EA suspends SimCity marketing campaigns, asks affiliates to 'stop actively promoting' game

In light of SimCity's disastrous launch week, publisher Electronic Arts has suspended the marketing campaign for the game, according to an internal email obtained by Polygon.

The email, which was sent to all of EA's marketing affiliate partners, informs them that EA is deactivating links through LinkShare and that "we ask you to please remove any copy promoting SimCity from your website for the time-being."

[majiebeast]

EA should just announce there is a offline mode patch coming in a few weeks and then i would buy the game for sure. Cause it does look pretty good but there is no reason for it to be online only and im not gonna support that its not like the game can have goldfarmers or bots.

I wish Maxis could sever itself from EA before they get shut down for lackluster sales.Sad to see Will Wright's franchises get destroyed by EA's moronic decisions.

[Godmars290]

Thing is the game isn't single player. Looking at several reviews that much is obvious. One city depends and is effected by another.

[Nawert]

It's going to take them awhile to add CPU cities to make it single player.

[ZombieNinjaPanda]

Depends? No. Effected? Yes. Can you easily play the game without anyone else? Yes. People are making their own private servers when they're actually able to get on.

[Bimkoblerutso]

You can create multiple cities. It would be very easy to play singleplayer in this game. You already can, its just you always have to be on....which as anyone can tell, is a disasterous requirement...

[ThanatosDMC]

They should copy Anno 2070's setup. Not to mention the maps are too small and why does it take such a long time to visit a friend's city that's adjacent to my city... ridiculous.

Btw, maps are stupidly small. 2013 city building game and it's minuscule.

[Gazondaily]

I just saw the ad in the picture advertised on tv about 10 minutes ago.

[camel_toad]

Yeh I really do feel sorry for the devs in this situation. People may lose their jobs because of this and it will only be EA's fault, not the devs.

[DonteDemonSlayer]

Funny that they say they have suspended marketing when just last night on Comedy C I saw an advertisement every commercial for the game. The only way EA can save themselves now is add offline mode, or compensate consumers after they address the online issues.

[PooEgg]

The media buyers need time to contact their reps to pull the ads, so that isn't really surprising. It isn't like EA can just make a decision and pull a switch and boom no more Ads.

This will probably be very costly to EA, but they have only themselves to blame, and I suspect this is their karma finally rising up to bite them in the ass.

[Derekvinyard13]

DRM is the problem dammit !!!!!

[Number-Nine]

EA is great!

....

[Kran]

I think this guy was trying to be sarcastic, but failed.

Hence the dot dot dot dot :P

P.S. it's "are great" if you were to be grammatically correct :)

[Dread]

Sorry
Electronic arts is great
I think its with "is"

[Number-Nine]

i thought it was pretty much a given :(.

also, "is" is proper grammar. when talking about a company (and not the people within said company) it's singular.

[Kran]

But "is" just doesn't...

i mean... :/

[clrlite]

EA IS a corporation. A corporation, Singular.

Or if things continue like this, "EA WAS a corporation"

example:

"How nice EA is/was for showing people the absurdity of always-on DRM."

:P

[harrisk954]

I believe that in the U.S. a corporation "is" and in Europe "they are"...

I think that the U.S. grammar rule makes more sense since it is only one corporation, not a group.

[uuaschbaer]

Careful: not in Europe but in Great Britain, outside of Britain people learn proper English at school.

[Saryk]

I guess they are in damage control mode now and not let the fire spread as far as it has, which is pretty damn far!

[Saryk]

I have a wonder. When EA sends out a memo, how fast does it take to become news?

[TitanUp]

this should have been predicted,diablo 3

[MadLad]

Stop making such stupid decisions and people will stop hating you so much.

Look at it this way . . . people aren't expecting, and they sure as hell don't want, their singleplayer experiences to be indefinitely tied to an online experience.
A queue to play your game by yourself?
Well, EA . . . that's idiotic beyond belief.

[Taggart451]

I'm surprised you linked to a Polygon article with a Kotaku header image.

*shrug*

[aliengmr]

Why suspend the ad campaign? Is it a way of halting sales?

[MestreRothN4G]

To have something to announce with a bang in a few days.

"It is fixed, marketing campaign is back, our game works".

[clrlite]

They must be redirecting funds to their new "Always-online DRM is okay again" ad campaign.

[MestreRothN4G]

I'm glad DRM is dying.

[Muffins1223]

The only thing drm needs to work is better servers... that's all.And if we get better servers i can assure you it will not die.

[V0LT]

DRM doesn't need to exist. Period.

[aliengmr]

No. DRM simply doesn't work. It never has.

Ubi had to stop the always online crap because it was having the opposite effect.

[Red_Devilz]

couldn't agree more

[TechnicianTed]

The only people that suffer from DRM are the paying customers, the pirates find ways around DRM one way or another.

The steps some companies are taking is just silly now.

[kingPoS]

Hhahaha! This is first time I've heard of a company purposely halt advertizing of their newly released product. I know the situation behind it, but that doesn't make any less amusing.

[V0LT]

I can't say I feel bad for EA. This company is my enemy.

[grassyknoll]

You have to be a really special publisher to kill SimCity, but I think they've done it!

[kobonline]

I'm so disappointed. I've been waiting 10 years for a true sequel to Sim City 4 and what we got is this crap.

You would have thought that they learned their mistakes from Sim City Societies.

I would have been satisfied with Sim City 4's gameplay with updated 3D graphics. This crap feels like an IOS game.

[clrlite]

Thank you EA, for reminding people how absolutely absurd alwyays-online DRM is.

At least for a little while, until you trick them into using it.

[madpuppy]

At the end of the day, games are still products, and no matter how hard a developer worked on the game if things are implemented that ruin the game play experience, like Always on DRM, or no way to win a game if you don't spend extra money on micro-transactions.
It either needs to be fixed or fail in the market. sometimes, that is the ONLY way a Company will learn and change.

[aLiEnViSiToR]

RUN MAXIS RUUUUUUUUUUUNNNNNNNNNNNN !!!

[parkerpeters]

EA needs to learn one day. The only way that companies learn is by people not buying their products. Complaining doesnt help, because you already bought the damn game.

If you bought Sim City, you should ask for a refund, and if they refuse, then yell bait and switch, and take their ass to court. This game is not what they advertised. I am sure they know that. I am sure you all see that.

[lassenwolf]

Ea needs to stop making or financing games, They are the biggest rip off ever. I stopped buying any EA game and haven't bought a sports game from them forever. They started the on line pass now they can eat it.

[kostchtchie_]

i hope this fail shows other developers that we need Online & Offline games, none this always online garbage, feel for fellow gamers that bought this game

[tweet75]

EA needs to personally refund every gamer that has purchased simcity and take it off the market. Otherwise EA should be boycotted

[bmwyallaa]

you know what, iv been a fan of simcity back when it was on snes and the original simcity pc on our IBM 486 33mghz 2mg of ram and this game particularity iv been following its progress for some time now i swear i was waiting for time of work so i can go buy this game and then i found out all this shit about single player online and saving your cities on servers and some other cunts city affecting mine mate i just wanna play single player not everyone has a good internet connection. Or when the data cap is almost at its limit, you don't want to fucking use the internet to play single player fuck ya

[BitbyDeath]

Maxis will be fine, Sims earns too much money.