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[Freki]

I hate to disturb you when you’re playing SimCity, but I’d like to offer some straight answers on the topic: Always-Connected and why SimCity is not an offline experience.

Always-Connected is a big change from SimCities of the past. It didn’t come down as an order from corporate and it isn’t a clandestine strategy to control players. It’s fundamental to the vision we had for this SimCity. From the ground up, we designed this game with multiplayer in mind – using new technology to realize a vision of players connected in regions to create a SimCity that captured the dynamism of the world we live in; a global, ever-changing, social world.

We put a ton of effort into making our simulation and graphics engines more detailed than ever and to give players lively and responsive cities. We also made innovative use of servers to move aspects of the simulation into the cloud to support region play and social features. Here’s just a few:

We keep the simulation state of the region up to date for all players. Even when playing solo, this keeps the interactions between cities up to date in a shared view of the world.
Players who want to reach the peak of each specialization can count on surrounding cities to provide services or resources, even workers. As other players build, your city can draw on their resources.
Our Great Works rely on contributions from multiple cities in a region. Connected services keep each player’s contributions updated and the progression on Great Works moving ahead.
All of our social world features - world challenges, world events, world leaderboards and world achievements - use our servers to update the status of all cities.
Our servers handle gifts between players.
We’ve created a dynamic supply and demand model for trading by keeping a Global Market updated with changing demands on key resources.
We update each city’s visual representation as well. If you visit another player’s city, you’ll see the most up to date visual status.
We even check to make sure that all the cities saved are legit, so that the region play, leaderboards, challenges and achievements rewards and status have integrity.

Cloud-based saves and easy access from any computer are another advantage of our connected features. You can pop from work to home, play the game and have your cities available to you anywhere.

Almost all of our players play with connected cities. But some chose to play alone – running the cities themselves. But whether they play solo or multiplayer, they are drawn to the connected city experience. And Always-Connected provides a platform for future social features that will play out over regions and servers.

The game we launched is only the beginning for us – it’s not final and it never will be. In many ways, we built an MMO.

So, could we have built a subset offline mode? Yes. But we rejected that idea because it didn’t fit with our vision. We did not focus on the “single city in isolation” that we have delivered in past SimCities. We recognize that there are fans – people who love the original SimCity – who want that. But we’re also hearing from thousands of people who are playing across regions, trading, communicating and loving the Always-Connected functionality. The SimCity we delivered captures the magic of its heritage but catches up with ever-improving technology.

So I’ll finish with another HUGE thanks to everyone who stuck with us through this launch. Hundreds of thousands are building and sharing cities online now. And what you’re creating just blows us away. SimCity is a special game, with a very special community of players, and we’re proud to be a part of it.

source

The tone alone annoys the fuck out of me and don't get me started on the content...

 

[Salsa]

I hate to disturb you when you’re playing SimCity

ROFL

 

[Trigger]

But I do want to play it offline.

 

[dinosaur_hunter2]

I laughed so much while reading this. I want to know where are all the "straight" answers she was talking about.

 

[dr3upmushroom]

WE Tell You How To Play Games!™

 

[epmode]

I wanted to buy this at one point. Oh well.

 

[Glass Rebel]

why can't i hold all these parameter strings

that's such a bullshit answer

 

[RoKKeR]

Lucy just stop, you're making it worse.

 

[raphier]

WE Tell You How To Play Games!™

Welcome to game industry where publisher knows you better than yourself. And investors suck it.

 

[Freki]

But I do want to play it offline.

But others are enjoying the online functionality so you won't get to.
Deal with it!

 

[Diddy Kong]

Full of fail

 

[Sendou]

Wow this Lucy person has balls!

 

[Liquid_Bike]

What a load of crap. I don't want anyone telling me how to enjoy my games.

 

[Soulflarz]

and all of gaf laughs :'D

 

[nckillthegrimace]

Maybe your vision is shit.

 

[Alien Bob]

The laughs keep on coming

 

[Danny Dudekisser]

Thread title's kinda misleading, but what I've learned is that they made SimCity to be precisely what I don't want from SimCity... which is fine; it just means I'm not giving them any money and will continue to laugh at this disaster.

They really should stop trying to defend the game. They keep digging themselves deeper. Just lay low.

 

[Freki]

WE Tell You How To Play Games!™

That's the attidtude that pissed me off about Jay Wilson - I am so glad that he's gone.
Perhaps one day we'll be as lucky with Lucy...

 

[jimi_dini]

We recognize that there are fans – people who love the original SimCity – who want that. But we’re also hearing from thousands of people who are playing across regions, trading, communicating and loving the Always-Connected functionality.

Great. So make online optional.

 

[bounchfx]

why why why why why


why

 

[antonz]

To be totally honest some aspects of the game are totally broken beyond repair if you don't play it online.

Don't expect to have a successful Gambling City playing by yourself alone or a Tourism City. If it is just you and no one else in the region you are fucked unless you build up a city in every spot.

 

[Dynamite Shikoku]

Of course there are millions of people who want offline play, but thousands enjoy the connected experience

 

[Freki]

Thread title's kinda misleading, but what I've learned is that they made SimCity to be precisely what I don't want from SimCity... which is fine; it just means I'm not giving them any money and will continue to laugh at this disaster.

Really? Because that's exactly the message I get.

 

[Wario64]

I'm so dizzy

 

[AcceptableGhost]

"You don't want to play SimCity".

 

[JoeBoy101]

My reaction while reading all of this:

"We recognize that there are fans – people who love the original SimCity – who want that. But we’re also hearing from thousands of people who are playing across regions, trading, communicating and loving the Always-Connected functionality."

We recognize that there is a built-in playerbase who love the original offline SimCity and would eagerly want that. But we're going to get little microtransaction dollars out of them when they're not online playing across regions, trading, communicating and enduring Occasionally-Connected functionality.

Lucy? Can I call you Lucy?

Don't piss on my leg and tell me it's raining.

 

[Jamie OD]

Hey guys, turns out there are loads of people who love Sim City being online only. You can trust me.

 

[Tesseract]

no.

 

[unknownhero]

If I were human I would say "go to hell"......if I were human

but seriously, what a bunch of BS

 

[Data West]

I'm so dizzy

maybe if you weren't upside down

 

[Freki]

To be totally honest some aspects of the game are totally broken beyond repair if you don't play it online.

Don't expect to have a successful Gambling City playing by yourself alone or a Tourism City. If it is just you and no one else in the region you are fucked unless you build up a city in every spot.

That's precicely the way I want to play. I don't like to be spammed with service vehicles and criminals!
The online aspect of this game is completely superficial for me atm the way the game and it's ai is designed.

 

[TedNindo]

How about an offline freeplay mode or something then. Where you can build an offline city. Everyone happy.

 

[Ninja Scooter]

Lmao @the opening line. Ice cold.

 

[Jac_Solar]

To be totally honest some aspects of the game are totally broken beyond repair if you don't play it online.

Don't expect to have a successful Gambling City playing by yourself alone or a Tourism City. If it is just you and no one else in the region you are fucked unless you build up a city in every spot.

They could allow the client to access the stuff that requires authorization/server access, or implement an A.I that builds cities and can trade with you. I think most of it is done on the computer anyways, it just requires permission to access certain files.

 

[kirblar]

source

The tone alone annoys the fuck out of me and don't get me started on the content...

She has absolutely no idea how to address an audience that isn't primed to accept corporate BS-speak.

 

[evanmisha]

Smells like Tomb Raider backlash

 

[KarmaCow]

At some point it's better not to say anything, much less this garbage.

 

[kpjolee]

Single player, huge size map is all I need. I dont want multiple numbers of small cities...I want to build one big megacity.

 

[Just_myles]

I haven't played this game at all yet, but I don't understand, well I do understand why, but I think it would have been a better idea to just add the single player mode. It could not have taken that much time to implement really. Glad they are dealing with their troubles with the launch head on. I can't imagine what it would have been like if they said nothing at all.

 

[Zemm]

The game is so broken, there is no way they salvage it. With Diablo 3 you could see with some good direction they could, with this? Not a chance, not with these people in charge.

 

[mysteriousmage09]

Lol so they actually admit that while online play does provide some nice things, the always online requirement to play the game is a load of shit.

This is amazing.

 

[Yagharek]

What a condescending, lying fool. The sale of this game and it's misrepresentation by EA and maxis constitutes fraud.

 

[railGUN]

To be totally honest some aspects of the game are totally broken beyond repair if you don't play it online.

Don't expect to have a successful Gambling City playing by yourself alone or a Tourism City. If it is just you and no one else in the region you are fucked unless you build up a city in every spot.

Honestly, that sounds like fun.

 

[Whiskeymatt]

I didn't think they could make the situation any worse than it already was, but well here we all are.

 

[Thug Waffle]

I think their reasoning for always-online DRM is pretty bullshit. If I wanted to open up my city to others, why can't I just sign into the server or approve that sort of multiplayer environment through my settings?

I should be able to play offline and close my city off from everyone else if I want to. I don't see why you can't just open up the menu and sign into EA's service when you actually want to take your experience online.

 

[Berordn]

Are we going to just ignore that region play was achievable and worked well in SC4 which was a solely single player experience?

It also didn't restrict you to tiny, pointlessly specalized cities or prevent you from nuking your town with aliens and loading a previous save.

 

[legacyzero]

BAHAHAHAH!

This whole thing is such a mess.

 

[jay]

Oh, well if thousands of players are enjoying it...

 

[rac]

In many ways, we built an MMO.

Lucy tell us your gaf name.

 

[doniewhalberg]

I understand sometimes the consumer doesn't know that they want your experience until you show it to them and there's that moment.

This isn't it. I think it's clear what players want here after their complete failure to back their end up after deciding it was online only.