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SimCity's Empire Has Fallen and Skylines Is Picking Up the Pieces
sarahnaomi writes: Colossal Order's SimCity-like game, Cities: Skylines, sold more than half a million copies in its first week. The first 250,000 of those were sold in the first 24 hours, making it the fastest-selling game its publisher, Paradox Interactive, has ever released. Only a week before Skylines was released, game publisher Electronic Arts announced that it was shutting down SimCity developer Maxis' studio in Emeryville, which it acquired in 1997.
"I feel so bad about Maxis closing down," Colossal Order CEO Mariina Hallikainen said. "The older SimCitys were really the inspiration for us to even consider making a city builder." At the same time, Hallikainen admits SimCity's mistakes were Colossal Order's opportunity. "If SimCity was a huge success, which is what we expected, I don't know if Skylines would have ever happened," she said, explaining that it would have been a harder pitch to sell to Paradox if the new SimCity dominated the market.
"I feel so bad about Maxis closing down," Colossal Order CEO Mariina Hallikainen said. "The older SimCitys were really the inspiration for us to even consider making a city builder." At the same time, Hallikainen admits SimCity's mistakes were Colossal Order's opportunity. "If SimCity was a huge success, which is what we expected, I don't know if Skylines would have ever happened," she said, explaining that it would have been a harder pitch to sell to Paradox if the new SimCity dominated the market.
Forced to play online. Not enough server support. Too much DLC. Incredibly overpriced DLC.
Goodbye SimCity, you were great long ago.
That is all.
But why is no one talking about the traffic issues in Skylines?
It really is the SimCity everyone wanted. Shame on EA and Maxis for fooling us with their shoddy game.
Got Cities Skylines a couple nights ago, sinking tons of time into it. It seems...adequate I guess? First one that's been even adequate in well over a decade though. Transportation is a little more like the (confusingly, unrelated) Cities XL series...in that roads actually have lanes that actually matter. Not a perfect implementation, there's quirks like a lack of a way to merge two one-way streets directly onto a two-way street without allowing a u-turn at the intersection, but it's a heck of a lot better than the nightmare that was SimCity 4's road pathing. Also, unlike Cities XL, the city building part is actually a game instead of a micromanagement chore.
Game balance is a little meh, but again--better than any other city builder since SC2k. I'd say it's worth it, especially since it isn't sold for AAA-game price. Of course, people who played SimCity 2000 probably don't have the time to blow on city builders these days. It's published by Paradox (Crusader Kings, Europa Universalis) and it shows...none of their games aren't huge enormous time sinks.
Also, if you don't build graveyards after a certain point, people start complaining about the dead bodies stinking up their houses, and that's hilarious.
With Steam workshop support?
https://youtu.be/u6u88JeFY9g?t...
Sounds like my daily commute. WORKSFORME WONTFIX.
If I have been able to see further than others, it is because I bought a pair of binoculars.
I've sunk a bunch of time into it and gotten to 7 tiles so far, feels like a big city and a number of highway entrances, subways, trains etc... feels spacious and i don't have to destroy my early area to keep moving forwards...
But yea, there are some annoyances like the traffic backups here and there and finding ways that shouldn't be needed around them, but they aren't EA, they set the price lower and have been open about what they are doing. They've built up goodwill so I cut them a lot of slack. It's a good game and worth the time and money.
Now they start doing stuff like EA has over the years with madden exclusivity, the sim city stuff and everything else, then I won't even look at games they release.
I didn't know they were coming out with a different Europa Universalis, which is a game I enjoyed many years ago and totally forgot about...
If you cared about Maxis as a game studio that made a lot of classic games, they've been gone for a while. EA has long ago assimilated Maxis into the fold.
If you care about the Maxis name, it is still around. They closed a location in Emeryville, not the entire studio.
EA screwed up Simcity when it decided to turn it into the Facebook of city builders. Nobody wants to play a single person strategy game online with all their friends. Nobody wants to have to buy content to fix issues with the game.Nobody wants city sizes smaller than the previous version.
I eventually bought it when they released the offline mode, but I still found it kind of disappointing.
If you are not allowed to question your government then the government has answered your question.
and i almost certainly would have otherwise.
Its also why i didnt buy civ5, payday2, saints row IV(?), and Borderlands 2
DLC = unfinished game from price-gouging publisher = no thanks!
I played and loved so many of the original Maxis games (some that I'm sure no one else loved like SimTower and SimAnt). I even liked the SimCopter game (when I had access to the cheat codes). The sim games at their best were sandboxes to play in and build and experiment. The latest SimCity had some interesting ideas that were poorly executed. I like the idea of building onto the hospitals, fire and police stations, having spots for garbage trucks, and so on. The problem arose when the maps were incredibly too small, offered too little options to experiment, and cities became traffic nightmares. I played through some of the patches, but gave up when my cities reached a level where I couldn't enjoy them anymore. I am sure there are still firetrucks stuck in traffic in some of them.
So yeah, someone came along and did SimCity better than EA. Big surprise. Look for EA to acquire the company and turn it into shit within a couple of years.
By the way, if you work for EA and want the company to get back in my good graces, all they have to do is prove that they understand what makes a game "fun" and actually make one that is. I don't think they're capable, though. That would require "risk", and there are plenty of suckers out there who will gladly drop $60 on a "Madden" rehash. More and more people have been burned by AAA titles are are starting to buy indy games, though. I've sunk more time into a single sub-$20 indy game than I have the last three AAA titles combined. And if I drop $5 or $10 on an indy game, I don't have super high expectations for it and can only be happily surprised.
The big publishers talk about how piracy is destroying the industry, but there are plenty of people willing to pay for good games. The big publishers are just incapable of recognizing what makes a game good and expect consumers to just buy into every $60 turd they drop. It's not pirates killing the AAA industry, it's the publishers. And I for one will be happy to see them go.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
"I feel so bad about Maxis closing down," Colossal Order CEO Mariina Hallikainen said.
Well, that's nice to know. I guarantee that EA don't give a fuck.
I have a 9-year old and 11-year old, both into Minecraft, and I thought this might be a fun way to spend a few hours a week together.
Opinions?
Always online play... Pffff!
Maxis did it to themselves and they know it. I still play SimCity 2000 on my PowerMac, however I never liked the sim cities that followed 2000.
So long back stabbers!
I hope every studio under EA starts crashing and burning or finally freeing them selves of the evil empire.
I had not heard of this game, but went to read about it on Steam, expecting Windows-only. I was happily surprised to see it runs in Linux. Thanks Colossal Order!
For having a vastly inferior collection of window dressing. (I kinda miss the zombie attacks). Lack of a Day Night Cycle(days just go by too fast). The base game of Skylines is rock solid. I'm sure the modders will put some of the stuff I miss back in. In the mean time I'm just having fun making a functional Highway network.
I do miss some of the research unlockables too. Getting unlockables by simply having a large enough population seems unforfilling. I liked having to research the advanced tech at the university.
I worked at EA for a while, and while I was there, a lot of developers were said that EA was taking the Maxis brand off the "The Sims" franchise. They evidently resurrected it for Sim City, and I'm sure they'll bring it back if they think it's worth it. I don't know how many original Maxis employees are still there, anyway, many seem to have percolated through the EA empire and then left for greener pastures.
It's EA. That's what they do. Buy a smaller developer, try to milk what they can out of it while adding in stupid "features" like required online play, DLC, etc, run it into the ground and then close them down. Rinse and repeat.
The DLC actually made the game better. Now you can get the complete civ v with all the DLC packs for like $50 less if its on sale.
Their Linux support since Steam on Linux became more then a fever induced dream I had once has been excellent. As publishers go theyve been amazing. So yeah, Skylines is on Linux, go grab a copy (if you play games on that platform).
1000hrs and counting for PI games on my steam, not sure if I should hate them or love them.
It's a lot of fun and it runs on Linux. For me I've been getting really bad frame rates, particularly when zoomed in. Apparently the developer is working on Linux performance.
A modern version of SimAnt or SimEarth would have been awesome.
And with native Linux support! No need for winetricks. Nice. Just bought the deluxe edition. Cheers Colossal!
~A long time Sim City fan
Fanboy Status: Apache Flex, C#, Eclipse, KDE, Pirate Party, Ron Paul, Slackware, Windows 7
Skylines is fun. It's approachable. It's easy to pick up, and difficult to master. It has a mod engine that allows players to modify it in many subtle and extreme ways. It would have done well regardless of whether or not Simcity was successful because Skylines places emphasis on fun and not tedium or publisher profit margins.
BeauHD. Worst editor since kdawson.
If you miss the zombie attacks, you'll be pleased to know that there are still some disasters in the game. You just need to work at them (or not work at them) a little bit:
Cities Skylines Flood
LGR has done a review of this. He's an excellent reviewer and should be on "the list" of every slashdotter methinks.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
Lack of a Day Night Cycle(days just go by too fast).
The 24/7 sunshine also makes it possible for solar to best nuclear as the endgame power source (no, I'm not kidding).
At one time, I liked EA. That was a long long time ago. They created a 'game' called Deluxe Paint for the Amiga. It was gold. I could do things that people I knew who were running microsoft PC's couldn't even imagine. That was a long long time ago. At least a half a dozen years later, I was running SimCity. It was fun. I could win (city maxed out in area, making in way more money that it spends, as built as it could be). Later, I bought SimCity2000. Still have it. Play it occasionally. That was the best of Maxis. Then it was bought by EA (even then, there were stories floating around... not good ones). And now Maxis is being shut down. And history of the computer games industry marks another milestone, like Duke Nukem or Wolfenstein. The new game looks good though. And it runs on Linux!
And the Steam client will (note: WILL) demand you connect on occasion, so if you can't manage to run the game entirely without the Steam client, you WILL be forced into re-proving you're not a pirate of the game you had proven you had bought.
And you're really renting the game. Before, the company could insist that it was licensed not sold, but that wouldn't ever work in court, so it was ignored by people and they just clicked "I Agree", knowing it didn't make a damn bit of difference. Steam and online activation means they don't have to bother with the courts any more: they just disconnect you and you have to go through the courts to get redress.
So, yes, I understand completely where the OP is coming from. Though you're right it's not *much* like an always on line game, you're wrong in that it's more like an always on line game than the scores I have here with me now.
Or if you mention it "too often" on the steam forum they can and will cancel ALL your games.
Oh, and if you have multiple accounts so that some games won't be blocked, that's against their ToS and they can cancel all your accounts to what they think are the same person and you have to prove you're not the one they wanted to ban to get it back.
You can't just afford to click on "I agree" any more, because Steam allows them to enforce any old shit they put in there without bothering with whether it's legally enforceable.
Your "response" has fuck all to do with my post. My post was a comment on the GP post, nowhere do I claim I buy Steam games. Indeed I do not buy Steam games.
So given that, would you like to try a response that actually is relevant?
Or do you wish to prove your stupidity again?
It was an unfinished buggy mess and if you buy the DLC, it becomes a slightly less unfinished but still completely buggy mess.
I've been playing Civ since before Civ had a number and Civ V is the only time I've actually gone back to the previous version because it was better. Civ sequels have always been evolutionary. A refining of the original idea. Civ V was a dogs breakfast of dumbed down non-civ games with a Civ coat of paint thrown over the top and used the name to try to make it sell.
Beyond this, the beyond awful AI. I mean what world leader says "Look at the wide open land, ready for an empire to expand. I will build two cities and no more" because that's exactly what happens in Civ V.
EA screwed Civ like they screwed SimCity. All we need now is for someone else to release Call to Power 3 that is basically Civ IV with an updated graphics engine.
Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
Glad to see this isn't just me. From where I sit Civ 5 seems to have adopted the whole cheap gimmicky mechanics philosophy that so pervades game development these days.
Steam's DRM is optional to the publisher. Several older and indie games don't use it and work just fine without being online. In fact for several games you have to copy the install files out of steams directory to install mods, and the publisher will tell you this.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
Take something gamers love, shoehorn a lot of unwanted bullshit into it, and then charge them fees to use the bullshit they never wanted.
A game like this doesn't need to be tied to a Steam account, though.
Although you're right that i f the account was hacked, this was a good idea, the problem is that you need the damn account at all.
If my Amazon account is hacked, my games don't stop working. If my Steam account is hacked, my games on it, ALL OF THEM, do.
GoG doesn't need it to provide the same selling and warehousing services for downloaded games. Steam does. Which is why it's a bad system.
clearly you havent seen the 1600MW 3200 cost dams yet. and yes, you can get those on the standard maps.
also fusion reactor
That's got to be the longest time it's ever taken for EA to demolish a beloved studio!