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Lucy Bradshaw - You don't want to play SimCity offline!

D

dejay

Banned
unbias said:
Haha, from the article I posted, I didnt realize the javascript was that bad:

It’s since been revealed that population numbers are nonsense, even down to leaked Javascript code (Javascript code? Was this meant to be a Facebook game at one point?) featuring “simcity.GetFudgedPopulation” as a function.
Click to expand...

Wow - that's classic. Am I right in assuming the population is only fudged just before it gets presented in the UI?

Oh, for people who don't want to play, here's a theme song. Just change the one word in the chorus in your head as you're listening: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aopKk56jM-I#t=30s
 
E

encephalon

Member
Sim City 4 was not "single city in isolation." Don't pretend as if you couldn't have made 5 with both online and offline functionality. The online component would probably be appealing to plenty of people, including those who are upset with the game on GAF. You could have attracted legitimate sales that way. That's not what you did, EA. You blew it.
 
Oppo

Oppo

Member
You know what kills me about this whole SimCity thing?

The game that we want is there. We can see it. All of the building blocks are in place. It's just the behavior that they ascribed to the feature set, that is driving us fucking bonkers.

It's like, an awesome Lego set that it's just been built weird. You can look at the pieces, and say yeah – that's everything that I want, but you've put it together in such a strange and infuriating way…
 
D

DaBuddaDa

Member
I find it incredibly distasteful how Lucy keeps putting in these sarcastic little jabs in her responses in attempt to create an "us versus them" mentality in consumers. Totally gross PR.
 
D

D-Pad

Member
Fat Goron said:
You know... I can't even imagine if my heart could handle RollerCoaster Tycoon 4 finally being anounced.... and this shit happening.
Click to expand...

Lucky for us we won't have to worry about that any time soon hahahahahhaa

haha... heh... eheh...
...
sgbKWpU.gif
 
K

Kyari

Member
Someone at Maxis/EA really needs to stop letting her talk to media outlets. Its just watching a train wreck in slow motion at this point.
 
indigo-cyclops

indigo-cyclops

Member
Nerfgun said:
You know what kills me about this whole SimCity thing?

The game that we want is there. We can see it. All of the building blocks are in place. It's just the behavior that they ascribed to the feature set, that is driving us fucking bonkers.

It's like, an awesome Lego set that it's just been built weird. You can look at the pieces, and say yeah – that's everything that I want, but you've put it together in such a strange and infuriating way…
Click to expand...

I could entertain someone arguing against this point. From all I'm reading/seeing, the game is a huge step back from 4.
 
K

Karl2177

Member
After this and the ME3 and DA2 shit, I'm just waiting for EA to collapse and have all of these developers come out and say it was all EA's fault.
 
B

Berordn

Member
INDIGO_CYCLOPS said:
I could entertain someone arguing against this point. From all I'm reading/seeing, the game is a huge step back from 4.
Click to expand...

I don't think anyone was outright opposed to simplifying the formula from SC4, since it can be a bit overwhelming depending on how experienced you are with it. If most of the bugs were ironed out before release and they let you play offline with larger cities and less reliance on neighbors, I don't think anyone would have that many issues with the game.
 
M

Master Nairb

Member
Oh. My. God.
They really think we're idiots. When she said that the reason they chose not to input an offline mode because thousands of gamers are requesting only on-play.

This just keeps getting better!
 
T

Tuck

Member
Honestly, Lucy Bradshaw should be fired. She lied to the press about the nature of the online-only DRM, and got caught. Now she is backtracking.

The fact that they are so vehemently against the option of an offline mode is extremely suspect. The online features may be nice but they are certainly no killer thing that completely revolutionizes the way the game is played. Plus, that is just one problem with the game. The small cities, the bugs and the fact that the game is actively lying to you about population size and sim behavior are all major concerns.
 
Auto_aim1

Auto_aim1

MeisaMcCaffrey
The game title should have been 'SimCity Online', it would have saved everyone the trouble, but no... they probably thought it wouldn't sell.
 
T

TedNindo

Member
INDIGO_CYCLOPS said:
I could entertain someone arguing against this point. From all I'm reading/seeing, the game is a huge step back from 4.
Click to expand...

It's not actually. If it weren't for the city size, bad simulation, forced online and bugs it's pretty much a SimCity game. In a lot of ways it's what I was expecting a new SimCity game to be.
It even does a lot of things better then SimCity 4 imo and they even added a lot of things that I like and I would have loved to see in a normal singleplayer SimCity game. But some mind boggling flaws and design decisions they made pretty much ruined what could have been a great game.

And imo even with its flaws. The first few hours of it were better then any city builder I've played since Sim City 4. Before the restrictions and flaws became painfully obvious and left me disappointed.
 
B

B-Dex

Member
Guys..... Guys... it gets better.

But what's even more baffling is that while browsing the official Simcity forum as a buyer beware agent, I realized that they were censoring EA's customer care phone number in, what I assume, is an attempt at limiting the number of refunds issued for this shameless broad daylight cash grab of a game.
Click to expand...

G7qNOhO.jpg
Click to expand...
 
A

Andrew.

Banned
Remember back in the days when SimCity 2000 was so fucking glorious and simple and we all ate hamburgers and grilled in our parents back yard and sang songs?

Those were the days. It was actually a Tuesday to a Sunday.
 
D

DasDamen

Member
Andrew. said:
Remember back in the days when SimCity 2000 was so fucking glorious and simple and we all ate hamburgers and grilled in our parents back yard and sang songs?

Those were the days. It was actually a Tuesday to a Sunday.
Click to expand...

Yes. In fact, I really want to buy a digital copy from GOG.com, but I really really don't want to contribute a couple of dollars to EA.

Maybe I'll look for copy on eBay provided that taking a used copy off the used game market doesn't induce a new sale.

Edit:There are 50 PC copies on eBay.ca right now. I'll buy a copy in a month if there are still around 50 copies available in a month's time.
 
IISANDERII

IISANDERII

Member
Lucy Bradshaw joined Maxis after the EA acquisition. I suspect she joined Maxis via EA, as the corporate drone who makes sure that everything done at Maxis complies with EA bullshit.

I still would like to believe that the good people at Maxis are still there, and the contradictory developer info seems to confirm that. I hope they break away and form their own studio and make what they want to make; something that isn't driven by stockholder interests.
 
E

Easy_D

never left the stone age
Why is everyone at Maxis seemingly saying different things?

"SUPER GIGAWAT SERVER SIDE COMPUTATION!!!"

vs "Yeah we like modders, yeah we totally can do that and stuff, yup"

vs "YOU HAVE TO PLAY ONLINE, WE TRIED OFFLINE BUT YEAH NO"

and then offline mode working perfectly fine when modded. This must be a PR nightmare for EA and I'm enjoying every single moment.

Edit: Actual developer thoughts vs corporate bullshit?
 
Flying Toaster

Flying Toaster

Member
IISANDERII said:
Lucy Bradshaw joined Maxis after the EA acquisition. I suspect she joined Maxis via EA, as the corporate drone who makes sure that everything done at Maxis complies with EA bullshit.

I still would like to believe that the good people at Maxis are still there, and the contradictory developer info seems to confirm that. I hope they break away and form their own studio and make what they want to make; something that isn't driven by stockholder interests.
Click to expand...

Maxis for all purposes is dead. They have been bled to death by EA making sims games and the studio is just a shell it's former self.
 
E

epmode

Member
Flying Toaster said:
Maxis for all purposes is dead. They have been bled to death by EA making sims games and the studio is just a shell it's former self.
Click to expand...

Business as usual for EA then.

I don't think I'll ever forgive them for desecrating Origin's corpse so they could have a catchier name for their downloader.
 
G

Grampa Simpson

Banned
I'm pretty sure I'm never buying this game. I used to be such a fan too. Maybe when it's $5 on Steam with an offline mode available.

Maybe EA will die in a fire some day.
 
C

Commanche Raisin Toast

Member
But we’re also hearing from thousands of people who are playing across regions, trading, communicating and loving the Always-Connected functionality.
Click to expand...

fucking name one! (other than the sites that gave your game EERILY positive reviews and seem to keep hitting on that "i$love$being$connected" bullet point so much.)
 
R

RotBot

Member
The thing is, my friends and I bought into the always-connected thing. We bought SimCity hoping to work together in a region. Except region interaction lagged terribly from server meltdowns, the global market was never enabled, and leaderboards were taken down. I don't know why Lucy Bradshaw is extolling the virtues of always-connected when none of it works properly yet.
 
E

endresults

Member
RotBot said:
The thing is, my friends and I bought into the always-connected thing. We bought SimCity hoping to work together in a region. Except region interaction lagged terribly from server meltdowns, the global market was never enabled, and leaderboards were taken down. I don't know why Lucy Bradshaw is extolling the virtues of always-connected when none of it works properly yet.
Click to expand...

The DRM is working properly. For now.
 
D

Deleted member 17706

Unconfirmed Member
Oh? Well then I don't want to play SimCity.

Sad I was looking forward to this at all, but very glad I didn't pre-order or purchase it at all.
 
B

BlastProcessing

Member
endresults said:
The DRM is working properly. For now.
Click to expand...

Except for the part where my buddy and I keep losing cities to server errors and lose hours and hours of gameplay. If I could just have a local save I would still try to play this mess enough to get my moneys worth.

edit: I missread what you were saying. You are right that no one has pirated it yet. I will keep my rant up because I am so disappointed in the game but it dosen't apply to you.
 
L

LuchaShaq

Banned
Nerfgun said:
You know what kills me about this whole SimCity thing?

The game that we want is there. We can see it. All of the building blocks are in place. It's just the behavior that they ascribed to the feature set, that is driving us fucking bonkers.

It's like, an awesome Lego set that it's just been built weird. You can look at the pieces, and say yeah – that's everything that I want, but you've put it together in such a strange and infuriating way…
Click to expand...

I think you're a little optimistic here.

They have a shell of a shitty facebook game with a bunch of poorly thought out game design affecting it to it's very core.

An offline patch/bigger city patch would just make it a regular sim city game but a VERY bad one at that.
 
E

endresults

Member
BlastProcessing said:
Except for the part where my buddy and I keep losing cities to server errors and lose hours and hours of gameplay. If I could just have a local save I would still try to play this mess enough to get my moneys worth.
Click to expand...

EAMaxis: "But the DRM's still working. Sorry about the saves, brah."
 
M

MC Safety

Member
Kyari said:
Someone at Maxis/EA really needs to stop letting her talk to media outlets. Its just watching a train wreck in slow motion at this point.
Click to expand...

It's not likely she's doing this without prompting, and it's also not likely her statements are being sent out without being vetted.
 
L

Lint21

Neo Member
MC Safety said:
It's not likely she's doing this without prompting, and it's also not likely her statements are being sent out without being vetted.
Click to expand...

Having worked in large corporations, it's not likely that she wrote it at all. She's just in the position within the company that if something goes wrong like this, she is that one to be "the face." Not that I'll feel bad when her career is what takes the hit for this shitshow.

I'm just stunned that the PR "experts" they certainly employ are letting this messaging go out. It screams that they are completely out of touch with their audience. They've lost their way so severely that they can't even hire people who can fake that "connection" properly.
 
Z

Zarx

Member
Translated "We know people want to play singleplayer without all the online bullshit and we could do that if we wanted like every other game in the series. But people are playing SimCity online right now so naturally we can't offer an optional offline mode with all the reigonal stuff simulated offline like we did in Simcity 4 as then less people would want to play online."
 
M

MC Safety

Member
Lint21 said:
Having worked in large corporations, it's not likely that she wrote it at all. She's just in the position within the company that if something goes wrong like this, she is that one to be "the face." Not that I'll feel bad when her career is what takes the hit for this shitshow.

I'm just stunned that the PR "experts" they certainly employ are letting this messaging go out. It screams that they are completely out of touch with their audience. They've lost their way so severely that they can't even hire people who can fake that "connection" properly.
Click to expand...

Yeah. I think you're right that someone in corporate communications wrote this.
 
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