SimCity Offline-Mode Patch Won't Be Arriving "Any Time Soon"

[VanQ]

What's interesting is that PoE doesn't have an offline mode either, yet nobody really complains about that. However we can extrapolate that many people have left D3 for other games (Probably PoE/Torchlight 2) on that merit alone.

Point being, comparing a (relatively speaking) low profile niche title like D3, to a high profile shooter aimed at a general audience in terms of pirating is simply rediculous.

Excuse me for a second hwile I try to catch my breath after laughing for a good 15 minutes straight at the fact that you called Diablo 3 a "low profile niche title." I'm sorry, my sides quite literally blasted off Team Rocket style thanks to that.

http://www.computerandvideogames.com/390025/diablo-iii-passes-12-million-sales-worldwide/

I'm sorry but you clearly have no idea what you're talking about. People left D3 because it was a terrible game. Torchlight 2 was a lighter game but was a lot more fun and didn't have a game breaking Real Money Auction House and always online DRM. PoE is always online because it was designed that way from the start and it's 100% free to play with only cosmetic items and a few convenience things like extra bank space up for small amounts of money.

 

[Ed130 The Vanguard]

Poor EA. Even when Maxis officially states its their fault, a large chunk of the gaming community insists its still EA's doing.

And so begins the process. Maxis has now been hung out to dry. Taking the fall. EA will drop the hammer on them soon. It was a long slow death Maxis. A damn shame really.

You do both realise Maxis died years ago?

On The Sims boxart the Maxis Logo was much larger than EA's.

On the Expansions EA was larger.

Sims 2 has Maxis relegated to the back of the box and the launch screens. (At this point Maxis longtime studio in Walnut Creek was officially closed).

By the fourth Sims 2 expansion even the launch logo had been omitted.

 

[Blind Sight]

There's something truly hilarious about an executive claiming they want players' 'trust' while they propagate an always online component that shows they clearly don't trust consumers.

 

[Sigmund Av Volsung]

EDIT: Before you troll me: Look at the companies that are currently being pirated the most... Square Enix, Bethesda, hell, even Valve games are more pirated than Diablo 3... lol

#1 pirated game: Crysis 2 (EA)
#2 pirated game: Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (Activision)
#3 pirated game: Battlefield 3 (EA/Sega)
#4 pirated game: FIFA 12 (EA)
#5 pirated game: Portal 2 (Valve Corporation)

Would you like to rephrase your statement?

I suppose you could look at Diablo 3 specifically, but that's a niche game that only a tiny portion of gamers would even enjoy. I haven't even once been motivated to look at Diablo 3, and none of that has anything to do with it having online DRM.

Edit: The above list are PC piracy stats from 2011. Similar results are found on other platforms and other years.

Diablo 3 doesn't have the always online DRM? The games you listed do?

Eh?

EDIT: Tomb Raider, Crysis 3, Farcry 3, and Skyrim are at (mostly) the top today lad. They don't have the DRM. Or am I wrong about that? I admit, I could be. I only hear about Diablo 3 and Sim City being the devil.

There are more sure, but even Minecraft is currently being pirated more then Diablo 3.... so is Assassins Creed Revelations.... REVELATIONS for damned sake!

Boarderlands 2, the Japan graphic novel where you try to score with cripples, a lot of games that were released well before Diablo 3. Left 4 Dead 2... Amnesia the Dark Descent, Batman Arkham city, COD MW2, CIV V, Total War Shogun 2, Mafia 2, ect ect

But NOOOOOOOO

It's always online DRM that makes people pirate.... lol

People don't pirate games made from good devs right?

Tell that to the thousands of people right now pirating The Witcher 2!

*giggles

Far Cry 3 has DRM through uplay, though not as aggressive, as say, ACII.
Revelations also had DRM(the same kind as FC3)
Borderlands/Civ V/Total War Shogun 2/CoD MW(any one of them)/Mafia 2/Left 4 Dead(though I imagine that few private servers for it exist, and those that do, either are hackers a plenty or just dead)/Skyrim is a steamworks game, so that counts as DRM
Crysis 3 works through Origin, so yes, DRM

Tomb Raider is the only exception, and it is not the best out of all the games you listed, so no, they don't always pirate games made by good developers; do you see The Walking Dead, Journey or Dishonored in those #10 charts?

No.

 

[Gearhead mk2]

...the Japan graphic novel where you try to score with cripples...

Katawa Shoujo is freeware made from 4Chan, dude. And from what I've heard of it, it's far beyond being just another creepy eroge game.

OT: My apologies to the loyal SimCity fans that were tricked into buying an EA game, and to Maxis for having to work for EA.

 

[RicoADF]

I like how they will say they 'will look into int to regain gamers trust'

they could look into it and then decide not to.

this is what happens when you make a game series that has been primarily single player, force it to be multiplayer with no offline mode, and expect everyone to be happy when your servers bite it when the demand was too high.

I'm sorry, that's the wrong fucking answer.

No, really. This should be seen as the last straw, final, definitive proof that always on drm does not work in a satisfactory way, and never has worked. There should be no fucking question behind this. EA, maxis, whoever the fuck's fault it is, you fucked up, there is no way this can not be seen as a fuck up, you better fix it.

They may very well have realised that forcing online wasn't the best move, and it seems like it was a design decision to both add something new into the game (multiplayer which some of us did want) and has the bonus of it being effective DRM. However, regardless of how much people want an offline mode I doubt its something that could quickly be patched in over night, the whole social region system is built into the core of the game and it wont be quick and easy to disconnect it all.

It's a shame they didn't build an offline mode into the game with a simple ping server when it starts, or just origin as the DRM requirement, either one would work fine and could be patched out of the servers were ever decided to be disconnected.

 

[Squilookle]

If you're only holding on to your money until an offline mode for Simcity arrives- you're not doing enough. You should still hold on to your money until they promise offline modes for ALL of their future games.

I don't know, a sudden spike in sales after they allow people to play offline would send the most clear and concise message that EA would understand.

Yes, and that message would be 'phew! you dodged a bullet with Simcity there. Business as usual from now on- no need for EA to learn anything whatsoever'.

 

[FoolKiller]

If you want a really good laugh

http://www.ea.com/executives

Not a single one of their own executives are even playing that shitty game they released :3

That's not their fault. They probably can't log into their servers either. Or possibly the drop down menu to pick the games that they are currently playing has SimCity deactivated so that they can get the core experience working in a timely manner

 

[VoidWanderer]

Terrifying implication...

What if all the stupid things we have seen in gaming are the developers fault, and not the people paying for the game to be made...?

 

[Strazdas]

Its easy. take the server region cluster emulation that they use on thier severs (surely they dont have a physical server for each cluster), copy it into the package and let anything even somethin as defualt as microsoft server emulate it. our cna ignore the securities since this is going to be a local server emulation anyway. and peopel shoudl be allowed to hack their own singleplayer games.

its a workaround, its clunky (so no your dad's pc), but it works, its fast to make and its better than not letting you
play at all.

I'm sorry, that's the wrong fucking answer.

No, really. This should be seen as the last straw, final, definitive proof that always on drm does not work in a satisfactory way, and never has worked. There should be no fucking question behind this. EA, maxis, whoever the fuck's fault it is, you fucked up, there is no way this can not be seen as a fuck up, you better fix it.

By that logic, AC2 (back in 2009) should be seen as the last straw, final, definitive proof that always on drm does not work in a satisfactory way, and never has worked. sadly, it is not true. they still earned huge profits on the title.

Not a single one of their own executives are even playing that shitty game they released :3

notice how they are playing mostly old games and neither have a DRM?

 

[Colt47]

Sounds like things are going the way I was leading towards in my older posts. EA built the game as a multi-player specific game, so making an offline version of this game would be like doing the reboot of Final Fantasy XIV: building a brand new game that uses assets from the older one and the SimCity title. Oh well, at least we got Tropico 4!

 

[GonvilleBromhead]

If you're only holding on to your money until an offline mode for Simcity arrives- you're not doing enough. You should still hold on to your money until they promise offline modes for ALL of their future games.

I don't know, a sudden spike in sales after they allow people to play offline would send the most clear and concise message that EA would understand.

Yes, and that message would be 'phew! you dodged a bullet with Simcity there. Business as usual from now on- no need for EA to learn anything whatsoever'.

I don't know, a bunch of shareholders seeing more sales and lower costs (servers cost money, afterall) is a pretty good incentive not to try this shit again. In fact, I'd very much imagine that there are a lot of shareholders asking very awkward questions about the increased cost and bad PR at the moment - something the executives will pick up on and when one considers that EA's stock has been in steady decline for some time, it is a damned site more likely to see an end to this bollocks than anything else

 

[Bestival]

This DRM is the best way I've ever seen something create equality between opposing factions.

If I were to pirate this game, I couldn't play it due to its always online DRM. If I were to buy this game I couldn't play it due to its always online DRM.

Truly the only way to win here is by just not wanting or trying to play this game at all. And I personally am okay with that. Sucks for the people that lost money on this though.

 

[GonvilleBromhead]

Terrifying implication...

What if all the stupid things we have seen in gaming are the developers fault, and not the people paying for the game to be made...?

In this case, I think blame can be fairly equally divided between the two - Maxis for deciding upon the online based system and heavily multiplayer biased gameplay (one only has to look at the bollocks that constitutes Sims 3 with the microtransaction and scaled back base gameplay with the need for expansion packs, not to mention Spore, to realise that Maxis has a quite a proclivity to do this sort of thing, perhaps more so than any other EA owned developer), and EA for the server errors and bad customer relations

 

[Myoukochou]

That's odd, because what I've heard from people who've disassembled the program code to look into this are that your PC does all the simulation (hence high CPU usage): the game itself is not "cloud" at all.

The parts that time out are the online copy-protection checksum code framework and savegame sync code (both factored into Origin), and the calls to the SimCity Social servers to update your region statistics and get the neighbouring region stats and transfers (that's the "cloud" part, although that could be emulated). These only time out once every 10 minutes or so (although the Origin savegame sync can also in some cases roll back to earlier save versions, which means potentially losing hours of play, and indeed this has happened to some people, including reviewers). All of that could be disabled, officially or unofficially, and leave a perfectly playable single-player game.

An offline crack is most certainly possible, and I believe is being worked on right now, so EA/Maxis are racing the clock: merely "looking into it" is several steps behind where they ought to be... notably, it ought to have been in there in the first place, or should never time out the game session... but we all know EA would "never greenlight a single player game", as they've expressly boasted about that.

I do wonder if, with the number of people who've been burned with this one (maybe for the last time for some of them), EA will end up eating those words. I wonder what will happen if an unofficial offline patch manages to come out before an official one (despite Maxis having the source code, so having an unimaginably significant head start).

I wonder what the piracy rate for this game will be like, bearing in mind of course that many of the people who do end up pirating it if EA/Maxis don't release an offline patch will have been people who bought the game, only to have been unable to play it, and then to have been refused refunds for a game that doesn't work. Those people are, justifiably, very very angry. (Last I checked, they're still refusing refunds, by the way.)

I mean, this is actually worse than Spore. I'm almost impressed by the level of malice, incompetence and indifference shown by EA towards its customers over this issue.

 

[Zipa]

EDIT: Before you troll me: Look at the companies that are currently being pirated the most... Square Enix, Bethesda, hell, even Valve games are more pirated than Diablo 3... lol

#1 pirated game: Crysis 2 (EA)
#2 pirated game: Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (Activision)
#3 pirated game: Battlefield 3 (EA/Sega)
#4 pirated game: FIFA 12 (EA)
#5 pirated game: Portal 2 (Valve Corporation)

Would you like to rephrase your statement?

I suppose you could look at Diablo 3 specifically, but that's a niche game that only a tiny portion of gamers would even enjoy. I haven't even once been motivated to look at Diablo 3, and none of that has anything to do with it having online DRM.

Edit: The above list are PC piracy stats from 2011. Similar results are found on other platforms and other years.

Diablo 3 doesn't have the always online DRM? The games you listed do?

Eh?

EDIT: Tomb Raider, Crysis 3, Farcry 3, and Skyrim are at (mostly) the top today lad. They don't have the DRM. Or am I wrong about that? I admit, I could be. I only hear about Diablo 3 and Sim City being the devil.

There are more sure, but even Minecraft is currently being pirated more then Diablo 3.... so is Assassins Creed Revelations.... REVELATIONS for damned sake!

Boarderlands 2, the Japan graphic novel where you try to score with cripples, a lot of games that were released well before Diablo 3. Left 4 Dead 2... Amnesia the Dark Descent, Batman Arkham city, COD MW2, CIV V, Total War Shogun 2, Mafia 2, ect ect

But NOOOOOOOO

It's always online DRM that makes people pirate.... lol

People don't pirate games made from good devs right?

Tell that to the thousands of people right now pirating The Witcher 2!

*giggles

Farcry 3 has DRM in the form of Uplay (and Steam), and im pretty sure that Crysis 3 requires origin to play even if you buy it from another retailer like GMG or gamestop. Same with Skyrim, it has to run through Steam even if you bought a physical copy. Same deal with the new Tomb raider, it has to run either Steam or Origin , sites like greenmangaming mention that it needs a steam account on the main page for the game. That's not to say that some of the clever people out there can get these games to run without DRM via means I can't mention here because of forum rules but the DRM is definitely there.

Pretty much every PC game now has DRM of some form on it, mostly if its using Steam and Origin its not invasive and doesn't disrupt you playing the game when you have no internet or servers are down ect. A lot of PC gamers accept it as a necessary evil and at least with Steam and to a lesser extent origin you get some stuff back for the inconvenience like in game chat ect.

What really pisses people off is the always online requirement, simply put if the servers are down or your internet is down or they decide to shut the servers down because they don't want to pay for them any more then you have a game that doesn't work any more.

 

[Euskalduna]

Well, when that offline patch gets around to getting made, then they can have my money, not a moment sooner though.

Until then (or even then) Sim City 4 will suffice.

 

[GonvilleBromhead]

That's odd, because what I've heard from people who've disassembled the program code to look into this are that your PC does all the simulation (hence high CPU usage): the game itself is not "cloud" at all.

The parts that time out are the online copy-protection checksum code framework and savegame sync code (both factored into Origin), and the calls to the SimCity Social servers to update your region statistics and get the neighbouring region stats and transfers (that's the "cloud" part, although that could be emulated). These only time out once every 10 minutes or so (although the Origin savegame sync can also in some cases roll back to earlier save versions, which means potentially losing hours of play, and indeed this has happened to some people, including reviewers). All of that could be disabled, officially or unofficially, and leave a perfectly playable single-player game.

An offline crack is most certainly possible, and I believe is being worked on right now, so EA/Maxis are racing the clock: merely "looking into it" is several steps behind where they ought to be... notably, it ought to have been in there in the first place, or should never time out the game session... but we all know EA would "never greenlight a single player game", as they've expressly boasted about that.

I do wonder if, with the number of people who've been burned with this one (maybe for the last time for some of them), EA will end up eating those words. I wonder what will happen if an unofficial offline patch manages to come out before an official one (despite Maxis having the source code, so having an unimaginably significant head start).

I wonder what the piracy rate for this game will be like, bearing in mind of course that many of the people who do end up pirating it if EA/Maxis don't release an offline patch will have been people who bought the game, only to have been unable to play it, and then to have been refused refunds for a game that doesn't work. Those people are, justifiably, very very angry. (Last I checked, they're still refusing refunds, by the way.)

I mean, this is actually worse than Spore. I'm almost impressed by the level of malice, incompetence and indifference shown by EA towards its customers over this issue.

Very interesting stuff, many thanks for that - I was under the assumption that a patch wasn't possible (though I could see a recall and reprint)

 

[NotSoNimble]

Tomb Raider is the only exception, and it is not the best out of all the games you listed, so no, they don't always pirate games made by good developers; do you see The Walking Dead, Journey or Dishonored in those #10 charts?

No.

Dishonored is 27th

Ya got me there!

 

[Sigmund Av Volsung]

Tomb Raider is the only exception, and it is not the best out of all the games you listed, so no, they don't always pirate games made by good developers; do you see The Walking Dead, Journey or Dishonored in those #10 charts?

No.

Dishonored is 27th

Ya got me there!

And what is #1 on a lot of torrent sites?

SIMS 3