10 ms·

A SimCity Update

65 points by acrum 14y ago

socialist_coder 14y ago
Who wants to bet that the free game will be limited to 2+ year old titles? And still no acknowledgment for the people that either don't care to play online or can't maintain a stable internet connection. Want to play while travelling? Want to play while in the military & deployed? Fuck you!
- deleted 14y ago
  [deleted]
- rdl 14y ago
  Doubtful, since most of the EA games I see on origin are either old or are "buy the game cheap, buy lots of expensive expansion packs" model. Giving SimCity buyers who bought on pre-order or release day a copy of Battlefield or The Sims is probably a great economic choice for Maxis/EA; they're the same people who will likely buy lots of expansions. The exception is what, Mass Effect (old now)? I guess there's Far Cry 3 and Assassins's Creed III (although AC has expansions and the Season Pass model, too)?
  - yohui 14y ago
    > Far Cry 3 and Assassin's Creed III Could EA give away Ubisoft title? I expect they'd have to pay Ubisoft for each redemption if they did.
    - rdl 14y ago
      Oops; I was assuming all the games on Origin were EA-owned-studios. They probably will only allow EA studio games. The Sims is the obvious one; if they give away Sims base games to everyone who bought SimCity, they'll probably see something like $30/user lifetime purchases.
- newbie12 14y ago
  Don't forget us rural folk on satellite broadband! We're screwed too.
  - rdl 14y ago
    It doesn't seem to actually use much bandwidth.
    - sesqu 14y ago
      It uses low broadband levels of bandwidth, from what I've heard. So it's pretty iffy for a lot of people.
- dclowd9901 14y ago
  $100 says its Need for Speed Most Wanted (2012). Just new enough to not feel like a cheap jab, but not so new it hurts them in any way.
- res0nat0r 14y ago
  Why would you buy a game you know before hand must be played online if you don't have a good Internet connection or would want to play while in an airplane? You shouldn't be mad at EA you should pissed at yourself for letting that happen.
  - mikeash 14y ago
    How clearly is this advertised? I poked around online on stores that sell it and saw no mention that an Internet connection is required to play. It's not even mentioned in the system requirements.
jader201 14y ago
> And to get us back in your good graces, we’re going to offer you a free PC download game from the EA portfolio. > 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 percent. To me, this seems insulting. They know most of their upset customers want a refund -- for now -- to feel like they've not quite been screwed over as much vs. forcing them to keep a broken product, and offering them a consolation prize. I don't know why Maxis doesn't realize that if SimCity is really as great as critics claim, then the best way to redeem themselves is to offer full refunds, no questions asked, knowing that customers will return once the game is back up and running. Not only would this show a little bit of class, but it may restore a little confidence and credibility to Maxis/EA, and their poor choices up to this point. And again, if SimCity is really that great -- and aside from the DRM/always online aspect, and the current broken state, the fundamental game sounds solid -- then customer will come back. These early adopters are the true enthusiasts, and ultimately just want to play a functional SimCity. So the net results will be the same -- and EA/Maxis redeems a little of what is left of their credibility. Maybe Maxis would refund them and EA won't let them?
- Tloewald 14y ago
  "Insults to the chef will result in larger portions" MAD magazine sticker I saw posted in an English cafeteria.
- aroman 14y ago
  Yes, I suspect the last line of your comment is at the heart of this issue and the doublespeak surrounding it coming from EA. SimCity is, to be sure, a great game. The problem seems to be that the people who control the strings (which, from our vantage point, we can only presume to be EA rather than Maxis) don't care about the reputation of the game and this PR disaster... only about their bottom line. And like so many other things, if money can be thrown at an issue, it's worth it to such a company. What I mean by that is that I bet EA made this decision not with the intention of "how can we win back the good faith of our loyal customers", but "how can we ensure we make as much money (or lose the least) from this". You know, there is a reason why certain companies involved in pollution-creating waste disposal actually factor in the cost of simply accepting (or challenging) the legal fines for improper disposal into their decision making... if the cost of simply dumping improperly and paying the price (literally) outweighs the cost of properly disposing and cleaning up their business (literally and figuratively), their choice is, unfortunately, usually pretty clear.
jorts 14y ago
This is a great opportunity for them to turn a shitty situation into one that will awe their customers. They should go overboard in terms of making their existing and potential new customers happy. While this is a good gesture, I don't think it's enough.
- ihsw 14y ago
  The really depressing bit about the situation is if their servers had handled the load well then nobody would have complained.
  - Kiro 14y ago
    What's depressing about that?
    - aikn 14y ago
      That it's now accepted to pay $60 for a service instead of a product in gaming. A service they can shut down whenever they want (e.g. when the customer refuses to be ripped off by the DLC anymore). The cities created by the players could (or probably will) be lost. For some games like MMOs this is normal. For simulation games it was not.
      - Kiro 14y ago
        Tell me one game with always-online DRM where the makers shut it down and people lost their content.
        Tzunamitom 14y ago
        http://www.gamefront.com/ea-announces-server-shut-downs-including-for-online-pass-games/ http://www.gamefront.com/ea-announces-server-shut-downs-incl... There's a few for you, all by EA, one of which after only 15 months - except in those cases the single player was at least still playable. Unlike SimCity.
kevinconroy 14y ago
"And a result of this public outcry, we've decided to remove the DRM that is crippling this otherwise great software." - Said no company ever
- UnoriginalGuy 14y ago
  It sometimes happens: http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2011/05/the-witcher-2-patch-removes-drm-improves-framerate/ http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2011/05/the-witcher-2-patch-re...
  - deminature 14y ago
    Assuming you agree with CD Projekt's approach to gathering piracy statistics, the community rewarded them by pirating the game in extraordinarily large numbers, despite the gesture of good faith http://gamespot.com/news/the-witcher-2-pirated-45-million-times-cd-projekt-6346876 http://gamespot.com/news/the-witcher-2-pirated-45-million-ti...
    - etchalon 14y ago
      Funny how that works, isn't it?
    - algorias 14y ago
      First of all, what is this monolithic "community" you're talking about? Secondly, the question is not if more people will pirate without DRM, but if the company can increase their revenues - in the long term - by making that move.
      - deminature 14y ago
        I'm basically referring to the fervent anti-DRM crowd (most gaming sites communities), and I would have expected at least a lower than average piracy rate for a game where the developer basically "gave in" to this group, in an attempt to placate them. Apparently this group is group is not actually that big/influential and/or there is a significant group of people who pirate regardless of developer goodwill, etc.
bryogenic 14y ago
The lack of detail is almost a guarantee that they will limit the 'free PC download game from the EA portfolio' to whatever they feel is the minimum necessary to calm the masses. If they were giving away anything more than the bottom of the barrel you know they would be proclaiming how amazing they are for giving away another "full price game" or something similar. Also, 10 days gives them enough time to say "We fixed it! SC works great _now_. You should be happy to get anything on top of the full game you already have."
jmspring 14y ago
Can someone explain the following - People are upset with the game -- sounds like it is unplayable Most of those people paid with credit card. I understand the desire to want to play the game, but if EA is being a sh*t, why not go the charge dispute route?
- jaggederest 14y ago
  EA will ban your Origin account. So if you own any other games, you lose them. Parenthetically, this move by them also ensures that everyone who purchased it will lose two games if they charge back the purchase...
  - tfe 14y ago
    How can this be allowed by their merchant agreements with the card companies?
    - kefs 14y ago
      Steam does it too. Status quo.
      - tfe 14y ago
        I'm aware. Question still stands.
        baddox 14y ago
        Well what exactly does the question mean? I can't think of an answer to how that would satisfy you. They simply agree on the terms.
    - DannyBee 14y ago
      Whether it is or isn't, threats go a long way. Like the signs you see in parking lots that say "not responsible for lost or stolen items" or "not responsible for damage to your car". They often are, it just says that to cut down on lawsuits. (This used to be universally true, though it's become less true over time that they are responsible)
Tzunamitom 14y ago
What are the possibilities of the free game being Sim City 4?!?
citricsquid 14y ago
The faux candor is cute. The upside is that these troubles will hopefully provide a good case study for future games of this sort. The reviews of Sim City are extremely positive about the gameplay, if the value the server based experience provides to Sim City can be utilised in other games without the issues that Sim City has had the future could be very promising.
- junkilo 14y ago
  Unfortunately webscale and load testing skills can only be passed tribally.
scottchin 14y ago
> And to get us back in your good graces, we’re going to offer you a free PC download game from the EA portfolio. I can't help but think of the "20$ off your next purchase" pre-order bonus. Which, if you read the fine print, must be used within 2 weeks, and from a select list of really old games, and only applies to a purchase of 30$.
Kiro 14y ago
Why are you guys so upset? Serious question. EA screws up, admits it and gives a nice compensation. What more do you expect?
pilif 14y ago
I wonder. In a previous post here on HN, somebody said in a comment, that the Sim City infrastructure runs in Amazon's infrastructure. Isn't one of the big advantages of cloud computing the ability to scale your hardware with demand? Why only scale up by 130% when there's still people having problems? Why not scale until everybody has a good experience? I don't even think it's going to cost all that much: after the initial onrush, the number of concurrent sessions is likely going to drop rapidly, at which point, they can easily scale down the infrastructure (maybe forcing regions to be consolidated, but as a player I'd rather suddenly have a new neighbor city than a ghost town because my neighbor stopped playing). If you can scale up by 130% in one week, you can also scale up by 500%. Or however much it takes. Them not doing this, leads to twoconclusions: 1) they don't care about the current ire among gamers. If the game is good, the rocky start will be forgiven when in two weeks time load normalizes and it will be forgotten within a month. And 2) having overloaded servers due to "unanticipated demand" is in the long run good news to give, increasing the perceived value and quality of the game.
- dietrichepp 14y ago
  Things don't scale that easily. I'm guessing you're not a programmer. Question: If it takes 1 server to handle 1,000 clients, how many servers does it take to handle 1,000,000 clients? Answer: Between 1 and infinity. It might not even be physically possible to serve 1,000,000 clients, depending on the application.
  - pilif 14y ago
    I'm certainly aware of what you are saying. But: if you can scale up the infrastructure by 130% in one week, then you have certainly baked the notion of scalability into your initial design. The fact that scaling to 130% helped makes me think that adding more capacity will help more. As such, it is potentially also possible to scale up to 200 or 500%, giving even more users a chance to play. I don't expect it to scale linearly with the added hardware, but it will help a bit. From a technical standpoint, I've learned somethings (from which I'm drawing my conclusions. Bear with me) about their problem: 0) the architecture is hosted on Amazons infrastructure 1) as part of their mitigation, they have turned off the ability to increase simulation speed. This points to a lack of CPU resources on the application servers or a lack of io resources on the backend database to keep up with the increased rate of changes to the data model. However, I've heard from various comments that they might not actually be storing all that state on-the-fly but syncing it at the end of the session at which point the db load would be independent of simulation speed. I'm inclined to think that CPU starvation on the app servers was likely the reason why they disabled cheetah speed. Adding more frontend CPU power is quite trivially done by adding more app servers and having each of them deal with fewer concurrent users. In the end, they could use one app server per region (= 10ish cities. Not all of them necessarily being played concurrently) without having to do a lot of additional work in synchronizing region state between machines. 2) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5347611 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5347611 was talking about database io issues. This is of course a problem you can't just solve by adding more machines as many databases can't easily scale horizontally. The way how sim city works though lends itself very well to sharding: run regions independently and balance them across multiple machines. Add more machines and rebalance shards (with downtime if you have to, but people weren't able to play anyways) This is all the information I had to build my opinion on. I did however reflect upon these facts before posting my opinion by which I stand even now. Being able to scale 130% in a week, having an easily shardable problem and having frontend server CPU starvation tells me personally, that adding more machines could be possible (but maybe not economically feasible). Of course it's guesswork in the end. But writing these half-technical articles like the submission I linked above do invite guesswork. As long as one has at least some facts to start with, a discussion is still warranted. I have no problem in being proven wrong by additional facts, a different interpretation of the facts or just one article that goes beyond trying to convert PR speech into technical facts (above linked article)
zobzu 14y ago
"you'll get a free crappy game" Well, yay for DRM all the way.

65 points by acrum 14y ago

Who wants to bet that the free game will be limited to 2+ year old titles? And still no acknowledgment for the people that either don't care to play online or can't maintain a stable internet connection. Want to play while travelling? Want to play while in the military & deployed? Fuck you!

deleted 14y ago
[deleted]
rdl 14y ago
Doubtful, since most of the EA games I see on origin are either old or are "buy the game cheap, buy lots of expensive expansion packs" model. Giving SimCity buyers who bought on pre-order or release day a copy of Battlefield or The Sims is probably a great economic choice for Maxis/EA; they're the same people who will likely buy lots of expansions. The exception is what, Mass Effect (old now)? I guess there's Far Cry 3 and Assassins's Creed III (although AC has expansions and the Season Pass model, too)?
- yohui 14y ago
  > Far Cry 3 and Assassin's Creed III Could EA give away Ubisoft title? I expect they'd have to pay Ubisoft for each redemption if they did.
  - rdl 14y ago
    Oops; I was assuming all the games on Origin were EA-owned-studios. They probably will only allow EA studio games. The Sims is the obvious one; if they give away Sims base games to everyone who bought SimCity, they'll probably see something like $30/user lifetime purchases.
newbie12 14y ago
Don't forget us rural folk on satellite broadband! We're screwed too.
- rdl 14y ago
  It doesn't seem to actually use much bandwidth.
  - sesqu 14y ago
    It uses low broadband levels of bandwidth, from what I've heard. So it's pretty iffy for a lot of people.
dclowd9901 14y ago
$100 says its Need for Speed Most Wanted (2012). Just new enough to not feel like a cheap jab, but not so new it hurts them in any way.
res0nat0r 14y ago
Why would you buy a game you know before hand must be played online if you don't have a good Internet connection or would want to play while in an airplane? You shouldn't be mad at EA you should pissed at yourself for letting that happen.
- mikeash 14y ago
  How clearly is this advertised? I poked around online on stores that sell it and saw no mention that an Internet connection is required to play. It's not even mentioned in the system requirements.

jader201 14y ago

> And to get us back in your good graces, we’re going to offer you a free PC download game from the EA portfolio. > 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 percent. To me, this seems insulting. They know most of their upset customers want a refund -- for now -- to feel like they've not quite been screwed over as much vs. forcing them to keep a broken product, and offering them a consolation prize. I don't know why Maxis doesn't realize that if SimCity is really as great as critics claim, then the best way to redeem themselves is to offer full refunds, no questions asked, knowing that customers will return once the game is back up and running. Not only would this show a little bit of class, but it may restore a little confidence and credibility to Maxis/EA, and their poor choices up to this point. And again, if SimCity is really that great -- and aside from the DRM/always online aspect, and the current broken state, the fundamental game sounds solid -- then customer will come back. These early adopters are the true enthusiasts, and ultimately just want to play a functional SimCity. So the net results will be the same -- and EA/Maxis redeems a little of what is left of their credibility. Maybe Maxis would refund them and EA won't let them?

Tloewald 14y ago
"Insults to the chef will result in larger portions" MAD magazine sticker I saw posted in an English cafeteria.
aroman 14y ago
Yes, I suspect the last line of your comment is at the heart of this issue and the doublespeak surrounding it coming from EA. SimCity is, to be sure, a great game. The problem seems to be that the people who control the strings (which, from our vantage point, we can only presume to be EA rather than Maxis) don't care about the reputation of the game and this PR disaster... only about their bottom line. And like so many other things, if money can be thrown at an issue, it's worth it to such a company. What I mean by that is that I bet EA made this decision not with the intention of "how can we win back the good faith of our loyal customers", but "how can we ensure we make as much money (or lose the least) from this". You know, there is a reason why certain companies involved in pollution-creating waste disposal actually factor in the cost of simply accepting (or challenging) the legal fines for improper disposal into their decision making... if the cost of simply dumping improperly and paying the price (literally) outweighs the cost of properly disposing and cleaning up their business (literally and figuratively), their choice is, unfortunately, usually pretty clear.

jorts 14y ago

This is a great opportunity for them to turn a shitty situation into one that will awe their customers. They should go overboard in terms of making their existing and potential new customers happy. While this is a good gesture, I don't think it's enough.

ihsw 14y ago
The really depressing bit about the situation is if their servers had handled the load well then nobody would have complained.
- Kiro 14y ago
  What's depressing about that?
  - aikn 14y ago
    That it's now accepted to pay $60 for a service instead of a product in gaming. A service they can shut down whenever they want (e.g. when the customer refuses to be ripped off by the DLC anymore). The cities created by the players could (or probably will) be lost. For some games like MMOs this is normal. For simulation games it was not.
    - Kiro 14y ago
      Tell me one game with always-online DRM where the makers shut it down and people lost their content.
      - Tzunamitom 14y ago
        http://www.gamefront.com/ea-announces-server-shut-downs-including-for-online-pass-games/ http://www.gamefront.com/ea-announces-server-shut-downs-incl... There's a few for you, all by EA, one of which after only 15 months - except in those cases the single player was at least still playable. Unlike SimCity.

kevinconroy 14y ago

"And a result of this public outcry, we've decided to remove the DRM that is crippling this otherwise great software." - Said no company ever

UnoriginalGuy 14y ago
It sometimes happens: http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2011/05/the-witcher-2-patch-removes-drm-improves-framerate/ http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2011/05/the-witcher-2-patch-re...
- deminature 14y ago
  Assuming you agree with CD Projekt's approach to gathering piracy statistics, the community rewarded them by pirating the game in extraordinarily large numbers, despite the gesture of good faith http://gamespot.com/news/the-witcher-2-pirated-45-million-times-cd-projekt-6346876 http://gamespot.com/news/the-witcher-2-pirated-45-million-ti...
  - etchalon 14y ago
    Funny how that works, isn't it?
  - algorias 14y ago
    First of all, what is this monolithic "community" you're talking about? Secondly, the question is not if more people will pirate without DRM, but if the company can increase their revenues - in the long term - by making that move.
    - deminature 14y ago
      I'm basically referring to the fervent anti-DRM crowd (most gaming sites communities), and I would have expected at least a lower than average piracy rate for a game where the developer basically "gave in" to this group, in an attempt to placate them. Apparently this group is group is not actually that big/influential and/or there is a significant group of people who pirate regardless of developer goodwill, etc.

bryogenic 14y ago

The lack of detail is almost a guarantee that they will limit the 'free PC download game from the EA portfolio' to whatever they feel is the minimum necessary to calm the masses. If they were giving away anything more than the bottom of the barrel you know they would be proclaiming how amazing they are for giving away another "full price game" or something similar. Also, 10 days gives them enough time to say "We fixed it! SC works great _now_. You should be happy to get anything on top of the full game you already have."

jmspring 14y ago

Can someone explain the following - People are upset with the game -- sounds like it is unplayable Most of those people paid with credit card. I understand the desire to want to play the game, but if EA is being a sh*t, why not go the charge dispute route?

jaggederest 14y ago
EA will ban your Origin account. So if you own any other games, you lose them. Parenthetically, this move by them also ensures that everyone who purchased it will lose two games if they charge back the purchase...
- tfe 14y ago
  How can this be allowed by their merchant agreements with the card companies?
  - kefs 14y ago
    Steam does it too. Status quo.
    - tfe 14y ago
      I'm aware. Question still stands.
      - baddox 14y ago
        Well what exactly does the question mean? I can't think of an answer to how that would satisfy you. They simply agree on the terms.
  - DannyBee 14y ago
    Whether it is or isn't, threats go a long way. Like the signs you see in parking lots that say "not responsible for lost or stolen items" or "not responsible for damage to your car". They often are, it just says that to cut down on lawsuits. (This used to be universally true, though it's become less true over time that they are responsible)

Tzunamitom 14y ago

What are the possibilities of the free game being Sim City 4?!?

citricsquid 14y ago

The faux candor is cute. The upside is that these troubles will hopefully provide a good case study for future games of this sort. The reviews of Sim City are extremely positive about the gameplay, if the value the server based experience provides to Sim City can be utilised in other games without the issues that Sim City has had the future could be very promising.

junkilo 14y ago
Unfortunately webscale and load testing skills can only be passed tribally.

scottchin 14y ago

> And to get us back in your good graces, we’re going to offer you a free PC download game from the EA portfolio. I can't help but think of the "20$ off your next purchase" pre-order bonus. Which, if you read the fine print, must be used within 2 weeks, and from a select list of really old games, and only applies to a purchase of 30$.

Kiro 14y ago

Why are you guys so upset? Serious question. EA screws up, admits it and gives a nice compensation. What more do you expect?

pilif 14y ago

I wonder. In a previous post here on HN, somebody said in a comment, that the Sim City infrastructure runs in Amazon's infrastructure. Isn't one of the big advantages of cloud computing the ability to scale your hardware with demand? Why only scale up by 130% when there's still people having problems? Why not scale until everybody has a good experience? I don't even think it's going to cost all that much: after the initial onrush, the number of concurrent sessions is likely going to drop rapidly, at which point, they can easily scale down the infrastructure (maybe forcing regions to be consolidated, but as a player I'd rather suddenly have a new neighbor city than a ghost town because my neighbor stopped playing). If you can scale up by 130% in one week, you can also scale up by 500%. Or however much it takes. Them not doing this, leads to twoconclusions: 1) they don't care about the current ire among gamers. If the game is good, the rocky start will be forgiven when in two weeks time load normalizes and it will be forgotten within a month. And 2) having overloaded servers due to "unanticipated demand" is in the long run good news to give, increasing the perceived value and quality of the game.

dietrichepp 14y ago
Things don't scale that easily. I'm guessing you're not a programmer. Question: If it takes 1 server to handle 1,000 clients, how many servers does it take to handle 1,000,000 clients? Answer: Between 1 and infinity. It might not even be physically possible to serve 1,000,000 clients, depending on the application.
- pilif 14y ago
  I'm certainly aware of what you are saying. But: if you can scale up the infrastructure by 130% in one week, then you have certainly baked the notion of scalability into your initial design. The fact that scaling to 130% helped makes me think that adding more capacity will help more. As such, it is potentially also possible to scale up to 200 or 500%, giving even more users a chance to play. I don't expect it to scale linearly with the added hardware, but it will help a bit. From a technical standpoint, I've learned somethings (from which I'm drawing my conclusions. Bear with me) about their problem: 0) the architecture is hosted on Amazons infrastructure 1) as part of their mitigation, they have turned off the ability to increase simulation speed. This points to a lack of CPU resources on the application servers or a lack of io resources on the backend database to keep up with the increased rate of changes to the data model. However, I've heard from various comments that they might not actually be storing all that state on-the-fly but syncing it at the end of the session at which point the db load would be independent of simulation speed. I'm inclined to think that CPU starvation on the app servers was likely the reason why they disabled cheetah speed. Adding more frontend CPU power is quite trivially done by adding more app servers and having each of them deal with fewer concurrent users. In the end, they could use one app server per region (= 10ish cities. Not all of them necessarily being played concurrently) without having to do a lot of additional work in synchronizing region state between machines. 2) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5347611 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5347611 was talking about database io issues. This is of course a problem you can't just solve by adding more machines as many databases can't easily scale horizontally. The way how sim city works though lends itself very well to sharding: run regions independently and balance them across multiple machines. Add more machines and rebalance shards (with downtime if you have to, but people weren't able to play anyways) This is all the information I had to build my opinion on. I did however reflect upon these facts before posting my opinion by which I stand even now. Being able to scale 130% in a week, having an easily shardable problem and having frontend server CPU starvation tells me personally, that adding more machines could be possible (but maybe not economically feasible). Of course it's guesswork in the end. But writing these half-technical articles like the submission I linked above do invite guesswork. As long as one has at least some facts to start with, a discussion is still warranted. I have no problem in being proven wrong by additional facts, a different interpretation of the facts or just one article that goes beyond trying to convert PR speech into technical facts (above linked article)

zobzu 14y ago

"you'll get a free crappy game" Well, yay for DRM all the way.