The Glade 4.0

Anyone else looking forward to this? I have been excited over this release since Q3 of last year. I've been itching for a good city building game for a while and some of the indie games on steam have scratched that itch a little bit but not nearly in the way that the Sim City brand can do.

I've seen nothing but overall positive feedback from the beta folks and the ability to network your city and it's resources with your friends' cities is also a neat concept.

Some of the older Sim Cities had "disasters" which were fun, like aliens and whatnot. This one will be no exception. One disaster will be a Godzilla-type monster that rampages through the city. When I heard about disasters, I was really hoping and praying for: Zombie Outbreak. And from the looks of it in beta, it's in!

It also looks like if you preorder you can have your city have superheroes and supervillains as well. Looks interesting.

Release date is March 5th.

http://www.simcity.com/en_US/game/info/ ... simulation

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Les Zombis et les Loups-Garous!

I refuse to suffer Origin in order to partake of what looks like an amazing new simulation entry for Maxis.

**** EA.

If they ever decide to drop it on Steam, or publish a patch that de-links it from the Origin servers or whatever so I can buy it in a store as a standalone product that won't install Origin, I'm sure I'd play the **** out of it.

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

I forget, why is Origin = evil but Steam = good?

Because EA loves money, UNLIKE EVERYONE ELSE

Oh, and to add: EA, allowing Ubisoft to sell it on UPlay doesn't strike me as improving anything. Teaming up with the second worst reputation for consumer rights in the industry isn't actually helping your credibility.

Not to mention, I'm pessimistic about you both that when I read you two had reached an agreement to sell each others' games on your digital platform, the first thing I thought of was the whole Games for Windows Live fiasco where Steam would launch a GFWL front-end to launch the game.

The only thing worse than loading Origin onto my computer is loading UPlay to launch Origin.

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

*sigh* My nerdrage can't keep up. Can I get a spreadsheet detailing what should currently be causing outrage? I've got to start scheduling it better, or I'll lag behind again.

Because everything I've read from indie developers (the only guys who will even make an effort to talk vaguely around the terms of their contracts) indicates that Valve is very reasonable and helpful with everything regarding developer/distributor relationships and pricing with Steam.

Because that, while, yes, Valve products are Steam-exclusive and require the installation of Steam, that accounts for about 1 game every 5 years in recent history. Hardly a concern when it comes to monopoly discussions. Compare that to the massive amount of titles that go platform-exclusive when EA decides they want to get into the digital delivery business.

Because Steam is a feature-rich community with a record of innovative risk taking in developing new features that actually provide utility and value to the customer. Origin's history of features include crashing on launch days. Repeatedly.

Because Steam has reasonable DRM-features, including an offline mode that is pretty good. I've heard of some people having issues with it, but it's always worked flawlessly as advertised for me. I find the balance they strike between offering the developer/publisher some peace of mind against piracy and user-invasiveness to be quite reasonable. Origin games (including SimCity) do not strike such a balance -- SimCity will close the game if you lose internet connection, for instance.

EA created Origin not to create a competitor to drive innovation and quality in the marketplace. It created Origin so that it could milk DLC bloat for every last penny. Its dream revenue model is as bad as most social games, and its games have been moving that direction for two or three years, now.

Valve has earned a reputation for taking creative risks and being driven to create compelling and interesting games. EA has earned a reputation for churning out annual sequels and shutting down the backends for the games they replace. In contrast, Counter-Strike remains one of the most played games on Steam.

I already have one Digital Distribution Portal on my computer. Origin does not give me any compelling arguments (except for ONE GAME) to switch. The idea of inviting a new client onto my computer for every distributor, or even creating accounts for every developer who wants to make a multiplayer game, is not appealing to me in this age of account database hacks by criminal and for-the-lulz elements. Valve attracts incredible talent and genius by being forward-thinking, progressive, and a harbor for innovation, in addition to being a genuinely good place to work, from all the accounts I've read. EA... well, no. As such, I trust Valve with my data more than I trust EA.

But then, I'm sure I've been over this all before, right?

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

I may not enjoy animal slaughter, but I still gladly eat meat.

As long as this game is playable on my PC in a legal fashion, I am there.

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Les Zombis et les Loups-Garous!

I'm sure that interested third parties will create just such a patch by release day.

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Well Ali Baba had them forty thieves, Scheherezade had a thousand tales
But master you in luck 'cause up your sleeves you got a brand of magic never fails...
...Mister Aladdin, sir, What will your pleasure be?
Let me take your order, Jot it down -You ain't never had a friend like me
█ ♣ █

I'll admit, this is the closest I've come to considering piracy in over a decade, Taly, all because of the Origin bullshit.

At the same time, from what I've heard, there's speculation that a lot of the core simulation calculations are done server-side and thus would be a ***** to work around and figure out how to emulate in a crack.

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

It looks interesting.

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I prefer to think of them as "Fighting evil in another dimension"

I'm really excited about it. I actually only found out that it was even being made a few days ago... which is awesome because I only have to wait like 2 weeks now. I was a huge fan of Sim City 4 and have been considering picking it back up recently, so this was a very pleasant surprise for me.

Yeah, it doesn't look perfect. Maybe it's been "dumbed down" some, maybe the smaller map sizes will be annoying... but it's still a new Sim City. And I don't really mind smaller cities and less depth in some areas. Especially if it means more polish in other areas (like roads that can be built at any angle!).

Oh yeah, and the online features look pretty cool too... except none of my friends are really into Sim City. So if anyone wants to start a Glade region or something, hit me up.

Here's a gameplay trailer for those interested.

I plan on doing some sort of regional thing with at least one friend of mine. So I'd be down for expanding that.

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Les Zombis et les Loups-Garous!

That video makes me want.

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Holy shitsnacks!

I like the idea of infrastructure being included in the road, no additional power/water lines.

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I prefer to think of them as "Fighting evil in another dimension"

Want to play badly.

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"It is true that democracy undermines freedom when voters believe they can live off of others' productivity, when they modify the commandment: 'Thou shalt not steal, except by majority vote.' The politics of plunder is no doubt destructive of both morality and the division of labor."

Some gameplay. Annoying guy but some really cool features going on.

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"It is true that democracy undermines freedom when voters believe they can live off of others' productivity, when they modify the commandment: 'Thou shalt not steal, except by majority vote.' The politics of plunder is no doubt destructive of both morality and the division of labor."

So, this looks cool and everything, but if I have to be logged into some software just to play, I'll pass.

Unless the wife makes me get it.

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“The duty of a patriot is to protect his country from its government.” - Thomas Paine

Wow you weren't kidding about the annoying guy part. "We need skilled workers because... uh... we need skilled workers, ok! ..... You don't want dumb people." My immediate response? "Or else they end up making crappy youtube review videos."

But yes, he does show quite a bit more of the game that hasn't been shown. That part was cool.

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Les Zombis et les Loups-Garous!

Why do they have to release games in the middle of the week?

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I prefer to think of them as "Fighting evil in another dimension"

Distributor shipping schedules.

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

I wonder if this will be ready at midnight or if i'm just wasting my time?

Oh and welcome back.

Edit.. shoulda known better.

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I prefer to think of them as "Fighting evil in another dimension"

Yeah, I didn't get the go-ahead until 2 hours and 23 minutes after they said it'd be ready. Still, for a game they didn't allow preloading for (even after saying they would) that's not too shabby.

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Les Zombis et les Loups-Garous!

Raise your hand if you're surprised...

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

The new Error 37... go go forced always on DRM... *rolls eyes*

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