Comments on: Sim City Has Shown Me That Reviews Don’t Work, So I’m Not Writing Them Anymore

By: chaos_noise

chaos_noise — Fri, 22 Mar 2013 18:42:15 +0000

“If you didn’t want to risk the problems associated with an online game you shouldn’t have bought an online game. You may disagree with the business model, but don’t feign outrage when you bought exactly what you paid for. I’ve never played an online game that doesn’t have connection issues, especially on the first day. That doesn’t mean the game itself is bad. ”

I’ve purchased a few games with this kinda of online only software validation. Not any more though. Not a single game I purchased this way was playable out of the box on day one. Zero. I’ve even returned one for my money back when after a week it still couldn’t connect to the server for it’s initial login. I paid for a game. What I got was a disc or a download, some loading bars and that’s it. I didn’t get the game I purchased at all since it was unplayable.

This also begs the question of what happens in 5 years, 10 years, 20 years? If I want to dust off an old game for another play though (I’m looking at you Heroes of Might and Magic 3) I can. If I want to play a game while on a plane or the bus without internet I can. Can I do that with this new system? Sure they ‘may’ unhitch the game five years from now. They may file Chapter 13 and disappear with the rights to games rotting unused(like when Acclaim went under).

We need to look at the long term implications of such systems. Do they benefit the consumer or the company? Do they hurt the consumer or the pirate? What are the potential implications of this technology expanding (big brother is watching you…sort your inventory in D3 for 2 hours straight).

By: shawn

shawn — Sun, 17 Mar 2013 19:30:18 +0000

well written sir and i agree with all your points i truly wish all reviewers who wrote reviews looked at it like u do because lets be real sites like ign and neogaf and even revision seem to lean toward a sponsored review it would truly be sad to lose such a honest opinon, And my honest opinion is simcity is amazing when the game is working, and i bought it a week after launch and seriously havent had any problems anybody want to build regions together add me on origin – Krypt1983

By: zebo

zebo — Sun, 17 Mar 2013 18:54:07 +0000

I don’t agree with this article-no way.
1)All these “facts” about reviews mentioned in the article are known for a long time,and many ‘journalists’ simply bash games as bashing is the easiest way to get klicks by creating controversials
2)the real point about sim city was completely missed here.
Even if you ignore always online,drm and pseudo multiplayer or the fact that you neither own this game,nor can save it,nor can play it as single player.
it is about the game itself.
Sim City is a beta,an unfinished product and you are ea’s guinea pig.
The AI is bad,no terraforming,subways?,small maps(in fact it is Sim Village,not sim city)
The gameplay was dumbed down.Huge loss of creativity.

Now combine all this and you have a game you don’t own but rent, though it is expensive,a game you can’t play and if you can play than it is a bad game.
Sim city deserved bad ratings.

The question is not how the reviews rating could have changed that much,
the question is: how can a game with so many flaws reach 90% overall score with the first 6 ratings.
Even if you ignore always on,drm etc and the game runs smoothly it is just below average-maximum:70% game.
maybe a casual gamer will love this game,but a reviewer is a skilled and professional core gamer and should recognize all the bad thing in sim city.No hoenest reviewer can rate this game 90%,not even close.

that’s why i don’t trust the 1st reviews of a new game as they are bought.

By: Hamsterfist

Hamsterfist — Sun, 17 Mar 2013 16:45:43 +0000

The problem with reviews are not the amateur reviewers. It is the paid shills, the professional gaming enthusiast press, who hide behind the name “enthusiast”. They are nothing but insiders who might as well be working directly for EA and any visit to their twitter accounts, where you will see back peddling and excuse making, will further prove what a bunch of slimey, egotistical, entitled (yes, they are the term they use against complaining gamers) and grifting losers they are. Is it any wonder all the old gaming press sites/magazines are dying. We are not getting what we want, as consumers. Actual journalism and actual opinion, not based off free games and being buddies with everyone on the “inside”. Why is this not a problem with other enthusiast press, such as with movies?

Anyways, there is more then just DRM and not being able to connect with Sim City, it is just that real reviews have been lost in the wilderness. Houses in streets, traffic disappearing and reappearing, getting stuck for no reason, the number of sims on the streets not being representative of the total population (which was the excuse as to why the town is so tiny compared to previous games) and I am sure many more issues that I have not read about. In either case I would also like to mention your idea that this is an online only game, of which I agree, if you don’t like it, don’t buy it. The trouble is, it is not like Sim City is World or Warcraft or something. It has always been a single player game, and if you don’t spend your time on gaming sites or /v/, you might be victimized by this. Yes, you could read the box, but the mention of online might not have been super clear. The brain does strange things, and you might just think it has online components. I mean, why would a single player game require online? Well…… those people certainly got screwed. The non enthusiasts, who don’t spend all day on n4g or are not technically proficient.

By: bmw801ts

bmw801ts — Sun, 17 Mar 2013 13:48:11 +0000

I’m pretty sure the Simcity fans have every reason to raise hell. That said, I despise always•
-online DRM. The reason was Skyrim. I thought that, buying a physical CD allows you to play it offline indefinitely. Wrong. But that’s ok, its just a one time online-based that’s deification right? Wrong, after a forged update by Steam I can’t even play Skyrim. Bought it since the beginning of last year and haven’t been able to play it due to the online requirement. That’s $80 wasted.

By: Josh

Josh — Mon, 11 Mar 2013 19:53:16 +0000

I feel the exact same way. I can see why people disagree with the decisions made regarding SimCity, but I can’t understand why they’re so angry. People are destroying the game online just because it’s not “100% complete” for the release. I’m not trying to excuse what happened; It’s unfortunate. However, now people are just going to remember SimCity as “The game that caused all those people to complain” or “The game with all those problems”, that will mar what is an otherwise structurally sound and rather fun and enjoyable game.

By: Danny

Danny — Fri, 08 Mar 2013 15:09:35 +0000

I get that game companies are against any piracy and such. This isn’t going to stop it and in two major attempts that we’ve seen with two major releases in the last year and a half. It’s only infuriated huge fan bases and left companies in utter embarrassment.

With that said, we all knew exactly what was going to happen when it was released and sure enough. It happened. Upsetting? Absolutely.

There is only one big loser in this whole mess and in any future ones if it is not sorted out.

Us. The consumer. The one who buys the game. We fork out X amount of money for a game we should be able to play the moment we get home and install it and wait for updates and patches 30 minutes later. Not have to sit around because servers are full or what other rubbish they want to use.

They should have expected this and be well prepared for it.

The companies still make their millions off us and we are the ones who suffer to play a game.

By: anon

anon — Fri, 08 Mar 2013 09:43:16 +0000

I think gamers are justified in their outrage at the online only aspect of this.
It represents yet another failed attempt at curbing piracy, with the net result being a significant inconvenience to paying customers, and not affecting pirates at all.

The point the article makes about “knowing the risk” involved prior to purchase is kind of moot. As somebody who loves the SimCity franchise and has done so since its early days, I am bloody well pissed off about having to be connected 100% of the time to their servers, if I want to play the game.

Am I supposed to simply forget my love for this franchise because I disagree with this new “business model”, not purchase it and pretend like I haven’t been psyched to play it since I heard it was in development? That is why many are so outraged (Read: Heart broken).

I am yet to purchase this latest installment of SimCity, but if its online only experience is anything like that of FarCry3 and that god-awful Uplay shit,
then I definitely do not want a bar of it. I bought it on steam, too.
Having to run 2 separate applications AND be connected to the net constantly, just to play a single player game? Wtf, honestly?

Publishers and Developers alike need to stop punishing their paying customers for the actions of others.

By: Alison

Alison — Fri, 08 Mar 2013 08:07:24 +0000

A game with less features than its predecessor, a disastrous first few days where a bulk of customers can’t play, and an online-only “feature” that only promises micropurchases on top of an $80 dollar base-game deserves all the hell. I love Simcity. I’ve been playing since the 90s as a little kid. While the game looks amazing and very fun (albeit with very limited map-space, no terraforming, and no subway systems which was part of the fun in creating an intricate city), I will not buy this game until there is some off-line functionality. I play my video-games (ALL of which have DRM via Steam) when I am unable to access internet. I rarely play a video-game when I have internet. Simple stuff. Not to mention, the fact that it’s an $80 RENTAL with the online-only “feature”? I played SimCity 4 *all* of 2011. It was my game after years of publication. I still think of my fond memories of YEARS of watching these clips: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8PlKwUtDUtk

Ten years from now, if I buy this game, will I be able to play Sim City 5? Hell, no. EA will attempt to force-feed Simcity 6 by 2015. It’ll cost $30/month, online-only, $10 to save game to specific server, $5 to add, what was once, “base-game” objects.

By: Darthsat

Darthsat — Thu, 07 Mar 2013 22:43:53 +0000

I agree with a lot in this post that reviews just seem to go to an extreme standpoint and wait for views. That said, for me it is subjective to the game at-hand whether I side with positive or negative reviews as the best indicator for the quality of a game. Take Sim City for example. The things I look for in a Sim City game are amazing replay value, fun, challenging, and playing god. For the new Sim City, it may be fun and challenging but it lacks everything else that I look for in a game. Extremely small city size forces me up against a wall that limits the fun and replay value. I don’t really mind always-online for most games. But I will simply not pay money for a Sim City title with forced obsolescence. I love picking up and playing my old SC games 10 years later. To fire up the new Sim City game 2 years down the road and see my collection of cities inaccessible is unacceptable.