EU release of SimCity officially bombs (who would have thunk it!)

[raankh]

More dissatisfied customers that will not be giving EA their money you say?

YAAAAY

They already gave them their money. That's why their called customers.

It's sad that EA haven't yet internalised the basics of their own business model (To paraphrase Mr. Young). They want to pull this always online shit, they need to have the infrastructure. It's onerous enough on the customer to force them to always have an internet connection of a certain grade, at the least there needs to be enough servers to run the shit. This shouldn't fly.

And, because band-wagons are comfy: OP: Bomb means it didn't sell. Not that it doesn't work. If a release bombs, it doesn't sell. This one sold, hence some of the errors.

Yes, that was already pointed out. I also responded by explaining that the expression has a different meaning locally where I am. To clarify, I'm bilingual since childhood but I speak International English rather than a primary English language or dialect. But sure, "bombed" in the British/American sense would be mistaken-- although it might from an other perspective be too early to tell.

I'll echo TotalBiscuit's sentiment that it seems like Maxis/EA have set this up as a DLC/microtransaction platform, so they're obviously expecting ALOT more revenue down the road. That might be very negatively impacted by this launch.

I can imagine that I would have put down another hundred dollars beyond the retail price if things had worked as advertised. I'm no longer looking to purchase anything more with regards to Sim City, since I don't trust the service or the product anymore. Three days after launch in Sim City I have played for a few hours during night time when the server load would be lightest, but I have nothing left of those cities since every save game is corrupted. I know I'm not unique in this regard.

Considering that I'm very much in the target demographic-- I have plenty of disposable income to spend on games, I'm generally forgiving with technical difficulties since I'm a software developer myself-- then this is a real problem for EA. Perhaps the angry gamers who hate EA with such passion are right and they just don't care. That just means EA are going to crash and burn sooner rather than later. You can't do business successfully like that, certainly not in today's market place where perception is everything. You can pull a heist or a scam and get rich quick like that, although you're giving up any future profits from the same source.

In the end, I guess I'm just finding it difficult to believe that a $5 bn enterprise can behave like such rank-and-file amateurs. How the hell did they get so rich? Or have monkeys in suits taken over somewhere along the road perhaps.

 

[Headdrivehardscrew]

Well, you just can't blame EA if you register different e-mail addresses from different countries.
They try to send you newsletters in your own language; it's you that have messed up with loads of different countries.

What did you expect them to do? Call you to sort it out and ask what language and email you prefer their newsletter delivered?
Come on.. You could have gone to each of your different accounts on EA and select to receive the newsletter only on one of your accounts.

Your way of thinking seems very backwards to me. EA has no say about where I reside, where I stay, how I move about. EA has no say about which company I want to register mail accounts with. EA should have no dictator-level rights on telling me what to consume and how to do it. Melonfarm that thought.

I first registered with EA way, way back. I always got my correspondence, targeted ads and whatnot in English, and I was happy with that. Then, eventually, they started to change it. I did not ask for that. I did not allow them to do that. They just did it. They region-locked me seemingly only on the base of the TLD of my mail addresses. I never said that I minded much receiving multiple copies of EA spam. Not sure where you got that idea from. My issue lies within the fact that EA has decided to geofence my customer accounts, not asking me about it and not giving me an option to receive the news and games I actually want. They just assumed they knew what I wanted, which I pretty much hate and can't stand and am not willing to put up with.

That's not very welcome or customer friendly, now, is it?

And, believe me, I put some effort into trying to get things 'fixed', as in back to what they were. I chatted with nice folks from India that, sadly, couldn't do nothing to help me. I exchanged mails with them. They couldn't do anything. I spent some time on the phone with them - nope, no can do.

We customer cattle are now more region locked than our DVDs. And, with EA, there's no way of unlocking things. I don't want to play that game.

So - for me, that's about as much as I need to kiss them goodbye on the bum cheeks and be on my merry way, throwing my money at someone else.

 

[Headdrivehardscrew]

@Toothsaw: You joined just to speak up for EA and the game itself in this thread?

Might you be one of the Chinese spammers that EA has allegedly hired?

Yeah, looks well fishy to me.

We customers just don't know what's good for us.

Silly us.

 

[IamLEAM1983]

So SimCity was actually a pretty good game until EA shat all over it?

That's good to know I guess.

You're being sarcastic and I can understand why, but it still is true. Structurally, this is a fun game. It's just a damn shame that it's intended as a launchpad for a steady stream of DLC and that it's coated in restrictive systems that are *themselves* touted as "social offerings".

Looking at it, you can tell there's a lot of SimCity 4 players tucked away in the dev team; but you're essentially right. Corporate more or less ordered Maxis to up the ante with à la carte content, because the traditional sixtyburger no longer cuts it.

 

[Loonyyy]

More dissatisfied customers that will not be giving EA their money you say?

YAAAAY

They already gave them their money. That's why their called customers.

It's sad that EA haven't yet internalised the basics of their own business model (To paraphrase Mr. Young). They want to pull this always online shit, they need to have the infrastructure. It's onerous enough on the customer to force them to always have an internet connection of a certain grade, at the least there needs to be enough servers to run the shit. This shouldn't fly.

And, because band-wagons are comfy: OP: Bomb means it didn't sell. Not that it doesn't work. If a release bombs, it doesn't sell. This one sold, hence some of the errors.

Yes, that was already pointed out. I also responded by explaining that the expression has a different meaning locally where I am. To clarify, I'm bilingual since childhood but I speak International English rather than a primary English language or dialect. But sure, "bombed" in the British/American sense would be mistaken-- although it might from an other perspective be too early to tell.

Yeah, to be fair I was jumping on a bandwagon, but I don't know (Having not tried) whether you can change thread titles.

And, if it were too early to tell whether it had bombed, to call it bombed would be unjustified.

I'll echo TotalBiscuit's sentiment that it seems like Maxis/EA have set this up as a DLC/microtransaction platform, so they're obviously expecting ALOT more revenue down the road. That might be very negatively impacted by this launch.

I don't know. I don't watch TotalBiscuit, but from what I know of the latest Sims, that seems rather likely. I don't know whether it would be negatively impacted. Considering they sold it at full price I strongly doubt their margins will be effected, and what they gain will be a bonus.

I can imagine that I would have put down another hundred dollars beyond the retail price if things had worked as advertised.

Yikes. I don't even want to put that down for a full regular game. $100 extra just for a game to work? I'm of the opinion that they should be liable for this. If their software don't run, they should be compensating users for both their purchase and their time. I work in the service industry, and if a customer is unsatisfied, we offer replacements or refunds. We damned sure don't say that they deserve a useless product because the purchase history says so.

I'm no longer looking to purchase anything more with regards to Sim City, since I don't trust the service or the product anymore. Three days after launch in Sim City I have played for a few hours during night time when the server load would be lightest, but I have nothing left of those cities since every save game is corrupted. I know I'm not unique in this regard.

Yeah, it's a tragic problem. I'm not up to date of the specifics of their DRM system, but I think it's probably due to their save system being off site.

Considering that I'm very much in the target demographic-- I have plenty of disposable income to spend on games, I'm generally forgiving with technical difficulties since I'm a software developer myself-- then this is a real problem for EA. Perhaps the angry gamers who hate EA with such passion are right and they just don't care.

Oh, EA care. The problem is, the people who care don't know what they're doing. This DRM doesn't help them in the slightest. I'm sure it'll be pirated eventually, and such a version would be superior in every way. Their system just makes their game crappier.

That just means EA are going to crash and burn sooner rather than later. You can't do business successfully like that, certainly not in today's market place where perception is everything. You can pull a heist or a scam and get rich quick like that, although you're giving up any future profits from the same source.

Indeed, I think that's one of the big problems. EA are sacrificing goodwill and quality for a quick buck. Not a good strategy.

In the end, I guess I'm just finding it difficult to believe that a $5 bn enterprise can behave like such rank-and-file amateurs. How the hell did they get so rich? Or have monkeys in suits taken over somewhere along the road perhaps.

I'm inclined to think it's the suits. The suits say "80% of players didn't pay for the game. We need to fix this. We'll put this software in, which will make it harder to get without paying (Without understanding the software, or cracking), and make our game worse for the customer, even compared to the cracked version.'

I really hope it isn't actual software engineers making these mistakes.

 

[Shadow-Phoenix]

Take that Draec. I told him that I hope he gets stuck waiting. Where is he now? He just stopped posting all of a sudden.

I'm sure they will get it running soon though, but who really knows? Go play another game in the mean time. One without DRM of course.

Out os pure irony he got banned for calling you a troll on that last Sim city thread a week or two ago and pretty much deserved it seeing as how he kept calling ad hominem,Troll and strawman to every argument he saw that he couldn't win and it seems he finally paid the price.

OT: I was really wanting to get this game but until the DRM vanishes and we can play truly offline then EA is just going to fail even harder at this point.

 

[Charli]

As much as I love Sim City I am still on my 6 year long EA boycott. Seems to be serving me well enough. Just disappointed that more around me aren't sticking to their guns.

 

[Aikayai]

Actually, Maxis' compensation is likely not fully settled. I recall news coming out a while ago that Obsidian missed a major performance incentive because their final Metacritic score was 84, one point short of the target of 85 (while you may not put much stock in Metacritic, for publishers the thing's basically treated like an oracle). Many devs likely have similar contracts, even fully-owned ones like Maxis.

So does that mean when the game fails, Maxis get the boot and/or don't get paid? Is that even legal?

 

[Jiefu]

Actually, Maxis' compensation is likely not fully settled. I recall news coming out a while ago that Obsidian missed a major performance incentive because their final Metacritic score was 84, one point short of the target of 85 (while you may not put much stock in Metacritic, for publishers the thing's basically treated like an oracle). Many devs likely have similar contracts, even fully-owned ones like Maxis.

So does that mean when the game fails, Maxis get the boot and/or don't get paid? Is that even legal?

Nah, it's just possible they won't get paid as much. They're not going to get fired/go unpaid (EA's run by jerks, but they're not some fly-by-night game mill), although some people might end up fired (the launch was severely botched, after all).

 

[raankh]

As much as I love Sim City I am still on my 6 year long EA boycott. Seems to be serving me well enough. Just disappointed that more around me aren't sticking to their guns.

Just out of curiosity, what happened 6 years ago that became the last straw? I haven't really had this kind of serious problem with anything not Bethesda before.

 

[Atmos Duality]

We'd all love that, but the triple-A industry is under the delusion that it's them or the commie pinko thieving pirates.

It will take several back to back failures on the part of the Publishers to realize that the tradeoffs of Always Online DRM and making every bloody game multiplayer-centric will eventually outstrip the benefits of more customers.

Diablo 3's population utterly tanked after the initial success; for most, the "best selling PC game of all time" wasn't even worth 3 weeks and rightly so. I hope SimCity falls off even faster than that, so we can be rid of these farcical money-grabs more quickly.

 

[shintakie10]

I'm not sure whats more surprisin. That the Simcity failed launch is still goin on for people.

Or that people in the the EU, with plenty of advanced warnin that this garbage was goin on and would still be goin on when it launched in their region still bought the game on launch day and complained about it.

Brain, boggled.

 

[raankh]

[snip]
I don't know. I don't watch TotalBiscuit, but from what I know of the latest Sims, that seems rather likely. I don't know whether it would be negatively impacted. Considering they sold it at full price I strongly doubt their margins will be effected, and what they gain will be a bonus.

Well, market capitalism, especially in the entertainment industry, is based on projected earnings. They even factor in unlicensed material as lost revenue (ie outright piracy, unlicensed posters etc). The projected earnings from the DLC is definitely a part of the equation, especially to investors. If they under-perform, they're going to take a hit.

Yikes. I don't even want to put that down for a full regular game. $100 extra just for a game to work? I'm of the opinion that they should be liable for this. If their software don't run, they should be compensating users for both their purchase and their time. I work in the service industry, and if a customer is unsatisfied, we offer replacements or refunds. We damned sure don't say that they deserve a useless product because the purchase history says so.

Ah, I meant that I would have spent another $100 if the game had worked, not to get it working. I do spend a bit on gaming, but far, far from what MOBA players spend.... Currently I'm spending $400/y on games, which is part of my overall PC budget year over year. With a solid game and good DLC, I'd be willing to give up buying three or four other games. Would have been, rather.

Yeah, it's a tragic problem. I'm not up to date of the specifics of their DRM system, but I think it's probably due to their save system being off site.

Whatever the case, it's obvious that other systems-- even always-online systems-- have manged, so it's clearly due to bad design or implementation. A bunch of people are having a veeery bad week at work, that's for sure.

[snip]
I'm inclined to think it's the suits. The suits say "80% of players didn't pay for the game. We need to fix this. We'll put this software in, which will make it harder to get without paying (Without understanding the software, or cracking), and make our game worse for the customer, even compared to the cracked version.'

I really hope it isn't actual software engineers making these mistakes.

Speaking as a professional software developer, as the one who is actually doing the work and implementing it all, it's your duty to tell your managers, hell even the CEO if you have to, that it won't work. Of course, that's not easy to own up to, since you might very well get fired for it. It's still the right thing to do. Otherwise, it's your own name that gets tarnished. I have left jobs because of that and been very honest about it at the next interview. One well paying job with a rather high profile in the power utility sector, even. Software developers have work ethics just like every craftsman. To make it current; "Who in their right mind would hire the release engineer for SimCity?!"

 

[snowbear]

I would just like to put it out there that ive had no problems so far. logged in at first attempt and am already working on building the second city up in my region.

But i will say the city sizes are WAY WAY too small cant have it all i suppose

 

[Epic Fail 1977]

The reason why Simcity (or Diablo 3) had terrible launches, was not the fact that those giant corporations were OMG-SURPRISED! by the number of people trying to log in on launch. They weren't. They just don't care. Addind server capacity is extremely expensive, and for a game that has no subscription, and whose number of active players will plateau quite heavily within the following month, there is no reason for them to do it. There is no reason to spend some money to prepare you launch day for 2 million logins, when only 30,000 of those will actually be playing concurrently in a few days.

This is your answer right here, OP.

 

[RicoADF]

I'm not sure whats more surprisin. That the Simcity failed launch is still goin on for people.

Or that people in the the EU, with plenty of advanced warnin that this garbage was goin on and would still be goin on when it launched in their region still bought the game on launch day and complained about it.

Brain, boggled.

People in the EU figured that the issues would be fixed by then, and with better consumer laws that require a refund in this case the risk was low.

 

[Cecilo]

Cough. Double Post.