SuperTaz Posted March 9, 2013 Share Posted March 9, 2013 http://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/simcity/user-reviews http://www.foxnews.com/tech/2013/03/08/new-imcity-launch-proves-disastrous/?intcmp=features http://www.forbes.com/sites/insertcoin/2013/03/08/ea-employee-chastizes-company-over-simcity-in-public-letter/?partner=yahootix This is the letter the EA Employee posted on reddit before it was removed: “To the executives at EA, from one of your employees I am deeply embarrassed by the troubled launch of Sim City and I hope you are too. When I walk around our campus and look at the kind of talent we’ve collected, the amenities we have access to and the opportunities working at such a big company affords us, I can’t imagine how for release after release, EA continues to make the same embarrassing, anti-consumer mistakes. We should be better than this. You should not be failing us so badly. Another thing I see when I walk around our campus are massive banners that display what are said to be our company values. They are on posters on every floor, included in company-wide emails and hanging above the cafeteria in bright colors. You even print them on our coffee mugs so we see them every day. But somehow when planning the launch of Sim City, you threw them all out the window. Most important of the values you are ignoring is Think Consumers First. What part of the Sim City DRM scheme, which has rendered the game unplayable for hundreds of thousands of fans across the globe, demonstrates that you are thinking about consumers before you are thinking about yourselves? Does “first” mean something different in boardrooms than it does to the rest of us? Does the meaning of that word change when you get the word “executive” in front of your title? You can’t even pretend that you didn’t know consumers would be angry about this. Common sense aside, consumers complained about this during your public betas. In fact, when one of them posted his criticisms on the forums, he was banned! You tried to silence your critics. The same thing is happening now as users write in to demand refunds. What part of this behavior aligns with our company value to Be Accountable? What you’ve demonstrated with this launch is that our corporate management does not believe in our core values. They are for the unwashed masses, not for the important people who forced this anti-consumer DRM onto the Sim City team. This DRM scheme is not about the consumers or even about piracy. It’s about covering your own asses. It allows you to hand-wave weak sales or bad reviews and blame outside factors like pirates or server failures in the event the game struggles. You are protecting your own jobs at the expense of consumers. I think this violates the Act With Integrity value I’m looking at on my own coffee mug right now. On behalf of your other employees, I’d like to ask you to fix this. Allow the Sim City team to patch the game to run offline. If Create Quality and Innovation is still a core value that you believe in, then this shouldn’t be a hard decision. Games that gamers can’t play because of server overload or ISP issues are NOT quality. Be Bold by giving the consumers what they want and take accountability for the mistake. Finally I’d like to ask you to follow the last company value on the list in the future: Learn and Grow. When you made this mistake with Spore, the company and all your employees suffered for it. You didn’t learn from that mistake and you are making it again with Sim City. So please, learn from this debacle. Don’t do this again. Grow into better leaders and actually apply our company values when you make decisions. Don’t just use them as tools to motivate your staff. With the money, talent and intellectual property available to EA, we should be leading the industry into a golden age of consumer-focused game publishing. Instead we’re the most reviled game publisher in the world. That’s your fault. Things can only change if you actually start following the company values and apply them to every title we launch. Sincerely, A Disappointed But Hopeful Artist at EARS” 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HSMagnet Posted March 9, 2013 Share Posted March 9, 2013 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
No_Nickname Posted March 10, 2013 Share Posted March 10, 2013 Sound's like it fell on deaf ears Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chaos1907 Posted March 13, 2013 Share Posted March 13, 2013 Here's something http://www.polygon.com/2013/3/9/4083764/ea-has-no-intentions-of-offlining-simcity-but-will-look-into-it-to Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HSMagnet Posted March 13, 2013 Share Posted March 13, 2013 Here's something http://www.polygon.com/2013/3/9/4083764/ea-has-no-intentions-of-offlining-simcity-but-will-look-into-it-to We have no intention of offlining SimCity any time soon but we'll look into that as part of our earning back your trust efforts. read that as " here is a cardboard cookie, please STFU " Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SuperTaz Posted March 14, 2013 Author Share Posted March 14, 2013 http://www.forbes.com/sites/johngaudiosi/2013/03/12/ea-maxis-simcity-launch-problems-drive-record-number-of-pc-gamers-to-change-org/?partner=yahootix An online petition, started by Change.org user Ryan Lashley, that demanded EA Maxis remove the “always online” DRM from SimCity and future games was posted on March 6. In less than one week, it received over 415,000 page views and 66,000 signatures. https://www.change.org/petitions/electronic-arts-inc-remove-always-online-drm-from-simcity-and-future-games. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wizard220 Posted March 15, 2013 Share Posted March 15, 2013 (edited) Here's something http://www.polygon.com/2013/3/9/4083764/ea-has-no-intentions-of-offlining-simcity-but-will-look-into-it-to Thats because of money and it would mean less for them. No micro-transactions means no cash. And I really hope that this a wakeup call for everyone. Edited March 15, 2013 by Wizard220 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MaydaX Posted March 15, 2013 Share Posted March 15, 2013 “SimCity can be played offline” True — cities can be simulated locally If you cut off your internet connection while playing SimCity, it doesn’t dump you back to the launcher. It warns you, but continues to simulate your city normally until it decides you’ve been mucking around offline for too long and boots you. But now that he enabled offline play for longer than the 20 minute limit by tweaking the game’s package files. (The video shows debug mode, which I’ll get to later—the claim appears in the description.) http://www.pcgamer.com/2013/03/14/simcity-tested-offline-play-phantom-sims/ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chaos1907 Posted March 18, 2013 Share Posted March 18, 2013 If you bought SimCity, you are in luck! Well, kind of. Although your initial experience might have been marred by constant server issues and connection problems stemming from the always-online requirement, you now have the opportunity to receive compensation for your troubles in the form of a free game. As an apology for the mishandled launch, EA is sending out a list of games for active SimCity users to choose from. Even if you have not yet registered your copy, you can do so by March 25th to take advantage of this offer. The “Free Games” list includes the following: Battlefield 3 (Standard Edition) Bejeweled 3 Dead Space 3 (Standard Edition) Mass Effect 3 (Standard Edition) Medal of Honor Warfighter (Standard Edition) Need For Speed Most Wanted (Standard Edition) Plants vs. Zombies SimCity 4 Deluxe Edition Not the kind of launch they were hoping for... Most of these games are a bit older, but “free” helps sweeten the deal, of course. Dead Space 3 is the newest of the titles, being just released in February. Or, you could just take SimCity 4 and try to erase the launch from your memory completely! Either way, its nice to see a company owning up to their mistakes and giving their customers something in return. But is this enough to make up for one of the worst launch days ever? Diablo 3 is the other contender for this dubious designation, but even the highly critiqued launch of the Blizzard ARPG did not go quite as badly as SimCity. The fact that the D3 launch did not change EA’s approach or their willingness to increase server capacity (which they finally did this week, by 400%) is mind-boggling. This is unfortunate because there is a lot to love about SimCity…but you have to be able to play it to figure that out! Lets hope EA resolves this issue for their future titles, because fans are obviously getting fed up with these server shenanigans. Until then, enjoy a free game! What are your thoughts on this olive branch? Will SimCity be able to recover from its hellish first week? http://www.xfire.com/news/free-games-here-ea-extends-an-olive-branch-to-simcity-players/ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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