The new SimCity...*sigh*

[Robert Maxwell]

I like the fact they still had issues with the game, like the fastest speed, and during that someone was sitting around making an ad in the game. That seems like a good idea. haha

Not at all unusual. The person(s) working on that DLC were likely allocated to it long before the game was actually released, and with something as large and complex as a game, you can't always pull someone off of one area to work on another without a productivity penalty. Besides that, most of the issues were due to exceeding the capacity of the servers set up for it--simply not a problem the game's programmers and artists are supposed to solve.

 

[Manticore]

I like the fact they still had issues with the game, like the fastest speed, and during that someone was sitting around making an ad in the game. That seems like a good idea. haha

Not at all unusual. The person(s) working on that DLC were likely allocated to it long before the game was actually released, and with something as large and complex as a game, you can't always pull someone off of one area to work on another without a productivity penalty. Besides that, most of the issues were due to exceeding the capacity of the servers set up for it--simply not a problem the game's programmers and artists are supposed to solve.

Exactly. This is a common fallacy amongst gamers: "spending resources on this thing when there's these other glaring issues is stupid!"

Employees at game studios are highly specialized. You have level designers, artists, content designers, engineers, qa reps, etc. Some companies, like most MMO teams, specialize even further, like the difference between a quest designer, encounter designer, and world builder, all ostensibly content designers. And that's not even going into support teams, like marketing, CS (such as myself), analysts, server techs, and so on and so forth.

A content designer and an artist working on a building, however crass, does not mean that resources were taken away from server stability. I'm sure that they have almost all of their server techs working to get their servers as stable as possible, but an artist and a designer won't be able to contribute diddly to it.

That said, the building is rather blatant, and let's not even get into the fact that a Simcity game shouldn't even have to worry about server stability.

 

[Robert Maxwell]

That said, the building is rather blatant, and let's not even get into the fact that a Simcity game shouldn't even have to worry about server stability.

Indeed, but then these are decisions well above the pay grade of the programmers and artists, and even the creative leads. This sort of hooey comes from the C-level dingbats who pat themselves on the back for coming up with such great ideas that the salaried peons never could.

 

[Holdfast]

I've been playing SimCity a fair bit since I got it a couple of weeks or so ago, and have found it pretty fun. Single-player private regions can be quite good, given the need for city specialisations, creating a lot of switching from one city to the next to get all your ducks in a row. In the region I'm currently playing, I'm up to about 8 cities, with two great works completed. I think there are two more great works sites in it, so I'm aiming to have all four different great works up & running in it. The only thing that annoys me slightly is that each great work only seems to affect the subset of cities that are directly linked to it, rather the entire region, even if there are road, rail & ferry connections to other cities. Other effects are regionwide (e.g. city hall annexes), so it's a bit lame to not let the great works affect the whole region. It would unbalance everything, but still, it would be fun.

The bigger issue is the server lag between doing something in one city, and the other cities picking up the effect. This seems to have improved recently (in the same update that finally reactivated cheetah speed), esp. with regard to great work sites updating faster, but things like donations of money are still susceptible to significant delays. I've a couple of cities that generate many millions of simoleans per day and I want the cash to subsidise others that are running deficits, but it can take time for the cash to transfer.

Still, the game remains a pretty good time-sink.

 

[Manticore]

That said, the building is rather blatant, and let's not even get into the fact that a Simcity game shouldn't even have to worry about server stability.

Indeed, but then these are decisions well above the pay grade of the programmers and artists, and even the creative leads. This sort of hooey comes from the C-level dingbats who pat themselves on the back for coming up with such great ideas that the salaried peons never could.

Heh, upper management is evil (below the executive level). And/or moronic. I could bitch and moan about some of the things my company's done to us poor CS reps, but that might lead some of you to figure out where I work, and that would be Bad.

 

[eastman23]

So... EA has released a major update to resolve issues with SimCity. For instance, your trees will now make traffic noises. And lack of taxis in your city? That's no longer a problem!



Man, I'm glad I didn't spend 60 bucks on this piece of crap.

 

[Melakon]

I was seriously considering getting this (even uninstalled Sims3), until I read about the required internet connection. That was the no sale sign for me.

 

[Saturn0660]

Thats... a lot of taxis.

 

[MacLeod]

I also considered getting this game, now I'm sort of glad I didn't. I could always fire up SC4, or 3 or 2000. Think I've still got a copy of the original somewhere as well.

 

[Squiggy]

Meh, I'm still going to get it.

 

[Saturn0660]

Indeed, just waiting for OSX.

 

[Squiggy]

June 11.

 

[Robert Maxwell]

SimCity 4 is on sale at GameFly right now for $4.99.

Just sayin'.

 

[Squiggy]

Just ordered my Mac copy.

Thanks to all the PC peeps for working bugs out.

 

[Alidar Jarok]

Did they increase city size at all?

 

[Haggis and tatties]

Did they fix the AI path finding yet, i gave up on it due to that causing to many issues to enjoy the game.

 

[MacLeod]

From what I heard, I think I'll stick to SC4.

 

[Squiggy]

They just pushed back the mac launch to August.

God dammit.

 

[beamMe]

They just pushed back the mac launch to August.

God dammit.

that particular success-story continues.

 

[TheGodBen]

They're finally adding an offline singleplayer mode to the game. I still have no plans to buy it because most of what I've read about the actual gameplay is... unflattering. But it's still a positive development in my eyes, and hopefully it signals a turning-point in this drive towards online-only games.