SimCity Burning: A Warning to Publishers on The Dangers of Always-Online DRM • Hacker News Board

Re: SimCity Burning: A Warning to Publishers on The Dangers of Always-Online DRM

#131

Post by Buzaga » Fri, Mar 08, 2013, 10:57 PM UTC

2591 1 star ratings of 2805 total LOL!

http://www.amazon.com/SimCity-Limited-Edition-Pc/dp/B007FTE2...

I'm thinking this fail may be so epic it can kill always-on-DRM forever, force EA to back up on their customer-pissing force-feeding stuff like this

I'm not in the gaming industry, but launch is probably the most important event and, with this, they fucked the launch of one of the most adored, famous and known PC game franchises of the World

Firstly, the game reviews will suffer forever(that amazon rating is probably NEVER cease to be 1 star [unless EA starts paying chinese to do that too]), that must cost sales

Secondly and most important, word-of-mouth must account for A LOT of game sales, the hype of your friends, co-workers talking about a game must be the reason for most of non-hardcore-gamers sales... I, for example, only bought Diablo 3 because all my co-workers wouldn't shut about getting it, even tho I was a hardcore gamer in the past, played Diablo and Diablo 2, I wouldn't buy if it wasn't for the hype... people are PISSED and EA is probably losing a ton of money because of it

I'm almost certain this DRM will ultimately cost them considerably more than piracy would take, it's perfect!

As we say in Brazil: Time comes and the whip hits your own ass!

Re: SimCity Burning: A Warning to Publishers on The Dangers of Always-Online DRM

#132

Post by [deleted] » Fri, Mar 08, 2013, 11:03 PM UTC

danielweber wrote: post #113

toki5 wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because there's a semantic difference between "SimCity" and "SimCity Online." SimCity's been a single-player offline experience since its inception. It's reasonable to believe in a vacuum that a newly-released "SimCity" game will be the same. Lots of people are in such a vacuum -- a LOT of people hear "A new SimCity game is coming out / has come out" in their periphery and, having enjoyed its past iterations, rush to…

I'm sure they had discussions about whether they should have called it "SimCity Online." I think they made the wrong decision, but maybe they thought that people would assume "online == free-to-play."

[deleted]

Re: SimCity Burning: A Warning to Publishers on The Dangers of Always-Online DRM

#133

Post by chinpokomon » Fri, Mar 08, 2013, 11:03 PM UTC

The truly disappointing thing to me, was that I was really excited and looking forward to playing Spore. That is another Maxis game produced by EA that I've completely lost interest in because of the DRM. From the sound of it, I need to stay away from this one too. It is as though EA doesn't want my money.

Re: SimCity Burning: A Warning to Publishers on The Dangers of Always-Online DRM

#134

Post by idunno246 » Fri, Mar 08, 2013, 11:10 PM UTC

ConceptJunkie wrote: post #114

lotharbot wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "So eventually keeping a game 'alive' starts generating negative money" When a game nears that point, the publishers can theoretically push a patch that removes the "must be online" components and/or allows connection to self-run servers, so the community can keep it alive. I'm aware of a few companies actually doing something like this. Years ago, Parallax/Outrage/Volition (of the Descent series) went out of their…

Perhaps, but companies like that are the exception, not the rule. I fully expect that companies like EA don't give a warm bucket of spit about anything past the initial phase during which a game will be sold.

EA actually did this for a fb game:

http://www.joystiq.com/2012/06/20/dragon-age-legends-no-long...

Re: SimCity Burning: A Warning to Publishers on The Dangers of Always-Online DRM

#135

Post by lttlrck » Fri, Mar 08, 2013, 11:13 PM UTC

tobyjsullivan wrote: post #111

Irregardless wrote: post #28

> There's also the question of preserving gaming history. As we saw with THQ last month, publishers aren't immortal. They can die, and had THQ implemented always-online DRM in Darksiders II, all copies of that game might've died with it when the rights to the series weren't bought up by another publisher. That's the part that concerns me the most. I still install (and play) lots of old games on every computer I own -…

I think the real mismatch for EA and Gamers is that EA is effectively selling a SaaS product but pricing it like it's an boxed product. It's not just unlikely but, in fact, impossible for the operating costs of the servers to be worth keeping on forever since no (significant) additional income will be coming in from the title after some point X. SaaS companies have been dealing with this for years quite successfully…

Subscription still doesn't prevent them from stopping subscription renewal and switching off support.

Re: SimCity Burning: A Warning to Publishers on The Dangers of Always-Online DRM

#136

Post by jblow » Fri, Mar 08, 2013, 11:14 PM UTC

thebokehwokeh2 wrote: post #129

tobyjsullivan wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the real mismatch for EA and Gamers is that EA is effectively selling a SaaS product but pricing it like it's an boxed product. It's not just unlikely but, in fact, impossible for the operating costs of the servers to be worth keeping on forever since no (significant) additional income will be coming in from the title after some point X. SaaS companies have been dealing with this for years quite successfully…

This is truly delusional. Your model assumes that the current model, (buy once own forever), isn't making them enough money to keep the lights on. The issue here isn't that EA is not making enough to keep the lights on. It's that EA wants to make more, and more, and more and more, and more... And is too lazy to figure out a true solution to piracy. Nobody will pay $60 to "rent" something for 2 years. You already pay…

Have you looked at EA's financials?

They have been losing money for years.

Re: SimCity Burning: A Warning to Publishers on The Dangers of Always-Online DRM

#137

Post by Tanner » Fri, Mar 08, 2013, 11:19 PM UTC

jl6 wrote: post #121

12 years ago I quit gaming because decent titles weren't available for Linux. I now have a great job and family, part of which I attribute to spending thousands of hours learning about life and technology instead of playing games. Give it up people, video games = fast-forwarding your life. (Actually I'm not really suggesting being that strict. I did return to play the occasional top title like Portal 2, but on a stri…

To offer an alternate perspective: I owe video games a great debt. I wouldn't be where I am today if I hadn't thrown myself to whole-heartedly into playing and making video games right out of highschool. My passion for them got me my first job as a developer despite having extremely limited experience.

Giving up video games, for me, likely would have meant I was working a menial job for low pay. Games are a huge part of life for a lot of people and it's totally possible to engage with them meaningfully, often and still have it be healthy.

Re: SimCity Burning: A Warning to Publishers on The Dangers of Always-Online DRM

#138

Post by lttlrck » Fri, Mar 08, 2013, 11:23 PM UTC

lotharbot wrote: post #130

jl6 wrote: post #121

12 years ago I quit gaming because decent titles weren't available for Linux. I now have a great job and family, part of which I attribute to spending thousands of hours learning about life and technology instead of playing games. Give it up people, video games = fast-forwarding your life. (Actually I'm not really suggesting being that strict. I did return to play the occasional top title like Portal 2, but on a stri…

My wife did excellent work on a training simulator, and regularly impressed both the military customer and higher ups on the corporate side. She credited three video games with building her most impressive skills: Descent taught her to visualize and maneuver in 3D space, Starcraft taught her to think about force composition and disposition, and Nethack taught her to make thousands of decisions (and type thousands of…

Descent... well you needed as certain aptitude to play that game well. A degree in three-dimensional awareness would also have helped.

Re: SimCity Burning: A Warning to Publishers on The Dangers of Always-Online DRM

#139

Post by tobyjsullivan » Fri, Mar 08, 2013, 11:23 PM UTC

lttlrck wrote: post #135

tobyjsullivan wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the real mismatch for EA and Gamers is that EA is effectively selling a SaaS product but pricing it like it's an boxed product. It's not just unlikely but, in fact, impossible for the operating costs of the servers to be worth keeping on forever since no (significant) additional income will be coming in from the title after some point X. SaaS companies have been dealing with this for years quite successfully…

Subscription still doesn't prevent them from stopping subscription renewal and switching off support.

I may have failed to clearly communicate my point. My intention was that they could do a lot more to manage expectations of their customers which would, most likely, greatly reduce the ill will they are currently experiencing.

Re: SimCity Burning: A Warning to Publishers on The Dangers of Always-Online DRM

#140

Post by BystanderX » Fri, Mar 08, 2013, 11:35 PM UTC

drobati wrote: post #95

danielweber wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

but piracy seems to be our only guaranteed method of preserving them You aren't going to pirate Sim City 5. This is the future of gaming. Companies are just going to avoid all the grief of piracy and weird DRM by either moving to locked-down platforms (iOS and consoles) or into games that have essential online components. It's a classic prisoner's dilemma. I'd love to by a game and install it on my PC without it taki…

This is not the future of gaming. Look at how badly SimCity flopped. Let me compare to DotA2 which I play a lot. It's exclusively multiplayer and thus needs an internet connection, yet it's free to play. How much have I spent on it? At this point at least $75+ dollars. THIS IS THE FUTURE OF GAMING. Valve has the right model. I know valve didn't create the F2P model but it has implemented it the best as far as I know.…

And you know what's exemplary about DotA 2? All that money you spent isn't even short-cutting grind, it's /only/ on cosmetics.

I can't find a better example of F2P models out there, even my beloved Planetside 2 has some pretty big issues with how its model applies to gameplay.