I got it for my birthday, didn't even bother to load it up yet. Amazon knew it was going to be a POS because they gave my gift-giver a $20 promo code for a future Amazon purchase. I'm away for work today and tomorrow, so I won't actually get to play until Friday, hopefully by then the issues are mostly resolved. I was a huge Sim City / Will Wright fan, and I didn't know he sorta retired from games in 2009. :(

Amazon apparently just suspended selling the game due to the floor of single star reviews and refund requests:
http://www.geek.com/articles/games/following-800-poor-reviews-amazon -s tops-selling-download-copies-of-simcity-2013037/



I'm thinking this is a first among botched game launches.  Achievement unlocked EA, you've earned it!

The_EliteOne: I got it for my birthday, didn't even bother to load it up yet. Amazon knew it was going to be a POS because they gave my gift-giver a $20 promo code for a future Amazon purchase. I'm away for work today and tomorrow, so I won't actually get to play until Friday, hopefully by then the issues are mostly resolved. I was a huge Sim City / Will Wright fan, and I didn't know he sorta retired from games in 2009. :(

Will Wright has nothing to do with this one, he left long ago. Honestly Maxis is pretty much Maxis in name only. Everyone is gone.

Banana$$$Stand: The_EliteOne: I got it for my birthday, didn't even bother to load it up yet. Amazon knew it was going to be a POS because they gave my gift-giver a $20 promo code for a future Amazon purchase. I'm away for work today and tomorrow, so I won't actually get to play until Friday, hopefully by then the issues are mostly resolved. I was a huge Sim City / Will Wright fan, and I didn't know he sorta retired from games in 2009. :(

Will Wright has nothing to do with this one, he left long ago. Honestly Maxis is pretty much Maxis in name only. Everyone is gone.

A sad day for gamers when the great minds are robbed out of their beloved creations.

Rixel: BafflerMeal: SimCity: EA Refuses Refunds, Threatens Customer With Origin bans

http://www.gameranx.com/updates/id/13275/article/sim-city-ea-refuses -r efunds-threatens-customer-with-origin-bans/

I smell a Class Action brewing.

rpm: Rixel: BafflerMeal: SimCity: EA Refuses Refunds, Threatens Customer With Origin bans

http://www.gameranx.com/updates/id/13275/article/sim-city-ea-refuses -r efunds-threatens-customer-with-origin-bans/

I smell a Class Action brewing.

Unlikely, or at least they'll get thrown out pretty quickly.

I agree that the class action is unlikely.

HOWEVER, if EA is making threats to deprive people of paid-for licenses on an account that could fall under RICO. That changes it from money to jail + money.

madgonad: HOWEVER, if EA is making threats to deprive people of paid-for licenses on an account that could fall under RICO. That changes it from money to jail + money.

Man, I hope you're right. Interesting to see the fallout there, since Steam has the same policy with chargeback.

J. Frank Parnell: the_sidewinder: Relevant

Quite.

In the last 24 hours, customer sentiment has gone from this, to this.

EA may never live this blunder down.

God damn that was funny, short and to the point.

xalres: rpm: xalres: Call me an old curmudgeon but I long for the old days where you could buy a game, get it home and be playing it within a minute of hitting the power button.

You're not an old curmudgeon. I remember when it would take forever because tape is freaking slow :-P. Even the disk drives from that time period were damn slow

HAH! I was thinking of consoles but I remember loading games on my dad's C64. What a slog, especially if it took up BOTH SIDES of the disk...uggggggh.

Every now and then I'd enter the load command wrong and it would say "Press play on tape". We didn't have a tape drive so I had no idea wtf it was talking about.

I remember being envious of my friends with consoles. Perhaps I'm not as curmudgeonly, but a new game on the PC always looked like this:

1. Instal game.
2. Install fails because not enough HD space.
3. Run Xtree and find some stuff to remove.
4. Install game.
5. Fail the config a couple times while I try and figure out which sound driver best matches my family's off-brand card.
6. All right. Locked and loaded. Let's take it for a spin.
7. "This game requires 550KB of conventional memory to run. Please free up some memory and try again"
8. mem /d
9. 520K. Fark.
10. Tweak the config.sys and autoexec.bat. 600k. Good to go.
11. Forgot the mouse and cd-rom. Double fark.
12. Alright. The stars are now all aligned and it loads.
13. "Boy, you've been on that computer too long. Go outside."
14. "What the hell did you do to this computer? You're banned for two weeks."

/I think Betrayal at Krondor was the worst one, but definitely worth the hassle

meuchler696: xalres: rpm: xalres: Call me an old curmudgeon but I long for the old days where you could buy a game, get it home and be playing it within a minute of hitting the power button.

You're not an old curmudgeon. I remember when it would take forever because tape is freaking slow :-P. Even the disk drives from that time period were damn slow

HAH! I was thinking of consoles but I remember loading games on my dad's C64. What a slog, especially if it took up BOTH SIDES of the disk...uggggggh.

Every now and then I'd enter the load command wrong and it would say "Press play on tape". We didn't have a tape drive so I had no idea wtf it was talking about.

I remember being envious of my friends with consoles. Perhaps I'm not as curmudgeonly, but a new game on the PC always looked like this:

1. Instal game.
2. Install fails because not enough HD space.
3. Run Xtree and find some stuff to remove.
4. Install game.
5. Fail the config a couple times while I try and figure out which sound driver best matches my family's off-brand card.
6. All right. Locked and loaded. Let's take it for a spin.
7. "This game requires 550KB of conventional memory to run. Please free up some memory and try again"
8. mem /d
9. 520K. Fark.
10. Tweak the config.sys and autoexec.bat. 600k. Good to go.
11. Forgot the mouse and cd-rom. Double fark.
12. Alright. The stars are now all aligned and it loads.
13. "Boy, you've been on that computer too long. Go outside."
14. "What the hell did you do to this computer? You're banned for two weeks."

/I think Betrayal at Krondor was the worst one, but definitely worth the hassle

DOS machines were their own set of headaches. I remember getting my first sound card. Every damn game I tried to run I'd have to tell it what serial bus address, IRQ and Bog knows how many other settings just to get it to work right.

I'm posting this on an old ass Pentium 4 box at work, so I'm getting a kick.

/really
//barely even loads FARK with IE
//I could heat my coffee with the CPU exhaust

FTFA: "We have been overwhelmed by the outpouring of support and enthusiasm from our fans"

Damn, can anyone anymore admit "Hey, we f'd up, and we've been getting a lot of angry comments about it." Any time anyone publicly talks about a screw-up they always have to refer to these, completely unverifiable mind you, supporters.

meuchler696: /I think Betrayal at Krondor was the worst one, but definitely worth the hassle

I played the Mac version on an SE/30.  Sounds like I win on that one.

xalres: DOS machines were their own set of headaches. I remember getting my first sound card. Every damn game I tried to run I'd have to tell it what serial bus address, IRQ and Bog knows how many other settings just to get it to work right.

I had a friend install some weird sound card that used the same IRQ as the hard drive.  Hilarity ensued.

OgreMagi: xalres: DOS machines were their own set of headaches. I remember getting my first sound card. Every damn game I tried to run I'd have to tell it what serial bus address, IRQ and Bog knows how many other settings just to get it to work right.

I had a friend install some weird sound card that used the same IRQ as the hard drive.  Hilarity ensued.

Those were always the best, my most memorable was soundcard + serial(mouse), every time you'd move the mouse around Comache's sound would dive a couple octaves :P

I still own a copy of simcity 2000 so I'm getting a kick

/Also own a copy of Simcity 4 so not getting suckered again

Smelly McUgly: scottydoesntknow: Smelly McUgly: Fallout is one of the few major series that I like (and I actually really like all of the games, even Fallout 3).

Don't treat Fallout 3 like the red-headed stepchild, it was a fantastic game. Hell it was Fallout 3 that actually got me into the series. Bought that on a whim and ended up playing it for weeks. The second I found out I could nuke an entire town I fell in love. Granted, I only did it once and then reloaded the save because I felt so horrible, but it's nice having that option.

Oh, I love it. The Fallout vets are the ones that don't seem to like it. Frankly, I also didn't get to play Fallout until I got Fallout 3, also on a whim. It got me to go back and play the first two, which are also awesome games.

I started off playing the original fallout games, and I love Fallout 3 and New Vegas. They're different. The series progressed with the available techology. Would I play a Fallout 1/2 based off the Fallout 3 Engine? You're damn right I would, and I would enjoy every minute of wandering through the wasteland, provided I get me a Highwayman at some point.

albatros183: I still own a copy of simcity 2000 so I'm getting a kick

/Also own a copy of Simcity 4 so not getting suckered again

You don't like Simcity 4? Why?
Farkers have been saying SC4 + Rush Hour + NAM = Fun

I'm on the fence right now between SC2k, SC4 or CitiesXL

akula: tom baker's scarf: Space Station Wagon: tom baker's scarf: The game was more than worth it and in those days the manuals came with all kinds of other information. The manual kept me occupied for a couple of days.

I still have tie fighter on 3.5, the box and all. The instruction manual has the names of Star Destroyers in the lower corners of the pages and every so often when you launched the game it would ask for the name on page _
That is about the perfect amount of rights management :)

Yep. Nearly every game hd some variant of that back in the day. RR Tycoon had ID the locomotive, Covert Action had ID the mastermind, Pirates! was the date of the treasure fleet, Fields of Glory was word x of y paragraph on page z. Those were real manuals not the quick reference crap that comes with games today.

*Old man shakes fist*


Why is it that I can remember all that stuff from 20 years ago but my nieces names always escape me?

I remember that stuff too.

688 Attack Sub had the names of the various subs of the class on different pages (and they'd sometimes have you fill in the blank of a paragraph, IIRC), Gunship had a little reference section on military vehicles in the back and you'd have to ID the armored vehicle.

That was awesome stuff. Back when manuals had more than just how to install it. They told you how to play the game and gave you rudimentary tactics. There was no tutorial level, just an easy one so you can get used to the controls.

Modern manuals are useless.

I was banned from the LOMAC forums for disagreeing with whoever the company shill was about releasing what might have been a great air combat simulator without a proper manual.  Nevermind the fact that shooting down an enemy fighter and having any part of the downed fighter touch water would cause the game to crash.  And much of the original game involved coastal combat.

That was (sadly) my last flight sim purchase.

BumpInTheNight: OgreMagi: xalres: DOS machines were their own set of headaches. I remember getting my first sound card. Every damn game I tried to run I'd have to tell it what serial bus address, IRQ and Bog knows how many other settings just to get it to work right.

I had a friend install some weird sound card that used the same IRQ as the hard drive.  Hilarity ensued.

Those were always the best, my most memorable was soundcard + serial(mouse), every time you'd move the mouse around Comache's sound would dive a couple octaves :P

i learned to code in basic so that i could create a program to quickly load my game of choice and reallocate the RAM between XMS and whatever the other setting was.  That and i was a nerd.  still am.

tom baker's scarf: i learned to code in basic so that i could create a program to quickly load my game of choice and reallocate the RAM between XMS and whatever the other setting was.  That and i was a nerd.  still am.

You call that nerdy? I reverse engineered how DOS stored the parsed config.sys and wrote a driver in assembly that let me edit it on the fly in boot.

/Then they came out with a version of DOS that did it natively. Dammit.

rpm: tom baker's scarf: i learned to code in basic so that i could create a program to quickly load my game of choice and reallocate the RAM between XMS and whatever the other setting was.  That and i was a nerd.  still am.

You call that nerdy? I reverse engineered how DOS stored the parsed config.sys and wrote a driver in assembly that let me edit it on the fly in boot.

/Then they came out with a version of DOS that did it natively. Dammit.

That wasn't nearly the zenith of my nerdiness just a byproduct therof but kudos to you good sir.

J. Frank Parnell: the_sidewinder: Relevant

Quite.

In the last 24 hours, customer sentiment has gone from this, to this.

EA may never live this blunder down.

I don't know what the hell just happened, but thanks for posting these.