Quit Buying Sequels, Stupid: Why SimCity was all your fault

So the latest thing the internet is losing its mind over is the newest SimCity game. Reddit is calling it a disaster! Communicating their outrage the only way they know how, half-assed memes. Game review site, Polygon, lowered their review score down to a 4 out of 10, and SimCity is just the latest in a string of massive DRM failures. Before that we had the infamous error 37 caused by Diablo 3 require an internet connection for an ostensibly single player game, and Ubisofts’ ill fated insistence on always on DRM. And once again, the internet is letting the world know how enraged it is over these terrible injustices.

But wait a minute, why are we angry again? No really. It really wasn’t a big secret that SimCity was going to have always on DRM. Reddit was certainly well aware of the DRM when the Maxis developers were doing an interview on the popular /r/IAmA subforum, where they were attacked over the DRM decision. Likewise, we knew in advance that Diablo 3 was going require a constant internet connection. Yet the game easily sold millions of copies. Diablo 3 already showed us why always on DRM is problematic, and before that we saw the same issues from Ubisoft. So by this point. With all our advance warning, shouldn’t we all be laughing at the poor suckers who actually bought the game, rather than angrily flocking to our blogs to complain?

The Failure of MMOs

Like many, many others, WoW was my first MMO, and while I certainly had quite a bit of fun in WoW, I really couldn’t help but be kinda disappointed  The thing is, when I first heard the concept of an MMO it sounded like an amazing sci-fi concept from the future. The idea of hundreds of different people all co-operating and competing in the same world, all acting on the same space at the same time, blew my mind way back in ’04. The frustrating part is, technically, they totally accomplished this. The hard part they got right, but the truly amazing potential has been squandered.

Anthony Burch, (of HAWP fame) brings up a great point about people’s dream games inthis video. When people tell you about their dream game, most people don’t tell you about a game where you progress through a linear story, the story ends with a boss fight, and then you get a “game over, good job” screen and that’s the end. Most people’s dream game involves intricate interlocking systems where whole cities or entire planets grow or decay based on the player’s actions. Where based on your actions certain factions will befriend you or make you their enemy, leading to entirely different sets interactions and responses.

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