Fun fact - my friend waited about 240 minutes in queue, played for about 4 hours, then the game crashed for all people in his region (4 guys total).

Then he managed to log back in (miracle - no queue) - the game didn't save any of their progress.

Much enjoyment followed.


As a side-note, the game is halfway decent, but the tiny maps will make it ridiculously boring in the long run. It's supposedly quite easy to fill out city area in 2 hours, and I just can't see any appeal of creating 50 'cities' one after another.

I won't even bother with the fact that a game which should have been SP turned into such abortion with all of this DRM bullshit, because... EA. 'nuff said.

 

It's more like having to crack an MMO than a normal single player game. You need to duplicate the server that's running Sim City, and that's quite difficult to do from the outside.

Ubisoft's always-on DRM was eventually cracked following a large cooperative community effort, but that was a tacked on DRM solution. The Sim City situation isn't like traditional DRM, the local/server design is how the game has been built from the ground up. I'm sure someone will work out how to duplicate it or fake it, but it'll be a while.

 

I was tempted to get this game as I've always been a huge Sim City fan. I played the original Sim City at my granddad's house when I was a kid and then Sim City 2000 came out and my brothers and I would spend days on end playing it.

But as soon as I read about the Always Online DRM I said I'd wait until after the release, not making the Diablo 3 mistake again. Then I read a few reviews and quite frankly there are two things here that I find almost more disturbing then the always online DRM.

The fact that you can't just save and load your game as you want. WTF? And then the tiny cities. Seriously, from all the screenshots I've seen... it looks like you can't build anything at all! You must run out of space so quickly that you can't get much gametime out of it. There's only so many times you can rebuild small cities before you get bored.

Back in Sim City 2000 I'd have a completely flat map with only a thin coastline so I could fill the whole thing with one massive city and in the end fill loads of Domes as well. Good thing I bought the game again from GOG.com for less than 6$. Might just go play some now in fact...

 

This took about 2 hours. The plot is full and there's nothing else to do but increase density and tech level. Or make a new city. :facepalm

Contemplating a chargeback.

 

I've played for a bit, and the city size limitations are really being felt after a bit of playtime - even more so in the city where I went for lesser density. It has been fun so far though.

That being said, server load is keeping most people from playing now - apparently they went from "not being able to connect to the server" to "connecting but not loading your city".

One fun thing: I played for a bit, then had to exit and when I came back, some progress was gone. So I replayed that for a bit, went back out and when I returned, I was back at the point where I had left the first time. Weird stuff...

 

Won't be buying this at all. Thanks a lot EA, you stupid cockblocking faggots!

 

I don't know. Word from EA makes it sound like some of the actual calculations for the game are done server side. But I have also heard that the game runs fine if you suddenly disconnect from the server, with the exception that you don't have social features and can't save the game. That would imply the server doesn't really have much game code running on it, so you could crack the game.

 

Even the actual parts that have nothing to do with the server are kinda shitty. The AI is incredibly poor to the point of blatant stupidity on so many levels that I'm unable to actually build the city that I wasn't: instead, I'm forced to build the city to maximize output from the AI. It's like they hoped to make the DRM side of the game so unappealing that people would fail to realize that the non-DRM side was crappy as well, relying on the effort-reward mentality, I suppose. But when you climb a mountain, and all there is at the top is a bunch of trees and a rapist in a bear suit, the effort just feels wasted.

 

I don't think that's terribly unusual in this type of game. The same is certainly true for all of the Tropico games. Specifically, I'm referring to traffic management and path finding. I still find T3 a heap of fun, but I have to design my cities from the ground up to accommodate the AI.

 

I'm pretty sure this can get your account banned, so I wouldn't suggest doing it if you have any other games on Origin.

 

Yeah, account ban for chargebacks. [Not that that's unusual, Origin or not.]

source: Reddit and every gaming news site on the internet.

 

I've read the reviews, I've read this thread, and I've watched some videos. Tears were shed for the SimCity that could have been.

Instead, I've just gotten Anno 2070 and all its expanded content. On Steam. And now I'm having a blast.

 

Yeah, not touching anything Origin contaminated.

 

Not too much of an issue. The only other games that I have through Origin are Bad Company 2 and SWTOR, both of which I no longer care to play anyway.

 

Keep in mind they will probably flag your billing data and you might have trouble to get games in the future from EA. (+1 if you decided not to ever buy Origin games again and stick with it no matter how 'hyped' they are)

 

Some of you are probably already aware of this, but SimCity owners will be receiving a free game from EA/Origin.

source: http://games.on.net/2013/03/simcity-owners-to-receive-free-origin-game/

 

There are reports on gaming blogs coming out the AI in SC5 is a joke. All traffic runs on a shortest point between A and B mode. So if you build a 8 lane highway 2 blocks away, the traffic would still clog up the little 2 lane road it always did. All fire trucks will hit one fire then move on to the next then the next. So if there is multiple fires you will lose a building while 16 fire trucks battle one little blaze.

 

The traffic thing sounds about right, but I think the fire trucks in my games have fought multiple fires at once.

Can't really say much more, because I haven't been able to play at all this weekend, which is seriously starting to piss me off. I wholeheartedly recommend not buying the game.
Edit: Update see two posts down.

 

All service vehicles tend to group up into a little herd in my experience. It's quite annoying really, since a shitton of garbage is being left out on the streets despite having the maximum amount of trucks, fires are burning down stuff all the time despite having full coverage, etc.

Buses and streetcars in particular are particularly bad. Not only do they group up, they also take the most retarded paths imaginable. Seeing them perform u-turns constantly and only end up covering 10% of the map is a common occurrence.

 

An update on my situation: Apparently my region cloned itself, and the one I was trying to play with is broken - the other one works. Was able to play the last five hours without any problems (other than that I have to get to sleep!)