EA's SimCity
Looks like the DRM/servers were only the first problem.
After people were finally able to get in to play, they found out the game is a piece of shit.
http://www.foxnews.com/tech....eatures
After people were finally able to get in to play, they found out the game is a piece of shit.
http://www.foxnews.com/tech....eatures
School buses, fire trucks and tourist hordes all seem to have trouble finding obvious routes to their goals. As a result, designing a functional city may mean planning a street grid and placement of different facilities in a deeply counterintuitive way. Players have to design their cities to suit bad algorithms, not realistic goals.
One popular emerging strategy is to construct a city with one long, single street winding back and forth like a snake. This enables players to reduce the problems of having school buses that cannot find students and fire trucks that refuse to go where they are supposed to. One way to avoid suffocating traffic jams is to fill the city with wide avenues, resulting in weird maps where normal streets are used as sparsely as possible.
The lame pathfinding algorithms may explain one of the biggest mysteries surrounding this new SimCity iteration; why is the city size limited so drastically? Many early reviews cited claustrophobia as the number one complaint even before the server problems surfaced, including the exhaustive Ars Technica piece. It now seems likely that the strict size limitation may have been necessary to avoid complete gridlock.
"Be bold, and mighty forces will come to your aid."
Does EA touch anything, non-sports related, that doesn't become a shell of its former self?
"Happy slaves are the worst enemies of freedom." - Marie Von Ebner
"It was always the women, and above all the young ones, who were the most bigoted adherents of the Party, the swallowers of slogans, the amateur spies..." - Orwell
"It was always the women, and above all the young ones, who were the most bigoted adherents of the Party, the swallowers of slogans, the amateur spies..." - Orwell
I like this, from the notes:Leisher wrote:Modders are playing it offline.
- SimCity has behavior for offline save handling. When offline, your city is saved and is uploaded to Origin the next time you go online. Offline mode seemed to be cut hastily.
"Be bold, and mighty forces will come to your aid."
From slashdot:
"Is it even fun?"
The answer is "no."
I'm embarrassed to say I purchased this game. The goddamn digital deluxe edition for $80 goddamn dollars. I should probably click the "Post Anonymously" box to hide my shame, but I won't. I'll wear my scarlet EA.
Now, I knew about the "you have to be online" thing, but I thought that was just for authentication, like StarCraft 2. I do not like DRM, I run Linux on most of my computers, and I'm a donation-making member of the EFF (got the t-shirts and everything) but I will, on occasion, fork over cash for a DRMed video game and roll my eyes when I have to sit through "verifying with server..." bullshit. I'm weak.
I read pre-reviews of the game, and I watched gameplay videos. I have fond memories of SimCity 2000, and thought this game looked awesome.
I was annoyed when I couldn't play for the first two days because of 'server load' issues. They were right about the "multiplayer experience." Not being able to play a video game because "servers are unavailable" is definitely part of the multiplayer experience.
But, I'm a patient person, and I wanted to play this game. So when the servers stabilized and I had time over the weekend, I played. And it was great! It was a ton of fun drawing and planning my city.
Until.
Until you hit about 100k population (which, as the decompiled ui code shows is only actually 15000 sims because they inflate the pop to make it seem like they're doing more). When you get about that big, all of a sudden, the city collapses because of incredible traffic jams on the roads. No one can get to work or back, a building catches fire and the fire trucks can't get to it so the building burns down. Sims get sick and the ambulances can't reach them because of traffic, they die, people become unhappy and leave, no money from no taxes, city collapses etc etc.
And at first you think, "Oh, I have clearly been mistaken with regards to my city planning abilities! What an interesting challenge! Let's look closer at the traffic patterns to see what I've done wrong, and what I can do to fix my city that is being simulated in exciting and challenging ways!"
So you start looking closer. You turn on the traffic map and see, "hey wait a minute. Why are all cars using that one narrow side street instead of the massive 4 lane highway right next to it..?"
So you think, "perhaps I've overloaded that street, or have failed to understand the population density along it?" So you look closer. So you follow a single sim to see what he does to get to and from work.
And when you look at an individual sim, an "Agent" in the GlassBox lingo, you see that he is stupid, and does not behave in any way like a real denizen of a city. Which is what you're trying to simulate.
You follow the sim and discover that when he leaves his house at 6AM to go to work, he does not know where he is going. It isn't even correct to call it "his" house, as it's not his house, it's the first open house he came across when he left work the night before. When a sim goes to work, he becomes aware of the closest building with an available job. And closest means "shortest path" routing, not "least cost." So he will take a .99999 mile long dirt road instead of 1 mile long super highway, because it's shorter. So he travels to this closest building, and if when he arrives, there is still an available job there, he will go inside and fill up a job slot. If by the time he reaches the building, some other sim has arrived first and TOOK HIS JERB he will pick the next closest building with a currently available job and try his luck there instead.
However. Every other sim that spawned is following the same process. Which results in the city-ending traffic jams.
And this is when it happens. There's an word for it, "anagnorisis." It's an element of greek tragedy. It's the moment when the protagonist realizes the clearer, fuller picture of the situation and of his destiny, in all of its horror.
Because you think, "so how do I lay out a city to perform with this behavior?" and you realize that you can't. I mean, you can "solve the puzzle." You can make one long winding road with the homes all at one end and the jobs scattered along the rest so none of the agents ever have to make a turn. When they get to a full building they keep on going along the same road to the next one, so they're always heading in the right direction. Or you can lay out some clever paths so they always take a path that takes them away from other job locations, or along a narrow street. And it has to work in both directions, because they use the same logic when they leave work to go "home." They crash in the first open house they find.
But if that's the puzzle you're solving, then you're not solving the problem of city planning, because no city works like that.
Since the sims are not simulating the way people in a city behave, you're not actually simulating a city. You're drawing a city that will accommodate the behavior of "Sims," which are entities that have nothing have in common with real commuters.
It gets worse when you start visiting forums and looking around the internet and discover other problems. Like that you can build a city that's nothing but residential buildings and city services. No industrial or commercial zoning needed.
So, in the end, all this time, you haven't been simulating a city at all. You've just been drawing. The graphics are beautiful, don't get me wrong. But there is no actual "game" here because there is no simulation of a city, so it's pointless.
And that's when I turned off the game, have not turned it back on since, and started demanding my refund. EA has refused, so next I'm going to issue a chargeback on my credit card.
I have never in my life disputed a credit card charge for an order I actually placed, but this bullshit will not stand. This is a bait and switch. I ordered a game of city simulation and I got MS Paint with city tiles.
I don't care about banning my Origin account, as it has nothing on it except SimCity, and I will never purchase another product through Origin, anyway, given their "no refunds" policy. To paraphrase a great American, "there's an old saying on the Internet - I know it's in Texas, probably on the Internets - that says, fool me once, shame on - shame on you. Fool me - you can't get fooled again."
Fuck EA, fuck Maxis, fuck them right in their goddamn ears.
"Be bold, and mighty forces will come to your aid."
TPRJones wrote:So much to say, I wouldn't know where to start.
So I'll just summarize: this may finally be the beginning of the end of EA. I hope.
Currently, EA develops and publishes games under several labels including EA Sports titles, Madden NFL, FIFA Soccer, NHL, NCAA Football, SSX and NBA Jam. Other EA labels produce established franchises such as Battlefield, Need for Speed, The Sims, Medal of Honor, Command & Conquer, as well as newer franchises such as Dead Space, Mass Effect, Dragon Age, Army of Two and Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, produced in partnership with LucasArts.
Going to be a long, long while.
EDIT: EA wins "Worst Company in America" award.
Edited By Malcolm on 1363620041
Diogenes of Sinope: "It is not that I am mad, it is only that my head is different from yours."
Arnold Judas Rimmer, BSC, SSC: "Better dead than smeg."
Arnold Judas Rimmer, BSC, SSC: "Better dead than smeg."
Fuck EA.
If it weren't for their sports games, which to their credit have been mostly solid, they wouldn't be in the position they're in today.
Everything else they touch has turned to shit, and honestly, you'll hear a lot of their sports fans bitching about those games going downhill...
If it weren't for their sports games, which to their credit have been mostly solid, they wouldn't be in the position they're in today.
Everything else they touch has turned to shit, and honestly, you'll hear a lot of their sports fans bitching about those games going downhill...
"Happy slaves are the worst enemies of freedom." - Marie Von Ebner
"It was always the women, and above all the young ones, who were the most bigoted adherents of the Party, the swallowers of slogans, the amateur spies..." - Orwell
"It was always the women, and above all the young ones, who were the most bigoted adherents of the Party, the swallowers of slogans, the amateur spies..." - Orwell
The Madden franchise is solid? Bullshit. If you took all the fun I've ever had playing Madden NFL and condensed it into a single session, it still wouldn't be as fun as the shittiest game of NFL Blitz.Leisher wrote:If it weren't for their sports games, which to their credit have been mostly solid, they wouldn't be in the position they're in today.
Everything else they touch has turned to shit, and honestly, you'll hear a lot of their sports fans bitching about those games going downhill...
Diogenes of Sinope: "It is not that I am mad, it is only that my head is different from yours."
Arnold Judas Rimmer, BSC, SSC: "Better dead than smeg."
Arnold Judas Rimmer, BSC, SSC: "Better dead than smeg."
EA offers a freebie if you chose to put up with SimCity. If they were actually sorry about fucking up, they'd offer everyone free copies of the next big game they put out, not something from their previous releases.
Diogenes of Sinope: "It is not that I am mad, it is only that my head is different from yours."
Arnold Judas Rimmer, BSC, SSC: "Better dead than smeg."
Arnold Judas Rimmer, BSC, SSC: "Better dead than smeg."
The Madden franchise is solid? Bullshit. If you took all the fun I've ever had playing Madden NFL and condensed it into a single session, it still wouldn't be as fun as the shittiest game of NFL Blitz.
You ignored where I said things have been going downhill, and lost your credibility when you suggested NFL Blitz was nothing more than a gimmick.
You should have went with Sega's NFL 2K series that was hamstrung by EA buying the rights to the teams/players. (EA is currently being sued by the NFLPA because of these practices.)
they'd offer everyone free copies of the next big game they put out
Ha! Could you imagine the quality of a game that EA developed knowing it would make no money? It'd probably make pong seem advanced.
"Happy slaves are the worst enemies of freedom." - Marie Von Ebner
"It was always the women, and above all the young ones, who were the most bigoted adherents of the Party, the swallowers of slogans, the amateur spies..." - Orwell
"It was always the women, and above all the young ones, who were the most bigoted adherents of the Party, the swallowers of slogans, the amateur spies..." - Orwell
NFL Blitz was fun because it took the notion of rubberband AI to an absurd extreme. Were you up by 50 points midway through the 4th quarter? Didn't matter because you and your opponent could pull of one insane play after the next.
Fine, then, nothing specific so as to diffuse that possibility. Maybe just a voucher for a future EA product as long as it's under $100 or something.
Edited By Malcolm on 1363634508
Ha! Could you imagine the quality of a game that EA developed knowing it would make no money? It'd probably make pong seem advanced.
Fine, then, nothing specific so as to diffuse that possibility. Maybe just a voucher for a future EA product as long as it's under $100 or something.
Edited By Malcolm on 1363634508
Diogenes of Sinope: "It is not that I am mad, it is only that my head is different from yours."
Arnold Judas Rimmer, BSC, SSC: "Better dead than smeg."
Arnold Judas Rimmer, BSC, SSC: "Better dead than smeg."
NFL Blitz was fun because it took the notion of rubberband AI to an absurd extreme. Were you up by 50 points midway through the 4th quarter? Didn't matter because you and your opponent could pull of one insane play after the next.
It was fun, but I wouldn't say it resembled actual football.
Fine, then, nothing specific so as to diffuse that possibility. Maybe just a voucher for a future EA product as long as its under $100 or something.
Now that's a good idea.
"Happy slaves are the worst enemies of freedom." - Marie Von Ebner
"It was always the women, and above all the young ones, who were the most bigoted adherents of the Party, the swallowers of slogans, the amateur spies..." - Orwell
"It was always the women, and above all the young ones, who were the most bigoted adherents of the Party, the swallowers of slogans, the amateur spies..." - Orwell
I was.JUST coming to the thread to say that i doubt EA will be hurt by the simcity debacle. Maxis, on the other hand....
I cant believe that POS game has had a millions units sold. Maybe they are inflating the.numbers like with city population.
And TFA mentioned Skylanders.... my kid loves that game and is personally responsible for about half of the $600 million in U.S. sales. He has every champion except for one.
I cant believe that POS game has had a millions units sold. Maybe they are inflating the.numbers like with city population.
And TFA mentioned Skylanders.... my kid loves that game and is personally responsible for about half of the $600 million in U.S. sales. He has every champion except for one.
"Be bold, and mighty forces will come to your aid."
I think that a lot of it is..... peeps start game companies not because they are driven to make art forever, but because they want to get a hit and sell out and get rich. Yeah, EA buys out the code shops we love.... but they owners didn't HAVE to sell. And, Westwood and Cavedog and Sierra and etc etc etc all had to know what would happen to their properties once they were owned by Megala-Lo-Software-Sweatshop.
"Be bold, and mighty forces will come to your aid."
In a memo sent by Riccitiello to Probst to remind the latter of why the fuck he was leaving, the outgoing chief highlighted the company's <s>growing</s> flaccid digital <s>business</s> reputation that ranks slightly lower than Jack Thompson's. At his direction, EA created an online games platform that no one uses dubbed <s>Origin</s> Fuck You Richard Garriot and Fuck You Chris Roberts to <s>distribute</s> overcharge for titles over the Internet because sales are for pussy retailers.
Fixed.
SimCity hits 1.1M sales
I see nothing cited beyond EA's word, which goes for about as much as a cold pile of shit with ebola.
Edited By Malcolm on 1363661132
Diogenes of Sinope: "It is not that I am mad, it is only that my head is different from yours."
Arnold Judas Rimmer, BSC, SSC: "Better dead than smeg."
Arnold Judas Rimmer, BSC, SSC: "Better dead than smeg."