Simcity Burns

[Tyyr]

So is it possible for someone to steal the base code and run a pirate server?

In theory, if you had enough legit players playing it you might be able to track the variables that are sent out and the return data and start to reverse engineer the algorithms of the base engine on the server. You'd probably need to coordinate, minimize the variables and size of the cities but in theory you might be able to do it.

However if someone was able to get a hold of the server software you could run a pirate server or even repackage it either as a working game with what you get in the download or maybe run some sort of virtual server where you trick the game to sending data to a "server" but it's just another program you keep running.

EA games is having the worst PR disaster out of any game company I've ever seen.

They need to do an emergency recall and refund and relaunch.

Holy flying shit. They release a press release saying that they will give you a refund if you're not happy... then refuse to do it. I do have to wonder if this is legit but even if its not it could seriously piss a lot of people off.

I couldn't be happier. I can't believe I'm sitting here actually hoping that a Sim City game goes down in flames.

[Tyyr]

You know, this might warrant it's own thread, thoughts?

Also, breaking news, they're full of shit. Apparently there isn't anything like a truly massive amount of data being sent back to EA. Between packet sniffing and just plain old pulling the plug on their router people have found that the game plays perfectly well for ten minutes with NO internet connection. In multiplayer the region doesn't update but the game continues to run just fine. Furthermore, whatever you did to the city during that ten minutes will be uploaded to EA's servers the next time you get online. You lose absolutely nothing. The always on thing? Pure DRM. Glassbox handing off calc duties to the servers? Bullshit. The game isn't handing off work to Glassbox, it's just that minimally processor intensive.

[Teaos]

Yeah I was meaning someone hacking the EA server and stealing the info on their end and rehosting and formating the game so it runs with out internet.

I think that is legit as comments are saying they are getting similar responces or just being put on indefinate hold. One commentator was linking the the "on hold" call that he was on, it had been running for over 3 hours.

[Teaos]

Split. People are clocking standard i5 CPU's at 15-25% usage. Anyone with a gaming machine are barely registering the usage.

Sales were good the first 3 days then dropped and if possible people are returning. I think EA is going to try and stall on returns until they can put a cap on this problem. At the very least get the servers running.

They have already cut down the play options drastically. No cheeta speed and limited multiplayer options which takes away the only legit reason to have it be online.

[Tyyr]

Meanwhile Lucy, the project lead from Maxis is saying that you can't just turn off the online requirement because it's a region based game and cities interact and blah blah blah. Single player, I don't have other people building cities near me and all cities are under my control. There's no need to be online for single player and she knows it. She's just got her EA overlords breathing down her neck.

EA is stalling, hopping to get things running so that people will settle down and decide they want to keep the game.

[Teaos]

I dont follow the Diablo series but people are comparing this debarkle to its premier.

[Tyyr]

This is WAAAAAY worse than Error 37, and its with a game that has a strong, but not Diablo strong following.

[stitch626]

Yeah this makes Diablo's problem look normal.

Here's hoping this gets to the point that they reconsider their stupid concept.

[Tsukiyumi]

Reading a couple of reviews with people saying "it's worth the hassle" and "the online-only gameplay is the core of what makes it great", etc.

Could these people be any more obviously paid off by EA? The core of what makes SimCity great is BUILDING YOUR OWN CITY, not "social interaction". that's what The Sims was for.

I'm really glad that there are literally hundreds of games that I never got around to playing; there must be enough for me to enjoy for another 30 years. Call me back when games evolve into holodeck programs. Then it might be worth this sort of hassle.

[Tyyr]

It just keeps getting uglier. People are starting to examine the game in detail and it's pathetic. Path finding is based solely on shortest distance, there is no consideration given to transit options at all. So, if you build that big high capacity road a block or two over don't expect your sims to alter their routes. Unless it's the shortest they'll ignore it an continue to congest some little 2 lane feeder. Every fire truck goes to the same fire, every one. Doesn't matter how many fires there are in the city they'll all gang up on one. Trolley cars don't chose routes intelligently, it's purely random. With your buildings it doesn't matter if only one out of 10,000 jobs are filled the building will operate at 100% capacity. Easily delivered freight or no freight deliveries at all it has no impact on commercial buildings. In other words the simulation is actually worse than Sim City 4, much worse because it's not a simulation at all.

Game reviewers are whores, everyone knows this. They don't dare rip on games from big publishers like EA because if they do then EA just cuts them out of the loop and what's a game reviewer if they can never get a game to review? The entire gaming media is latched onto the teat of the game companies. I trust the reviewers I know off YouTube far more than anything that gets printed in a magazine. "Worth the hassle" my ass. If I get a chance to sit down and play I want to sit down and play, not wait half an hour to an hour to log on then play for a while and when I log off wonder if anything I just did will actually get saved. "Online-only gameplay is the core of what makes it great,"? The fuck does that even mean? The only online portion of it is regional interaction. In other words, what xxxTVVATD3str0y3r666xxx is doing in his city that's fucking up yours. How does that make a great game?

[Teaos]

Wow the whole reason they said it is mostly online is so all the calculations that are apparently way to powerful to be run on your own computer are handled by their server. If the code is that simple, more simple than SC4 which is almost a decade old... Why not just rip the old code of that game, tweak it a little and use it in this. Sure its dishonest and whoring the game out for money, but still better than what you say.

[Teaos]

From the devils mouth.

To apologise and compensate for SimCity’s tremendously troubled launch, EA has decided to offer a free game to everyone who purchased Maxis’s latest effort. According to an emailed statement, if you’ve activated a copy, you’ll be emailed with instructions on how to redeem your free game, which will become available on March 18.

“I know that’s a little contrived – kind of like buying a present for a friend after you did something crummy, but we feel bad about what happened. We’re hoping you won’t stay mad and that we’ll be friends again when SimCity is running at 100%,” Maxis head Lucy Bradshaw said. She went on to say the experience has improved dramatically over the last few days.

“A lot more people logged on than we expected. More people played and played in ways we never saw in the beta. OK, we agree, that was dumb,” she added.

Meanwhile, in an interview with Polygon, Bradshaw confirmed EA has requested marketing affiliates cease all promotion of the game.

Link

[Tyyr]

Oh, joys of multiplayer.

* Start a region and create what looks to be a decent city. Then build a couple power plants and start to export energy to your regional neighbors. Once they've grown large on your cheap energy, bulldoze your power plants.
* Start a city, take out all three bonds. Begin laying roads and keep this up until you run out of money. With no money and no way to make any the game automatically pauses and can't be started. Paused you can't receive any gifts of money from anyone else. The city plot is now officially ruined for everyone until you decide to delete it from your list.
* Build Vu Tower (Vu being some kind of supervillian) and his henchmen automatically steal money from neighboring cities.
* Or, just be a shitty mayor running a crime infested, pollution choked hell hole and enjoy it as your neighbors have no other recourse but just to suck it up and deal with it.

Sim City 5 Online, Enjoy!

Upthread I posted some results about people checking up on just what SC5 is sending back to the servers. Turns out its almost nothing. You can even play the game for 10 minutes to an hour or more with your computer completely disconnected from the internet. There are no significant calculations being dumped off on EA's servers, none. If you're not playing online it has almost no effect on you.

Pfft, free game. Yeah, sure. Sort of like how they're giving refunds? Notice it's not until the 18th. They're giving themselves time to get things sorted, or at least cool down and using this to help. However they make no promise as to what games. Expect a freebies list of shovelware or stuff two or three years old. You're not going to get BF4 for free.

[Teaos]

Wouldnt mind playing captain caveman again, i think that came out in 93.

[Tyyr]

DLC hell has just begun. People are not able to reclaim abandoned cities due to DLC mismatches. There are three versions of SC5 being sold right now. Deluxe which has 3 European tile sets and this supervillian/hero crap, Limited which has the Superhero stuff, and Standard which is just the base game. If someone who had the deluxe edition abandons a city you can't reclaim it unless you have all the DLC they did. This is leaving some regions with multiple abandoned, unreclaimable cities because people with the deluxe edition made them but no one with a deluxe is coming to reclaim them.

Also the server queue is borked. For whatever reason it lists the most popular regions first, regions which are almost always full. You have to scroll down a ridiculously long list to get to the "less popular" regions which might have a city slot open. There are no filters because apparently the filters were bogging down the servers.

Ok, so if the servers aren't really doing that much in the way of calcs what the hell is wrong with them? Did they cheap these so badly that they can't even handle the minimal amount of data being slung their way?