SimCity Apology Offers One Of Eight Free Games

[bug_of_war]

For fuck sake people, EA is offering 8 decent games as apology and you're still bagging on them? FUCKING GROW UP! EA is trying to do something good and a bunch of you are acting like children. THIS is why people don't take gamers seriously, because insead of being mature about a situation they always seem to demand more. So far EA have done more than Valve did when The War Z came out and was unplayable.

 

[RicoADF]

For fuck sake people, EA is offering 8 decent games as apology and you're still bagging on them? FUCKING GROW UP! EA is trying to do something good and a bunch of you are acting like children. THIS is why people don't take gamers seriously, because insead of being mature about a situation they always seem to demand more. So far EA have done more than Valve did when The War Z came out and was unplayable.

To be fair not everyone is complaining, myself and others are saying the same as you. Not only are most of them decent and varied games to suit most people's tastes, the majority of them are less than a year old.

 

[MeChaNiZ3D]

Plants Vs Zombies...*snicker*

...

...WARFIGHTER?! *guffaws*

Well if it isn't EA trying to flog unwanted games/attract new players to series that are loaded with DLC in the hopes of them eventually buying it.

Then again, considering their blanket approach to games, it is getting harder and harder to even find 8 EA-published games at random that don't imply ulterior motives.

As to "But they're free games", it's not free games I'm against. It's this particular selection of free games, clearly designed to sell DLC and prequels. For example, people at this stage have likely either played Mass Effect 3, decided NOT to play Mass Effect 3, or have previously had nothing to do with the series, Warfighter is complete crap, and PvZ is $10.

 

[carlh267]

snip

Oh yes, because even when EA gives out free games as an apology for a serious fuck up, its somehow a giant conspiracy theory to get into your wallet. Lets look at the number of sequels to the games on this list, shall we?

Battlefield does have a sequel
Bejeweled does not have a planned sequel
Dead Space does not.
Mass Effect does, but its not coming out in 2013
MoH has been canned due to poor Warfighter sales
No sequel for Need for Speed
Plants vs. Zombies- no sequel, but Popcap is rumored to be working on it.
Simcity 4: Well, there is a sequel, but it just came out and its coincidentally the game that's giving away one of these goodies.

So when you count everything up, its 2 games with confirmed sequels, 1 with an unconfirmed sequel, and 5 with no sequel. Yep, this is all a giant conspiracy to get you to buy future sequels to these games, grab your pitchforks everyone!

Unbelievable, people already are getting a pretty damn good selection of games (excluding Doorfighter and Bejeweled), and even then it isn't enough goodwill for some people, because they aren't handing out GOTY editions.

What, you need more evidence that EA is about as subtle as a rhino with a wrecking ball?
the games don't need to have sequels, they all have a ton of dlc that you have to buy to get the full experience. as for casual games and stuff that came out 10 years ago... they don't count for the same reason it wouldn't count if they were handing out keychains...
what is it costing them to give you these? nothing, because it's just a download. just as it would cost them nothing to give the full game. Don't take this as greed on my part though, I have no horse in this race because i didn't buy simcity to begin with so i'm not getting anything. I'm just calling them as I see them, and the way i see it, EA has some terrible business practices. before you say that i just think they can't do anything right, I think they can (although they won't). stop with the bullshit DRM, stop twisting developer's arms to make their games fit in your business model and sell games on their own merit. if they can do that, i'll buy it, say 'thank you' and get the dlc too when it comes out.

You don't provide any evidence to your theory besides that the free games they're giving out all have DLC? Nice try. Almost every game nowadays has a ton of DLC, including games not made by EA. Saints Row 3. Team Fortress 2. Dungeon Defenders. Sleeping Dogs. Games like, I dunno, Minecraft, are in the vast minority when it comes to not releasing DLC. So the "well, they're offering THESE games because they have a lot of DLC to get you to spend loadsamone" doesn't really cut the mustard here.

The fact is, the devs that allow EA to hand the games out for free could potentially lose money on every download during this forgiveness campaign. It hurts both EA and the devs to do so, not because they have to make disks, but because they're giving out copies of a product for free which otherwise might've been purchased by paying customers (hence the "potentially" disclaimer).

Like you, I don't have skin in the game, and also like you, I despise some of the business practices EA has made over the years. But lets not start reading between the lines to find evidence that doesn't actually exist.

 

[Xdeser2]

Eh, Still hate you EA...

...But it is undeniable that your marketing dept. is doing something RIGHT for a change

 

[Dumoras]

just finished downloading the free game, restarted and got this.
Battlefield 3
We're sorry, an error has occurred
Invalid license. Reason code =Missing DLL (15 chinese symbols)
Error:0x0000007e

Considering my avatar i should have seen this coming

 

[likalaruku]

I'f I'm not mistaken, you can either play Bejeweled 3 & Plants vs Zombies for free on Facebook, or get them for $7 at Bigfish, so those are really lousy offers when you pair them with games that cost upwards of $60.

 

[bug_of_war]

To be fair not everyone is complaining, myself and others are saying the same as you. Not only are most of them decent and varied games to suit most people's tastes, the majority of them are less than a year old.

That's the problem though, there's only a minority of people who think this way. The rest are all acting like children and make most of these threads a massive whinge fest instead of being mature and saying, "They fucked up. Thankfully they are acknowledging they fucked up and are trying to compensate customers whom were effected". It pisses me off the amount of unjustified hate EA gets.

 

[wurrble182]

you don't have to accept their gift, if you're so morally opposed to it. but you will, won't you, all of you god knows i will, just because they give me a free platform from which to download more of their precious DLC, doesnt mean i have to, last i checked i did actually have free will.

 

[Floppertje]

snip

You don't provide any evidence to your theory besides that the free games they're giving out all have DLC? Nice try. Almost every game nowadays has a ton of DLC, including games not made by EA. Saints Row 3. Team Fortress 2. Dungeon Defenders. Sleeping Dogs. Games like, I dunno, Minecraft, are in the vast minority when it comes to not releasing DLC. So the "well, they're offering THESE games because they have a lot of DLC to get you to spend loadsamone" doesn't really cut the mustard here.

The fact is, the devs that allow EA to hand the games out for free could potentially lose money on every download during this forgiveness campaign. It hurts both EA and the devs to do so, not because they have to make disks, but because they're giving out copies of a product for free which otherwise might've been purchased by paying customers (hence the "potentially" disclaimer).

Like you, I don't have skin in the game, and also like you, I despise some of the business practices EA has made over the years. But lets not start reading between the lines to find evidence that doesn't actually exist.

I'm not saying it's hard evidence or that i'm 100% right. I just think, looking at EA's past behaviour and the list of games they're giving away, it's a little iffy they're either casual, tanked or have dlc which you'll need to pay for to get the full experience. I'm not saying that having DLC is bad, I'm saying that when it comes to corporate apologies, this one seems to be focused on costing as little as possible, which kinda puts a question mark over the sincerity of it all. but that's just a gut feeling, i can't read minds or anything. If I could, I'd be the worlds best stock trader.

Nesides that, i'm pretty sure the devs don't own the rights to these games, so they don't get a say in the matter.

Anyway, I don't think either one of us is going to convince the other so how about we just agree to have a different interpretation of the matter?

 

[Mycroft Holmes]

This is the same stunt sony pulled after their snafu with the PSN hack; apologizing by offering free games, which, coincidentally, have sequels coming out next month. That's not an apology, that's salvaging the situation by salvaging some more money from your pockets. they could at least try being a bit more subtle about it. Hey, how about this? give away the full edition of quality games and generate some goodwill so that people will want to buy the next game you release? god knows you could use it...

So when you count everything up, its 2 games with confirmed sequels, 1 with an unconfirmed sequel, and 5 with no sequel. Yep, this is all a giant conspiracy to get you to buy future sequels to these games, grab your pitchforks everyone!

Also even if it is a conspiracy to get you to buy sequels, who the fuck gives a shit? They are giving you free games. If you don't like them then obviously you won't buy the sequel. If you do like them, then congrats you have found another game you like, how is that a bad thing? It would be like bitching about videogame demos or those assholes at Id for releasing a shareware version of doom 2 that gave you an entire free episode set of 9 levels for free.

 

[Atrocious Joystick]

Wow. Dead Space 3 was released like last month?

I expected decent games but decent games that were a few years old. Like Dragon Age or Mass Effect (numero uno). Most of these are decent and fresh games. That is one hell of an apology.

Although it is kind of ironic that one of the games you can chose is Simcity 4.

 

[Strazdas]

So which game should I choose?

Battlefield 3.
You have liked one previuos installement, so the gameplay is at least somewhat to your liking. It is a good game even if it does get a lot of hate in the COD vs BF wars. and frankly this is your only option anyway.
Dead Space 3 is bad. really bad. Dead Space 1 was a good game, it went downhill with 2 and 3 is a very bad game.
NFS:Most wanted is no contender either. NFS franchise keep going downwards after Underground 2 and this is no exception. Played at cousins, feels like its some fan-made arcade and not a AAA game.

just because they give me a free platform from which to download more of their precious DLC, doesnt mean i have to, last i checked i did actually have free will.

And thats what seperates you from an average videogame fan.

 

[rofltehcat]

Did anyone really expect them to give out new games? Imo it was pretty clear people would get something a little bit older.
Overall, most games are still high quality games and if you didn't play them already it is at least some redemption after the whole Sim City thing.

However, this is hardly enough for the trouble they caused and letting them off with this will only lead to more of the same old crap.

 

[Longstreet]

Exactly as i predicted when they announced this.

They offer free games without dlc in hopes of still making money.
Offer free standard version of a year or so old game without dlc, customers think: "eh whats 20 bucks for dlc to me, the game was free anyway"

As said in the article their distribution costs in 0, so EA can only get a profit out of this.

You could see this coming miles away.

 

[DTWolfwood]

Big big buyers remorse for Dead Space 3! paid only $23 still could have gotten it free

 

[Cpt. Slow]

You could see this coming miles away.

Yes and somewhere at EA, one of the marketing directors is twirling his moustache like Snidely Whiplash. Damn you evil EA, damn you all to hell!

Anyway, to get back to the less inconspicuous reason why they are offering these games... I think it's an appropriate response. I bought the game, aside of the (major) bugs this game has. The maps are way too small. No editing of the maps (probably will be jacked as a DLC?) so my fond memories of Simcity 3000 are slowly sinking away with this disaster of a game that the new SimCity is. What a pity. So I'm hoping Deadspace 3 is a bit more fun. Even if Yahtzee /dev/null(ed) it back to it's developers.