Who has SimCity, but not an internet connection anyway?

When you are clearly having bad luck, I have managed 34 hours with very minial disruption, I can't be the only one

I wish people would stop moaning about this game. I've played it for 84 hours since release day, with minimal disruption. It's a fantastic entry into the SimCity franchise. Just forget all the always online and just take it for what it offers, which is a thourghly entertaining game.

For anyone who thinks this game has microtransactions (I've seen someone talking about them), I haven't come across any so far, and I don't think there are any.

If you don't want to play with others online, then just create a private game when you select your region, it's as simple as that! You can then invite friends, later, if you change your mind. The gameplay is significantly enhanced while playing online with others anyway, but IT IS optional if you don't want to.

A lot of people whining about this game haven't even played it, and don't actually know what it's like. So shutup and play it before spilling your vile online.

Artists aren't exempt from criticism. Especially when their art is offered up for public consumption. Such art is actually designed to engage a audience. If the goal of a artist is to elicit a reaction from the audience. Then it goes without any question that some of those reactions will be negative. Any creative act is a form of art. My writing this post is in fact a creative act on my part. Thus it is a work of art. Even if I am not so self aggrandizing as to call myself a Artist. Am I not subject to peer review. For the content of what I post, or the underlying message I am putting forth. That should be the case, because I am obviously engaging in a relationship with other posters.

Just as the studio in question is seeking to engage with potential customers for their products. If they don't want to deal with criticism. The obvious choice to avoid that was to not provide their game for public consumption, but that is what they did, because they want to be paid for their art. They want patrons to support their art. Artists have rights, but the patron has rights too. The right to not pay for art they find obscene is one of them. Further more as any big Artists from the Renaissance will tell you.

What the customer wants comes first. A Artist is free to pursue any art they want on their own time, and obviously at their own expense, but if they are filling a order. They need to bend their creativity to the desires of another. They don't have to make art for a Patron, but if they need or want money. Then they need to fulfill the needs of their client foremost. Art isn't a excuse for a service provider to not provide the service expected. A waiter cannot just choose what they are going to serve you. A mechanic cannot decide to repaint your car, because they didn't like the color. A Barber cannot decide to give you a Mohawk when the customer asked for a trim.

That isn't the way the world works. Your artistic license isn't a license to do whatever you feel like. If you want to make money from your artistic skill. In this case Electronic Arts is offering up just plain bad art, and at the core of that art is a pretty unethical view. That the consumer needs to be treated as if they were a thief. That the consumer exists solely to service them, and that means they should gear themselves towards the most vulgar exploitation they think that they can get away with.

Well as far as art goes. I wouldn't buy a picture of a brute of a man skull fucking a infant to death, and I don't intend to buy another game from Electronic Arts. After all they are basically the same thing after all. This is the same tired just plain nauseating excuse that is offered up for every misdeed that Electronic Arts perpetrates. As if claiming Artistic intent elevates them beyond the reach of the rabble. It speaks to a sense of them feeling that they are superior, and that we are nothing compared to them. Well they are just fucking wrong on that account.

It doesn't make them look more sympathetic. It only makes them look sardonic. We should feel more outraged by such a slimy excuse for why they shouldn't be judged. Art is never a acceptable excuse to behave unethically towards others.

Gamers just need to ban together and reject EA, protest with your wallet.
But alas this will never happen because we tend to forgive and forget easily as a community. As for me, EA will never get a dime from me ever again, so tired of their bullshit, anti consumer attitude.

What puts me off from this game, besides the online which is an immediate 'no-sale' anyway, is the fact that this game has nothing on SimCity 4.

This game's gameplay options are unrealistic and limited in nearly every field, when you could freely build everything you wanted, the way you wanted in SimCity 4. And 2000 and 3000 for that matter. It does so many steps backwards, it's unforgivable. It doesn't even look as good as SimCity 4! I usually don't care that much about graphics, I do expect there to be an improvement compared to previous entries. In a lot of areas, we're right back where we started with SimCity in the late '80s. If you were going to make a game that focussed on city interaction, you can't sell the fact that there is no real, customizable, buildable interaction in any way. That you are forced to obide by whatever boundaries (both literaly and figuratively) EA's random map generator gives you. All of this it directly accountable to their focus on this useless online aspect, which in turn means you can count on The Sims style add-ons (wether they'd be DLC or not) in the future.

There probably aren't a lot of people in the world who put in more hours into this franchise than me, which means I am thoroughly disappointed and quite frankly, the game ruined the franchise for me. To put it bluntly in response to the thread title; "Well, EA, your so-called vision, sucks."

And some people have paid money for the game and haven't even been able to play it for a single hour.
Just because you can, doesn't mean everyone can.

You would be surprised how many people have/are doing just that. :P
Unfortunatly, EA still have massive drones whenever a new game is released and people go to it like flies to poop.

I wonder how long it will take for them to close the Sim City servers down, I wonder?

You're wrong. Studios have no  obligation to follow the leads and wishes of the public. They aren't filling an order to the specs of the public. They can create their 'art' entirely in their vision. It is up to the public to vote with their money if the 'art' is worth it. THAT is how the world works.

I reject EA because they're business tactics don't fit my vision of how a publisher should treat gamers.

Looks to have cleared up.  All it took was a good health dose of bitching!  Game is awesome.