[edit] Note that this thread was created before EA announced that an online connection was required after all. See the latest posts in this thread, and the other thread here.
Original thread for posterity's sake:
Thought this was worthy of its own thread, but if mods feel otherwise, feel free to move to the main thread here: http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=465738
Anyway, Shacknews posted an article that I think is a lot more important than they do:
http://www.shacknews.com/article/72841/simcity-to-support-play-anywhere-online-design
This is freaking huge. SimCity is basically designed from the ground up to support playing it anywhere, on any device. They haven't outright said as much, but one can easily presume they have HTML5, iOS, Android, Mac, etc. front-ends in the works. Your data would be easily portable between them, and the back-end simulation could stay the same on every device. The only thing that would have to change is the visual presentation of it all.
Yet don't be scared:
Original thread for posterity's sake:
Thought this was worthy of its own thread, but if mods feel otherwise, feel free to move to the main thread here: http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=465738
Anyway, Shacknews posted an article that I think is a lot more important than they do:
http://www.shacknews.com/article/72841/simcity-to-support-play-anywhere-online-design
One of the goals of SimCity is to make it a game you can "play anywhere." In order to do that, it relies on cloud storage. Because the game save is in the cloud, players will have a continuous save file that they can access from multiple devices--such as (but not limited to) an internet browser. Games like SimCity are "data-driven," meaning it will only require "small upload bandwidth" to have a continuous gaming experience.
This is freaking huge. SimCity is basically designed from the ground up to support playing it anywhere, on any device. They haven't outright said as much, but one can easily presume they have HTML5, iOS, Android, Mac, etc. front-ends in the works. Your data would be easily portable between them, and the back-end simulation could stay the same on every device. The only thing that would have to change is the visual presentation of it all.
Yet don't be scared:
And while online is a key feature for SimCity, Maxis has implemented an asynchronous server model, so that there's "no reliance on a dedicated live server" in order to continue playing the game. That's a philosophy that Ubisoft would best learn from.