The continuing problems of SimCity

SimCity, one of the most influential titles to ever hit the video game market. Over the years, the franchise has snowballed in both popularity and spin-off territory, which has essentially ended in the huge crash that was SimCity `13. What are the problems of this game? Well let me tell you the story of how EA not only layed out some problems to coincide with the launch, but are also providing problems that update with the game.

It all started before the game even launched. I like to think of this game as a taste of what the XBone was going to be like before Micro$haft finally realized that spying on everyone wasn't going to net them any more than an angry mob and a lynching or two. (Seriously, we need to start killing government people in return for the horrid things they're doing to us. Every time something as heinous as this comes into the public eye, about five of these political fuckers need to be publicly offed to send an example of: "You piss the public off, you die.")

But anyway, the point is that the so-called "revolutionary" cloud was pissing more people off before the game was even released. That's not even talking about the trainwreck that was the launch of SimCity `13. Because Electronic Arts wanted to go with this mandatory cloud gaming, and with so many people buying the game just to try it out, the servers for the cloud became overloaded pretty quickly. Overloaded servers makes for impossible online play, and that's a PRETTY BIG PROBLEM for a game that's always online. That's only the launch though, I've only barely begun to talk about this shitstorm.

Then there was the DLC. This was mentioned before the game was even released, and it's only gotten more annoying. Before it was released, EA mentioned you'd have to pay extra money to get such content as optional themed tilesets. Now that it's been released, it turns out the EA is attempting a very underhanded way of getting people to pay some sort of monthly fee by releasing the content they had blocked on a monthly basis, starting with May and the "Amusement Park set." Only two packs have been released so far, and one hasn't been released this month, so either I was right and EA failed, or EA was just pulling their typical DLC bullshit ON TOP of their online code bullshit.

Next came the idiotic way that they tried to take the load off of the servers. After a few weeks, EA began to get worried that their scheme for always online wasn't going to work and that they would actually have to let people play without any terrible restrictions. (Scary, I know. It's not like any other SimCity games were like this.) It was getting to bad that Amazon put up a warning saying how the game may not work after you buy it, and EA was asking for online advertisements of the game to be taken down. So because EA couldn't let their grand plan to suck up as much money from the game as possible fail is the best set of decision makers ever, they chose the best solution possible.

...

Wait, they did buy more servers or take down the servers of games that didn't work anymore to repurpose them for this game, right? I mean, that's the logical thing to do after all?

No? What do you mean that they took out achievements and the fastest game mode? How in the hell does that bog down a server? Player traffic bogs down servers, not the features of the program, though with the cloud you aren't allowed to save any data to your computer. I guess that achievements must take up a pretty good part of this cloud. Or maybe it's just EA trying to stick to their guns and continue to force this always online DRM bullshit on everyone.

I can mention more though. Let's talk about CalebPeters and the refund trouble that he had with an employee of EA. When he asked for a refund of the game after its atrocious launch, he was refused multiple times AND threatened with a ban from the game when he threatened to dispute a refund with the bank. After this, the chat text went public and it turns out that people HAVE, in fact, been getting banned from their Origin's because they tried to get refunds for SimCity.

And that's the main problem with SimCity: the company that owns the name. Maxis isn't owned by the EA of old, the one that released most of the Sim games in a big boxed set in like 2001. They're not the EA that released The Sims, which ended up outselling MYST. They're not even the EA that made the Sims 3, because at least that game wasn't always online. The EA of today is a leech of a company, willing to sell you a down payment of a game for $60 and then force you to pay $10 intervals whenever they feel like. Or take away features because the servers are being bogged down from a mandatory multiplayer mode. Or force a mandatory multiplayer mode in the first place!

As a result, I'm appalled at this horrific trainwreck of a game, and I'm a die-hard SimCity fan! I liked SimCity 2000 and I even downloaded the source to the original game when I found out about it.(Currently porting the code to GM8 so that the Game Maker community can learn from it.) I got Sims on GameCube and I played the shit out of the Sims 3 on my Xperia play when I got it. Hell, I still have a big boxed set of Sim spinoffs and main games that I got when I was 6 years old. I will NOT be buying SimCity unless an offline mod gets rid of the DRM and let me play singleplayer. Otherwise, I'll just stick to my Virtual PC and SimCity 2000.

Natsucon 2013 wrap up

Okay, so NatsuCon was pretty great. Not as great as last year, but all around good nonetheless. As promised, I went as the Joker, but things didn't go as expected. My makeup job was pretty good for my first time doing it, but I had to be incredibly careful when handling it, and it STILL flaked off all day. The video games in the vendor's room were incredibly sparse this year, with only two minor vendors. (Though last year's large influx of games at one vendor was due to a store closing up shop and selling all its inventory to the vendor.) Despite this, I still raked in three awesome titles: Super Mario Land to replace my decrepit, broken copy; Final Fantasy 1+2 Dawn of Souls; and Kingdom Hearts. I guess you could consider this section another entry in the Pick-ups section, but I'm not going to make a separate entry for the three games I've already mentioned now.

Anywho, something I noticed that really bothered me was the fact that there was unneccesary security measures all over the convention area. After the registration period ended, you couldn't even get into the building without a badge, and even then you could only enter through certain doors. I found this unnecessary because once someone was able to get in, there was nothing to really stop them from causing further mischief, so it really rendered the whole guarding doors thing as redundant.

Now if you caught the masquerade, I did a walk-on and I also ensured that the ending of the event was a real "blast" for Batman. It's unfortunate that I didn't receive any recognition or awards for my work, but I congratulate the people that did win the contest, even the ones that got honorable mention.

Band camp and Natsucon 2013

Since last week, I've been preparing for something that I never really got to do as a kid, out of both general disinterest and lack of funds: summer camp. Well specifically, it was a band camp that was hosted on a college campus, so I was also able to get a good look at what college at this place might be like. This Monday I left for the Missouri State University Campus in Springfield to partake in Bands Alive!, a summer band camp for middle school and high school students alike. The entire program lasted about 3 and a half days, with 3 being dedicated solely to learning a few concert band pieces and molding the sound to absolute perfection so that they can be played for an audience on the half day.

Right off the bat, I'm going to mention that nothing particularly interesting (read: dirty) happened there. Basically it was work, work, work, all throughout the day, so I doubt there was any time to do anything above a PG rating. However, everything that I was afraid would happen, ended up happening all throughout the week, and it was pretty grating. It started when I wasn't able to fall asleep the night before we departed for Springfield, which ended up biting me in the ass later on. I fell asleep for like 10 minutes after the lunch break, and I ended up being late for the auditions, which caused everybody to panic and look for me. After that incident, I was afraid that I would be incredibly inferior to the other students because my concert band isn't very big, and it doesn't cover what other high school bands cover. Turns out I was right when they asked me to play an F scale during auditions and I thought they were talking about an E flat scale. (In my mind, I thought they asked me to play a scale where the note F sharp was played first, and they wanted a scale where G was played first. It's because of concert pitches.)

Everything was kind of lax after that, but the real tragedy struck on the day of the concert, when my mother and sister got into a minor car accident on the way to see me. I don't know how other people think when this happens, but I feel absolutely awful about it. The fact that my family could have gotten hurt over me just pains me to the point where I just hate myself for putting them through that much trouble.

Either way, the time for thinking about that has passed, and it's time to think of happier things. One of which being that I will be in Collinsville, IL tomorrow for the convention: NatsuCon. I will be dressed up as the Joker, and anyone that's brave enough to shake my hand (and risk a Joy Buzzer attack!) will receive a card that has a random Joker quote on it, as well as a signature. (Of the Joker, though every ace card will have a Betaman signature on the back.) The quotes range from all the different forms of Batman media that contain the Joker, from the original comics, to the '66 Batman show to the recent Dark Knight movie and the Batman Arkham City video game. Only 54 cards will be given out, so it's pretty much everyone will get a random card until I have none left. I mean, they're nothing really special, just a deck of Aviator cards with Joker quotes on them. Still though, it's a nice gesture to those that were a nice enough sport to play along with the Joker getup and actually get Joy buzzed.

Anyway, I've got cards to autograph. I'll update tomorrow evening after I return from the convention hall.

If you see me, please don't hesitate to say hey!