Talk:Electronic Arts

Help me understand this, C&C open source under Github

If all of the C&C games are on steam and the EA app, why is this true?

"meaning once users cannot purchase any Command & Conquer game, this source code repository is effectively useless."

Are we pushing EA to release their IP on GOG?

because they know,

reference :https://www.reddit.com/r/commandandconquer/comments/1icqudy/go_and_vote_gog_has_shortlisted_cc_the_ultimate/

"Absolutely—GO AND VOTE!

C&C: The Ultimate Collection is such an important title to many of us at GOG. We know just how awesome you all are and what can be achieved with the power of the gaming community :) You rock! Thanks for sharing our Dreamlist!" A Clippy (talk) 07:05, 8 March 2026 (UTC)

who tf added that line? I just noticed it. the Main article has no mention of "this source code repository is effectively useless" SinexTitan (talk) 17:44, 8 March 2026 (UTC)

also "meaning once users cannot purchase any C&C game" does not mean pushing for a release on GOG. it is talking abt when EA will eventually pull the game from Steam or any other store front. tho I do not understand what "and the only way to compile the source code continues to require ownership of a copy of Command & Conquer" means. is this referring to the assets not being open sourced? in that case the language needs to be explicit, not ambigious and should reflect this on the Main article. SinexTitan (talk) 17:50, 8 March 2026 (UTC)

I attempted to edit it for some improved clarity. Hopefully this was the author's original intent with that line... JamesTDG (talk) 00:34, 9 March 2026 (UTC)

EA games, false advertising and lies about SimCity 2013

At Launch SimCity (released in 2013), a single player city builder with some multiplayer capabilities, has come under heavy scrutiny by fans for its "always-online" requirement, especially because servers were unreliable and often caused progress to be lost. At the time Maxis' studio head, Lucy Bradshaw, has reported to multiple media outlets that the servers are necessary because "they do significant calculations for the city simulation" and it would be a significant engineering challenge to redesign the game. This however was a complete lie, exposed by insiders and later by modders. The game stopping due to connection loss, was a single line of code.

ref 1: https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/simcity-server-not-necessary

ref 2: https://www.eurogamer.net/simcity-modded-so-it-can-be-played-offline-indefinitely

Furthermore SimCity was under fire for its false advertising. Leading up to release, EA Games and Maxis advertised the game having brand new life-like agent-based simulation, where each car and person simulates a person living a life in the city. They called this simulation model "the Glass Box". However players quickly found out that these agents were not at all what the developers claimed them to be. Instead of going to work and going home, they had a cycle of going to the closest available workplace that hasn't been assigned to someone else yet, and then go to the closest empty home to sleep. Citizens slept in a different home every night and worked at a different place every morning, lived with different people each day. This complete unpredictability often broke the simulation, causing the infrastructure of the city to collapse, making the game almost unplayable. Of course Maxis defended the decision that actually having these virtual citizens remember where they live and work "just was not worth the cost", but when we consider how simple the computing is, it just makes the need for servers that much more of an obvious lie.

ref 3: https://kotaku.com/with-simple-ai-like-this-why-does-simcity-need-cloud-c-5990362

ref 4: https://kotaku.com/your-complete-guide-to-the-simcity-disaster-5991077

All of to say, this didn't need to happen. The servers were not necessary at all, their only-purpose was anti-piracy DRM. And the result wasn't the punishment of pirates, it was punishing the paying customers. Due to the servers not being able to keep up with the demand for play, over half a million players were left sitting in their homes with a copy of the game they paid for, but couldn't actually use. But studios and publishers insisted that the game wouldn't work without the servers. Only to prove that the game is perfectly functional without the servers when they finally released a patch that allowed offline play a year after release. But by then the public damage was already too severe. The SimCity disaster played no small part in Electronic Arts winning a consumer poll of the "Worst Company of America" a second time in a row in 2013, and resulting EA shutting down Maxis Studios in March of 2015, only 2 years after SimCity's release.

ref 5: https://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/09/arts/video-games/simcity-from-electronic-arts-plagued-by-server-issues.html

ref 6: https://www.ea.com/news/simcity-with-offline-play-now-available

ref 7: https://www.cio.com/article/298810/consumer-technology-bank-of-america-or-ea-vote-for-the-worst-company-in-america.html

RobertF. (talk) 10:22, 17 July 2026 (UTC)