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Sim City is now down, the maintenance message is amazing

Z

zashga

Member
Foffy said:
Is this perhaps the worst launch for a video game ever? I know that's full of hyperbole, but I have never seen such an unfathomable trainwreck.
Click to expand...

Well, Diablo 3 was unplayable for the first week or so for much the same reason. Somehow that one didn't draw quite as much attention from the gaming press, though.
 
F

Foffy

Banned
zashga said:
Well, Diablo 3 was unplayable for the first week or so for much the same reason. Somehow that one didn't draw quite as much attention from the gaming press, though.
Click to expand...

Perhaps because you could argue the idea that an auction house needing an always-online connection was a good safety net to prevent people from exploiting the game offline. I find such an argument for Sim City to be very hard to swallow, and perhaps a lot of the press find issue with it, too.
 
C

civilstrife

Member
This is completely insulting. These companies are aware that the first week after launch is going to suck, and they're just willing to take our money, deal with the fallback and hope that everyone forgets about it when the servers start working again.
 
N

Nibiru

Banned
zashga said:
Well, Diablo 3 was unplayable for the first week or so for much the same reason. Somehow that one didn't draw quite as much attention from the gaming press, though.
Click to expand...

This isn't true at all. It was hammered badly and did give errors during peak times but in none peak hours there was no problem at all. There is no such predictability with SimCity. The servers are down almost all the time, even during weekdays o_O
 
C

CrunchyFrog

Member
Foffy said:
Perhaps because you could argue the idea that an auction house needing an always-online connection was a good safety net to prevent people from exploiting the game offline. I find such an argument for Sim City to be very hard to swallow, and perhaps a lot of the press find issue with it, too.
Click to expand...

Plus this game has a lot more exposure outside the enthusiast gaming base, and people are starting to get sick of what is now becoming a growing and very worrying trend.
 
F

FantasticMrFoxdie

Mumber
Iacobellis said:
Polygon now gave SimCity a 4.0. Jesus Christ.

http://www.polygon.com/game/simcity-2013/2630
Click to expand...

bPgPkPz.jpg


shaking my head so much right now.

/gamesjournalism
 
S

Snuggles

erotic butter maelstrom
I admire that Polygon are following up on their promise but it is pretty damn amusing to see a game drop from a 9.5 to a 4 in one week.

I don't regret spending money on this game in the sense that eventually the servers will stabilize and it'll be worth the price of admission, but I do feel embarrassed to have funded such an incompetent wreck. Jesus.
 
D

Dupy

"it is in giving that we receive"
Nibiru said:
It was not even nearly equal to this and I hate D3.
Click to expand...

It's pretty close. I was able to play Diablo 3 for maybe 30 minutes the first 3 days after launch. Constant drop outs, lag and inability to connect. Then after one of their patches I got disconnected every 20 minutes due to a stupid bug that many others had as well.

The sad thing is that this won't stop publishers from continuing to push "always online" throughout next gen. I fear for the next Xbox.
 
G

Grief.exe

Member
Metacritic doesn't change scores because of the original Jeff Gertsman scandal with Gamespot.

I can't remember the specific game, but he gave Tomb Raider or Kane and Lynch a low score because it was a poor game.

The publisher pulled the ads, so Gamespot changed the score.

This is to protect the reviewers.
 
Angry Fork

Angry Fork

Member
Rezae said:
Maybe it's just me, but most of the people bitching have already given EA their money (good luck getting it back), and are all part of the problem. We knew about the DRM for months, you still gave EA your money, giving them justification, and now there are server problems?! Who could have seen that coming...

If you are against DRM like this, don't give them your money in the first place, and when you can't access your game because of these predictable DRM consequences, don't act surprised. The servers will eventually be smoothed out and all of this huffing and puffing will go away (until EA shuts the server down and you still preorder the next Sim City).
Click to expand...

Agree completely. EA is in the wrong but so are people who bought it knowing this shit would happen, they're not at the same level of fault but still.
 
G

Game Guru

Member
Ironlion45 said:
To be fair, to the best of my knowledge few people, and no pirates, are able to play Simcity; that's the big "advantage" (if you can call it that) for the publisher, is that it really does eliminate piracy, since a large portion of the program is server side and it won't work without it.

EA thinks its going to save money that way, and is trying to be cheap with the servers too; because those cost money and all that. Never mind that the DRM that's this bad actually prevents sales.

Has EA Forgotten the lesson other publishers learned from Starforce already?
Click to expand...

Well, yeah, but the problem is that when pirates can't play a game they pirate, they are out $0. When legit customers can't play a game they bought, they are out $60. So technically, this anti-piracy measure does hurt legitimate customers more because they paid money for a game that is turning out to be only useful as a coaster, while the pirates didn't.
 
L

lupin23rd

Member
Mik2121 said:
I can't imagine how bad some of the actual developers over at Maxis are feeling horribly bad seeing everybody shit on their game (though not as much the game itself as the network stuff). I know I would feel horrible, anyway...

I also can't wait for either EA (most likely not) or someone to put out some patch or something to be able to play this offline. Just thinking I wouldn't be able to play this on my laptop whenever I go somewhere without internet, or the fact that if EA ever closes their server I wouldn't be able to play it anymore just makes me sick...
Click to expand...

Some developer at Maxis probably spent 20 minutes to write a patch to do this, but can't release it until the powers that be figure out what the fuck they're going to do about this shitstorm.
 
G

golem

Member
Is this game still down?? I havent opened my boxed copy yet, maybe I should return it and wait for it to become stable/a better sale.
 
E

Eusis

Member
Nibiru said:
It was not even nearly equal to this and I hate D3.
Click to expand...
Yeah, Diablo 3 was more like running down stairs, tripping, grabbing the rails and going back down again after you caught your breath.

SimCity's running down the stairs, tripping, falling onto the broken remains of a shattered bottle that contained a high proof liquor, then getting set on fire.
 
S

Soi-Fong

Member
Eusis said:
Yeah, Diablo 3 was more like running down stairs, tripping, grabbing the rails and going back down again after you caught your breath.

SimCity's running down the stairs, tripping, falling onto the broken remains of a shattered bottle that contained a high proof liquor, then getting set on fire.
Click to expand...

It's not that bad. I've been able to play a few times.
 
T

timetokill

Banned
nib95 said:
I never thought I'd see the day that a game that doesn't actually work and is completely broken, reviews the same on Metacritic as a God of War game. Bizarre.
Click to expand...

Well to be fair, God of War nowadays IS pretty terrible.

(Well, I find it to be free of imagination or fun gameplay, but obviously ymmv)
 
T

Terra

Member
Dupy said:
It's pretty close. I was able to play Diablo 3 for maybe 30 minutes the first 3 days after launch. Constant drop outs, lag and inability to connect. Then after one of their patches I got disconnected every 20 minutes due to a stupid bug that many others had as well.

The sad thing is that this won't stop publishers from continuing to push "always online" throughout next gen. I fear for the next Xbox.
Click to expand...

And this is one reason that many will hesitate to buy games. Micro-transactions...always online...and so on, and so on. These are two reasons that titles like DS3 and Sim City is not in my games library.

I got burnt on Diablo 3.
 
P

partyphone

Banned
cool_dude_2049 said:
/gamesjournalism for what? Game was working fine on the pre-release build, and now it sucks and they adjusted their score. Good for them. Despite the hate Polygon gets, I like their style and review policy.
Click to expand...

It's a completely unsustainable policy because games change a lot these days. This whole thing has only served to highlight just how absurd game review scores are.
 
M

Marty Chinn

Member
Are the servers down still? Any way to check the status online? I just don't want to turn on my gaming PC only to find out nothing has changed and shut it down again.
 
A

Alcander

Member
Marty Chinn said:
Are the servers down still? Any way to check the status online? I just don't want to turn on my gaming PC only to find out nothing has changed and shut it down again.
Click to expand...

Still down for me... is there any way to change your server or something? Would that even make a difference?
 
C

cool_dude_2049

Banned
partyphone said:
It's a completely unsustainable policy because games change a lot these days. This whole thing has only served to highlight just how absurd game review scores are.
Click to expand...


The website has only been up for what, 3 months now? If they actually do revisit each one and stick by it, then it would work. I think Sim City is a different case though because of the always online aspect. That, in my opinion, warrants a quick revisit more so that a DLC single player campaign.
 
stuminus3

stuminus3

Member
The wife discovered today that there's a new SimCity and told me she was very excited about it. I'm not completely averse to an open marriage, I replied. I just rather wouldn't spend my money letting John Riccitiello fuck her.
 
P

partyphone

Banned
cool_dude_2049 said:
The website has only been up for what, 3 months now? If they actually do revisit each one and stick by it, then it would work. I think Sim City is a different case though because of the always online aspect. That, in my opinion, warrants a quick revisit more so that a DLC single player campaign.
Click to expand...

Been a year if you count theverge.com/gaming.

And I think we should definitely hold them to the policy. This has been pointed out before and it's a good place to start: http://www.polygon.com/game/minecraft/1816
 
G

Goon Boon

Banned
Grief.exe said:
I'm sure Nick from North Korea wants to support EA and the LGBT community by saying, 'fight the haters with good games!'
Click to expand...

Here we go again, Hate is not a Game by EA - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_RgEA07lAZI&feature=youtu.be&noredirect=1

Is EA's strategy for scandal/problems to just show support for LGBT equality to deflect attention?

Edit - Didn't know full spectrum was an event, derp. (In my defense the description is pretty much just a sentence and a hashtag)
 
L

LuchaShaq

Banned
stuminus3 said:
The wife discovered today that there's a new SimCity and told me she was very excited about it. I'm not completely averse to an open marriage, I replied. I just rather wouldn't spend my money letting John Riccitiello fuck her.
Click to expand...

Gf saw a banner ad for it as well and was going to grab it for her macbook before I threw my body in front of it.
 
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