SimCity sells 1.1 million copies, “biggest SimCity launch of all time”

GC: "EA has announced that SimCity has sold 1.1 million copies."

[majiebeast]

Great i wanna thank all the people that bought this always online piece of shit. Cause guess what we are gonna get even more of that now. Cause EA knows they can screw their customers and they will happily bend over to take it.

No wonder gaming is getting worse and worse with DLC of any kind,microtransactions, and now single player games getting forced online for no reason other then to kill off piracy, by screwing over the customer.

[shutUpAndTakeMyMoney]

"Great i wanna thank all the people that bought this always online piece of shit."

Like diablo 3.

But no one seems to complain.

And I think diablo 3 sold 10 million.

[thereapersson]

But many people I know who bought DIII on launch have either quit playing already or have even uninstalled it. It's fun but it feels like a pale imitator of itself as a Diablo game.

[DeadlyFire]

Diablo 3 sold 12+ million in 2012. So its higher than that now. Even so it didn't have same fun factor I believe.

[Derekvinyard13]

Simcity is a big series, the average joe just buys it without knowing all the spec jargon, I expected it to sell over 1 million PC gamers love the originals

[aCasualGamer]

I wonder how many of the Simcity owners knew about the always online connectivity before they bought it. I'm pretty certain not alot of people knew about it before buying it and can you imagine the rage that consumes them when they weren't able to play the game?

I mean, Simcity isn't your typical game, it doesn't have the same target group as other games. Those who bought the game are probably some old fashioned PC gamers who don't know that much about gaming or this industry, they just play Simcity, Civilization etc.

I'm pretty sure EA didn't market this game with a label of "oh btw you have to be online constantly, or you won't get to play!"... nope, that's not how EA rolls right?

All the managers over at EA deserve to get fired, for deceiving customers and gamers like this. If there is one company out there that deserves to get their games pirated it's EA.

[IK IR Y IP T]

i did i bought it a week after launch havent had a single issue not once and i get a free game woo sim city is amazing

[aCasualGamer]

@IK IR Y IP T

Good for you. Hope you enjoyed the game. You should know though, that alot of people have been getting issues with connecting to the game.

Are there many bugs and glitches in the game? Because i've heard from many people that the game has some pretty large glitches that can hinder the gameplay.

[rainslacker]

The Sim series in general sells a crap ton of copies. It's one of the most lucrative names in the industry.

For every one of us on here that may have stayed away from the game because of knowing these things would be an issue, there are 100 that have no clue about it. It's painfully obvious if you read any of the forum posts on EA's own website about it. These don't even include the average user who may not be adept at using forums, or who don't even post on forums.

While having a lucrative franchise is good, when you take the principles of why people buy it, see it sells a lot despite crappy anti-consumer practices, and then extrapolate that that is what all consumers want, it becomes a problem. If EA now goes on to say people will eat it up for every(or most) products, like they are with micro-transactions, then it can have serious long term side effects which disillusion the consumers in general.

Ubisoft was doing this same kind of thing with DRM, although don't recall always-on in the mix, and they eventually said it just isn't worth it. I hope EA comes to that conclusion a lot sooner.

[Godmars290]

Not really the fault of the people who bought it. They bought the game, pre-ordered it, got b*tch slapped by DRM, and now because of that the title's fallen under additional scrutiny which has revealed that it doesn't live up to any of its claims.

This is EA going before its stockholders and proving that no matter how badly they screw up and shortchange their customers, they can make money.

Course it would be sweet if they only sold 1.1 million. Ever.

[coolbeans]

To be fair, the 'average' SimCity gamer who bought this game probably pre-ordered or bought Day 1 on good faith. It doesn't help matters when most game reviews posted before City's release were positive on metacritic, leaving people who could've canceled at the last second to be fooled into thinking Origin's servers were ready for them (IF they even knew about the always-on DRM).

There's also EA's angle to consider in this: blocking digital refunds can lead me to believe they did it just to keep these first week numbers as inflated as possible from this fiasco, since that's when it's most important for publishers' stockholders.

[Kran]

As much as I agree with you, it's hard to agree with you when free will is apparently not allowed in the gaming world.

I'm not saying you're wrong. I hate EA for what they have done to gaming. But on the other end of it, if I want to buy a game, I expect it to be allowed without critism. Not many of us knew there was always-online DRM before the game was released.

[mrkeith]

lol always online DRM is fine for me considering that my PC is online 24/7 anyways. Im not really sure why you would be turning your internet off and on on your pc?? I just hope they learn that you need "always online" servers on the company end. Thats where you get screwed at.

[Animal Mutha 76]

I would also like to sarcastically ( slow hand clap) thank all those who bought Aliens CM before reading a review (I'm guilty of this), and the many people who have purchased all of those rubbish COD BLOPS2 micro transactions.

I really enjoy being shot by a gun made out of bacon. I sit there and think wow your such a great gamer with big bollocks. I bow to your awsomeness. Well done for paying 160msp for a small bacon texture that's been tiled over your gun. That's money we'll spent.

The guys at Activision must literally piss themselves laughing when they get told during their Monday morning business meeting that half a million people have paid for a bacon texture. They must sit there and think - 'my god they really will buy anything'. Next week if we need another million quid or so let's just rush out a gun texture of my ass crack. Loads will buy it then we can all go buy Ferraris and drive around smoking dollar bills.

Every COD from now on will have silly micro trans for weapon skins, attachments and so on thanks to you. Cheers, thanks a fudging lot.

On topic - sales of Sim City have demonstrated to devs that they can get away with skimping on beta testing to save money as we can all be used as guinea pigs at launch to test the game with a 'we'll fix it' attitude post launch.

[Root]

Great ¬¬

Thats all EA is going to take away from that

"You guys do realise that it was a failure at launch because of the no offline thing, got worse reviews then past titles and some fans felt it was stripped of some features which made past sim city games so good"

"...yeah but it sold a lot"

"but"

"...Money, Money, Money"

[Pandamobile]

Publishers generally don't care too much about quality. If a game gets poor reception but sells a lot, that's a success in their books.

[Root]

Shame because they'll never learn

[Irishguy95]

Hopefully the next SimCity suffers from it.

FFXIII was ****, FF13-2 sold poorly due to that.

[Outside_ofthe_Box]

^^^ Yup.

I'm pretty sure most that bought SimCity were unaware of it's always online issue. The next SimCity will surely suffer due to this colossal failure. FF13 is a great example of what will happen.

[rainslacker]

While I'd like to think that's true, and it surely will have some effect, the Sims games themselves often release with some major issue that causes consumer annoyance. They still sell very well on each new release. By the time the next one comes out(or any other series with a similar issue), most people will forget about those day one woes, and remember the game after it's fixed state. Even on the EA forums people are saying "it will get fixed later, just be patient", or "You should have waited since these things are common", so these kinds of practices, while controversial, don't make companies really try to do better.

There are some of us that are more pragmatic in how we decide to purchase a game...it just doesn't equate to enough sales lost to make a big difference.

[Blastoise]

EA is run by Mr Krabs

[Root]

"So what made you build the Krusty Krab 2"

"...money"

"So what made you make SimCity always be online"

"...money"

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-l...

[vega275]

Actually I'm more interested in how much of that was returned due to refunds. Probably not much since they was denying people refunds.

[-Alpha]

This is not what we meant when we said "Vote with your wallets", dammit!

Though, I'm under the assumption that fans of the legacy of this franchise put faith in this one. I do not expect a sequel to do as well, as consumers would naturally be more precarious.

It's just too bad that EA gets to get away with it.

[Kyosuke_Sanada]

So....uh......about them refunds?

[secretcode]

...Are you kidding me? THIS is what you've taken away from the SimCity launch, EA?

[josephayal]

and the best simcity game ever

[Kyosuke_Sanada]

-reads josephhayal's post-

Your posts always brighten up my day.

http://h8.abload.de/img/lau...

[SeraphimBlade]

Big launch, alright. It's about the size of the Hindenburg.

Don't blame the consumer, guys. I'm sure most people bought early or didn't know about these problems. Hopefully they learned a lesson about doing your research and waiting a couple days.

[cyguration]

You mean like Aliens: Colonial Marines? Whoops, looks like consumers dug their foot out of a pothole and stepped into a crater.

*slow clap*

[FarCryLover182]

I bet a large portion of those were upset and affected by botched online system. I'm sure the next SimCity won't match this success.

[CaulkSlap]

I absolutely regret buying. Bought it from nostalgia without looking into it too much. All EA has managed to do is destroy their credibility. Even without the DRM they've ruined the series in my eyes. No more day 1 purchasing from me.

And btw nothing could have encouraged piracy more than this fiasco. More than likely within a few months we'll see a cracked version of Simcity up that works with local saves and modding. Just totally separate it from their mess. If they want to drive paying customers away then we should have no qualms about leaving.

[amaguli]

Alright, launch was great, but what about the game's legs? Just because it launched to the tune of 1.1 million copies does not mean it will much more in the coming the months.

In the end, SimCity looks to be a short term success, but that won't mean much if it does not sell months after its release. Remember DmC and Resident Evil 6? Great launches, but Capcom had to lower their numbers because it was not selling well after the hype period.

[ColinZeal]

Jeez EA, i´d shut up about this for the moment...

[Glitch100]

How many refunds?
"1 Million gamers were refunded" -
"Biggest refund of a single 'game' of all time"

[ps3_pwns]

this game would of sold double in the same time peeriod if it had a offline mode and was drm free and had a sim city classic mode that allowed you to make big citys. not only that but it would have legs with a lot of dlc sales from the amount of people playing and hypeing it.

[Roper316]

I wonder how many of the 1.1 million are happy satisfied customers?

[Blastoise]

boooooooooooooo

[2pacalypsenow]

biggest but worst of all time for a sim city game

[Reborn]

I'm not sure what everyone expected.

They screwed up, blatantly. Announced a few free games, and hoped all was forgiven. You've bought their game, they've got your money.

I hope customers don't rush out for the next one (if its all online).

[ame22]

Despite the all the controversy and poor reception, this is sad just sad.

[Triggytrolls]

I didn't buy it.

[RTheRebel]

morons

[baldulf]

Between this and the cheers to Bioware for that cheesy ME3 DLC I have lost the little faith I had left in the game consumers.

[aLiEnViSiToR]

LOL i guess its now going to be "Biggest refund game of all time" too xD