PM, said ...
This controversy is a PR nightmare.
March 14, 2013 at 6:55 PM, Mr. Bubbles said ...
The gameplay itself looks alright, but I can't imagine ever paying a cent for this. Maxis/EA crippled their own game so they could implement unnecessary DRM and likely microtransactions (want more space? $5.00, please!). We seem to learn more about the sheer amount of bullshit they've been claiming with every passing day. They claimed that offline wasn't possible without major re-engineering of the game. Not only did a source at Maxis reveal that this was untrue, but the game has already been modded to allow offline play. I give it a month at most before a fully-modded offline version with local save functionality is floating around torrent sites.
What could have been a great game was completely fucked by EA's greed.
March 14, 2013 at 6:45 PM, said ...
Jeff made a Dark Knight reference? I thought he hated that movie?
March 14, 2013 at 6:37 PM, said ...
March 14, 2013 at 6:28 PM, said ...
Ah man so many people disagree with your first comment the fact that thousands of people couldn't play a single player game on day 1 because of DRM screwed it.
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