EA turning off games’ online servers is turning me off EA

Rory Boland, Which? Conversation: Electronic Arts (EA) has shut down online servers for a number of its games. But some gamers are losing more than just the chance to trade punches with opponents around the world…

[da_2pacalypse]

Just wondering... What happens to Sim City when EA decides to shut off its servers a few years from now? Does the game become completely useless?

[HammadTheBeast]

Pretty much. Which is sad considering I still play SC4 to this day.

[guitarded77]

Hopefully homebrewers will have a workaround by then. I'm not a fan of hacking/cracking for malicious purposes, but I respect home devs that solve problems such as this. I don't know what it will take to make it happen, but there are some pretty smart people in this world.

[mydyingparadiselost]

Yes. Welcome to the future!

[mrkeith]

Man i just thought about that since you said it. Makes me wonder if i should buy Sim City now. Ah screw it by the time they shut down Sim City 5 im sure Sim City 6 will be out lol

[StoneyYoshi]

Im sure Maxis would be kind enough to add a offline mode If that ever happens. I mean who knows when they will release another sim city to have to do that. And bad company 2 came out in 09 and its still up and running. so is 2142, and 1942.

And we already knew that EA has been shutting down the annual sports games servers after 2 years. And they never shut down BF2's servers.... maybe crummy modern combat that flopped.

This is the current server list status on bf2
http://www.gametracker.com/...

[SolidDuck]

Unless they patch in a single player offline mode, then yes.

[Stefanrules7]

EA are unlikely to do that because they will be trying to force you to buy the next one.

However, hopefully hackers and modders will be able to get their own no DRM server and even expand on the city sizes so EA cant sell you expanded land like theyre trying to do.

As for other games, youre fine if your on pc because of the reasons above but consoles are doooooomed!!!!

[Double_O_Revan]

This is my biggest fear when it comes to people talking about 'always online' consoles, like the rumored new xbox.

Servers don't stay online forever for these games. And it sucks when a game you love, even years down the line, goes under and becomes useless.

[Pillsbury1]

This is why free to play is not good for gaming. What happens when those games get shut down and all that money you wasted was for nothing?

[mydyingparadiselost]

I have this same problem with digital games as well. Digital only + corporate greed = humanity fail

[artdafoo]

I remember when they killed TF2 servers for consoles. Sombitches.

[SegaGamer]

I agree with this, i don't even bother playing EA games online anymore, i gave up on them after FIFA 11. Their excuse for closing down the servers is bull.

[ps3_pwns]

this is why people are trying to bash and protest this type of stuff because they are thinking long term while some of you just thinking about right now getting your fix untill ooops its to late to do anything about it bail out big banks time, recession time, messed up goverment time. what we see happning in game industry is basically what happen to the country people being dumb and letting crap companys take advantage because they want that quick fix now when they can get the same fix but with better long term security if they fight back now and not later.

[Scenarist]

Im sure this game will be burst open in a couple years with full mod support....

annnnddd. .. hopefully . full region play as 1 city lol

[WUTCHUGUNNADO]

LOL... read the article. Saw BF2 and was like WTF... clicked on the link to the actual list and laughed. BF2 Modern Combat XD...

Their shutting down servers for games no one are playing.

[Saryk]

The biggest problem with this is that they will continue to sell these games and new players will be SOL. Happened to me on NFS on Steam.

[GROTSTOMPA]

I hope people have half a brain enough to stop supporting EA like I did. Time to stop supporting TRASHCAN companies, and trash bag corporations. WHAT is wrong with people? Don't they get it? Have people stopped educating themselves (independently)? Have people really forgotten how to be independent and handle their own responsibility? Has the Government really succeeded to that extent in making our society that dumbed-down and dependent on everything? YES. WE all know this by now, clearly they have.. it's time for an overhaul with the new generations coming up and the young 1970's and 80's generation. Rise and shine, or before you know it, everything will be ran by EA's across the the country. Now of course.. it already is, but rather "They will come to stay" if nothing is done.
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Also, while I'm at it, go watch "Steven Greer's Sirius Disclosure", released April 22nd 2013 Earth day. Maybe this will help open the minds of people who actually STILL think we are free in this Garbage-Run Country, and whom still do not believe in "other life" or even a simple PLANT, being capable of living in a single Universe of 100+ trillion planets. Lets not forget the Multi-verse is being proven and IS USED AS FACT because it is the only answer to their missing equations for most scientists today (yea guys, clearly Multiple Universes were created just for our planet, we be special. *sarcasm).
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Time to wake up, stop supporting loser companies who's only interests is money and trash bags. Start understanding that you don't know squat about anything (other than slavery and death) that happens around this planet, or even with your OWN Government/Military Industrial Complex. It makes me sad in my heart literally. Once this is a much larger realization, we will begin to move forward and LEAVE our Counter-productive, slavery-status, competition ego's, short-penis cars, outdated, useless, inefficient, corrupted, abused and reused economy system in the entire galaxy shared by many that are beyond Governments and money systems. For the record I speak from fact, seeing things myself and being "places", not my "opinion", in other words, there's no arguing my point, it's already there and happening, so please don't bother, your argument is invalid and there are many others that follow and know exactly what I'm talking about. Thanks

[Z501]

They (EA) will continue to sell said games without any warning/notice to the average consumer. I'm not even the average consumer and it happened to me. NBA STREET HOMECOURT. (The ONLY 'street' basketball game this gen.) Bought the game. Took it home. Couldn't play online. No one told me. Had to go right back and return it. I was done with EA then & there.

[GROTSTOMPA]

Good for you sir, you're what I call a Man or a woman. Not a boy or girl. Thanks for knowing how to handle things independently, and basically standing up to a problem.

[ZBlacktt]

Nothing last forever people. More so 4 to 5 years after the title came out. Along with a already follow up title that is still online, etc. I loved MGO ( Metal Gear Online ). Gone on the 4 year mark. Been playing some Killzone 2 lately and it runs like CRAP. So many errors and SO much lag with the whole world playing on one server it seems. But again, we can't expect games to run forever. That's just not realistic. I would pretty much see the same names on Killzone 2 every single day.

[Kyosuke_Sanada]

Then expansions should be free but it's not isn't it.....

[ZBlacktt]

TOTALY agree with you there. I bought all the KZ2 DLC only to find out there is no one playing it.

But I did become the number 1 player in the world this past week for the week.

http://i29.photobucket.com/...

[PersonMan]

This is one of those reasons that I don't particularly like online gaming.... one day it can just end and you won't be able to play your games anymore.

Long live single player and local co-op!!!

[Soldierone]

Now imagine next generation when everything needs a connection. These servers shutting down no longer mean "damn can't play the multiplayer and get those stupid trophies," it means "damn, I can't play the game I paid 60 dollars for AT ALL!"

[Snookies12]

This is why I will ALWAYS prefer local co-op and local multi-player over online.