Pre-Orders / Activation Key / Download Issues

[mmmfloorpie 0]

Originally posted by: mmmfloorpie

Originally posted by: JanYpe

Let's be reasonable guys, like with every other product there is a delay involved with delivery. They can't exactly transport a game to your doorstep with magic.

The demo for the game is still available in a number of places. (like here: http://www.filefront.com/14491273/Cities-XL-Playable-Demo/)quote>

I downloaded this demo and installed it... When I loaded up the game I got a message saying my version was out of date and that I could update it by restarting the game. Well I restarted and it still yelled at me for having an out of date version... Any thoughts?

quote>

So, does anyone know how I can update the demo so I can actualy play it?

[kusanagi-sama 1]

Originally posted by: mmmfloorpie

Originally posted by: JanYpe

Let's be reasonable guys, like with every other product there is a delay involved with delivery. They can't exactly transport a game to your doorstep with magic.

The demo for the game is still available in a number of places. (like here: http://www.filefront.com/14491273/Cities-XL-Playable-Demo/)quote>

I downloaded this demo and installed it... When I loaded up the game I got a message saying my version was out of date and that I could update it by restarting the game. Well I restarted and it still yelled at me for having an out of date version... Any thoughts?

quote>

I tried playing the demo that I had installed on my computer, and it did the same.  I would assume the old demo is no longer in use, depsite the servers being online.

[8elhaj 0]

Originally posted by: gnomonite

Originally posted by: 8elhaj

I really think that whats ridiculous is you waiting till the eve of the game launch to order, you couldve at least ordered 3-5 days before. they cant get you the game in 1 day because people working there are human and they need sleep too.

Anyway you still get the limited edition for 20 bucks less so you have nothing to complain about.quote>

I agree! they are human and they love their sleep as much as I do! 

But my main issue is that if they cant fulfil orders that quickly, why accept them until such a late date. Why not stop accepting pre-orders a week before the launch. 

quote>

To give you and custumers who didnt get the chance to order before the oprtunity to get the game for 10$ less. If anything they are doing you and late buyers and favor.

[jennywill 0]

I have a review.........I have paid my money, I have installed the game, I have registered my copy, and I can not connect.  I have received an order confirmation, but I have not received a registration confirmation and when I try to login I keep getting the invalide username/password error.  Now I am really mad.  I spent all this time and paid my money and now I cant even play.  So I contact customer support (only available by email) and no answer from anyone. 

So far not so good.........

[dasilva 3]

Hey guys,

First, thanks for pre-ordering the game and giving Cities XL this value.

gnomonite, if you ordered the 7th on our North America Mail Order shop, you must have noticed that the shipping costs were free. Moreover, you should have seen that we are delivering through US Mail and the boxes have been sent 7 days before release to put as many chances as possible to deliver them before day 1.

Now, US Mail can't guarantee the delivery but it usually takes between 3 to 7 days.

Closing preorders 7 days before release wouldn't have made a difference as we are still selling the game in the US through Mail Order. I'm sorry that you have to wait a couple more days to get the game installed in your machine but that's just normal mail order process.

As for you mr-tom, if you didn't received your box yet, it should also be a question of days as we sent all the pre order boxes that were made during September 7 days ago.

And finally, don't be afraid as for the good spots in the planets, we will regularly open new ones for you to pick any map you want. Moreover, there aren't really "good spots" because if you want a good economy, you have to make sure that one's advantage compensantes the other's drawback and that the opposite is true too

Some maps will simply be considered "harder" because you'll have to manage things differently but I cannot see any real difficulty for such skilled and challenged city builder fans as you

[ozonemania 0]

Well, I am getting a little concerned. I pre-ordered for digital download from gamesplanet.com and had a confirmation of purchase and a receipt, stating that download links and key would be emailed to me on October 8.

It is now October 10th.

I have not received any further emails from anyone regarding my purchase.

I have emailed the support contact cited in the original emails. I received a auto-generated reply (stating they have received my email), but have received no contact otherwise.

Should I be concerned? Is anyone else in a similar situation? I was making an assumption that digital download purchase would just be alot simpler, and that I would be able to get my purchase in a timely and straightforward manner.

Of course, I have no choice but to wait. Not very pleased at the moment.

[Rik81 0]

Originally posted by: dasilva

Hey guys,

First, thanks for pre-ordering the game and giving Cities XL this value.

gnomonite, if you ordered the 7th on our North America Mail Order shop, you must have noticed that the shipping costs were free. Moreover, you should have seen that we are delivering through US Mail and the boxes have been sent 7 days before release to put as many chances as possible to deliver them before day 1.

Now, US Mail can't guarantee the delivery but it usually takes between 3 to 7 days.

Closing preorders 7 days before release wouldn't have made a difference as we are still selling the game in the US through Mail Order. I'm sorry that you have to wait a couple more days to get the game installed in your machine but that's just normal mail order process.

As for you mr-tom, if you didn't received your box yet, it should also be a question of days as we sent all the pre order boxes that were made during September 7 days ago.

And finally, don't be afraid as for the good spots in the planets, we will regularly open new ones for you to pick any map you want. Moreover, there aren't really "good spots" because if you want a good economy, you have to make sure that one's advantage compensantes the other's drawback and that the opposite is true too

Some maps will simply be considered "harder" because you'll have to manage things differently but I cannot see any real difficulty for such skilled and challenged city builder fans as you

quote>

My issue should be simpler to resolve.  I received the boxed, Limited Edition pre-ordered game yesterday on the 9th as predicted.  It should be a simple matter to send me the CD KEY.  Why hasn't that happened?

[marcuskoala 0]

Why won't MC or anyone help me with the registration email problem? Emails go unanswered; I've checked in spam mail, all my registration details were correct, I've been checking my inbox for 12 hours now and nothing. Have I wasted my money????

[gnomonite 0]

I agree. Mail takes time to reach and it will probably reach me by mon-tue but it was promised that I will be mailed the CD Key on 9th of Oct. I wonder if this is just management problem or some plan to prevent piracy. Like not sending the keys to customers who havent gotten the games yet. I dont know how that would matter cos I have already paid but I am just thinking.

[mr-tom 2]

Originally posted by: dasilva

As for you mr-tom, if you didn't received your box yet, it should also be a question of days as we sent all the pre order boxes that were made during September 7 days ago.

quote>

Thanks for the reply.

I ordered about 3 weeks ago, website login is mistertom.

It's not just a case of not having received the game.

I didn't get order confirmation.

I didn't get despatch confirmation

I have no order tracking

I didn't get the game

I haven't had the CD key

I did order and when I log into your website it shows me as having ordered, but some time after taking my money, somebody seems to have forgotten that I exist.

Likewise there's nothing sat in my junk mail folder.

And there's little point posting it to me now as since last night, my area of the country has a mail strike, so if you want it to arrive, you'll need to use a courier.

Would sincerely appreciate any help you can give me.

I presume that whilst I won't get a box in the near future, it would be no problem for me to have a key and a download link so that I can play despite not having the physical box?

Many thanks.

[marcuskoala 0]

I have the cd key. I bought & downloaded on steam. Everything's ready to go if only MC would send me a confirmation email. Otherwise I can't log in & this game is useless.

[therefromhere 0]

I found my download email in my Gmail spam folder today - it arrived 2 days ago.

The download links were mangled, but I was able to recover them via the "Message Text Garbled" option on the Reply menu.

[michaelsim 0]

I've just got back home after purchasing CitiesXL this morning. Loaded the game, registered a username and password and......... nothing!

No confirmation email, no activation email, no nothing. So, I'm sat here after waiting over a year to buy and play this game looking at a £29.99 box that I can't even play.

I hate the fact that you have to register to play a game. Why can you not simply play it 'out of the box'.

[mr-tom 2]

I imagine their email servers must be busy. Not making an excuse, but simply stating that now will be a time of peak demand.

Suggest you wait until tomorrow for the email.

If it hasn't arrived within the day though, I'd be tempted to take it back for a refund.

[gnomonite 0]

They promised that the CD Keys would be posted at 12:01 am the day the game is released. Its been well over a day past that time and still no CD key. They told me in an e-mail that it will arrive "shortly". How shortly? they are already one day late!

and WHY shortly? why not on the time it was promised?

A simple explanation from MC would be enough for me ::

"We could not send you the CD Key on the day the game was released because....."

[mr-tom 2]

Originally posted by: gnomonite

"We could not send you the CD Key on the day the game was released because....."

quote>

"...Our email servers melted down as we never expected more than 10 or 12 people to actually buy the game."

or perhaps the same thing said a different way...

"...massive demand for the game on both sides of the atlantic, especially via the download channel caused such massive bandwidth violations that we crashed the whole interwebs, we are sorry about that"

or more likely...

"...the huge demand for the game has caused some backlogs in processing and issue of keys via email.  Keys are being sent out in the order they were purchased and you will get to play very soon."

[gnomonite 0]

" Keys are being sent out in the order they were purchased ..."

hahaha..in that case I purchased my copy shipped on the 8th so I should probably not expect anything for another 2-3 weeks! lol...

[mr-tom 2]

Indeed.

I bought mine during September and have heard nothing yet, so you ought to be getting a key in late November.

[gnomonite 0]

lol

I would love to have an official word on it. I did send them an email asking to elaborate on the time frame of the "short" period in which I am supposed to receive the key!

[mr-tom 2]

Yeah. I emailed them too, asking what happened to my order, but I like life far too much to risk holding my breath on this one...

[JakeMD 107]

Guys, you will get it eventually. I will forward these to the Community managers of Monte Cristo, perhaps they can send a few hints to the sales team on some of the problems. Be patient, folks! Nobody can cooperate in a rowdy crowd.

[mr-tom 2]

Understood, but with all due respect I didn't pay to get the game eventually. If I was going to be happy to receive the game eventually then I wouldn't have pre-ordered, I'd have waited until it was available at bargain prices and bought it then.

However I do appreciate you sending the commentary to monte cristo and I hope that this along with the messages we've already sent will prompt some (rapid) action.

[6033252485 0]

I don't think they have any clue what is going on...I was one of the first thousand to pre-order from TMP/Monte. Yesterday, I received the really nice packaged CD, but still no activation key by e-mail, as stated on my receipt and this morning i received an e-mail from their support (10 hours later) telling me that my activation code is being sent by U.S. Mail because I'm in NA/USA? So now I'm totally confused as to where I'm supposed to get this activation code and want my money back before I even got to play...I'm mean Sim Societies provided me with at least 20 minutes of crappy game play before crashing.

------Here's the great customer support---------------

First of all thanks for your interest in Cities XL.

We remind you that if you ordered the game from North America (USA and

Canada) you will receive your CD key via mail.

If you need to have further assistance you should contact our american

distributor at montecristogames@tmpwdirect.com

In case you have ordered the game from the rest of the world then we invite

you to send us your order number.

Best regards,

the Cities XL team

Just a Follow-up Note...I called 800.647.3656, which is USA TMP Marketing support and was advised that it will take 2-3 business days to obtain a new key, so I guess no CitiesXL this weekend and I'll think twice before purchasing pre-order from Monte again..

[Redhunt 0]

Looks like Monte Cristo skimmed on more things than just the SP game.

[pipvac 0]

I pre-ordered my LE copy from Play.com, and its delivery has been delayed (unavoidably by the postal strike here in the UK, as it was despatched on time). However, I had a concern regarding the timing of the issue of my activation key and emailed MC. They responded promptly, clearly read the email, and offered me a referral contact for more information.

Frankly I couldn't have asked for more, and all this on launch day.  Thanks MC.

[gnomonite 0]

Originally posted by: mr-tom

Understood, but with all due respect I didn't pay to get the game eventually. If I was going to be happy to receive the game eventually then I wouldn't have pre-ordered, I'd have waited until it was available at bargain prices and bought it then.

However I do appreciate you sending the commentary to monte cristo and I hope that this along with the messages we've already sent will prompt some (rapid) action.quote>

I agree. I did not pay to see the e-mail saying oh u will get your stuff shortly, it may not be on the launch day..but it would be shortly! 

If that was the case that keys would be distributed in order of purchase, it should have been mentioned on the website when one was pre-ordering. I am really very very disappointed. 

I have e-mailed them but no reply.

[Rik81 0]

I pre-ordered from MC back on Sept. 1st.  Got noticed from USPS that packaged would be shipped on 6th.  Receuved package yesterday, the 9th.  So far, so good.

Manual says CD key is printed on back of Manual.  WRONG.

E-MAIL says that CD key will be "mailed" when:

Game Key:

Your unique game key will be sent to you via email once your order has shipped.

Obviously WRONG again.

Would anyone, in the US, that pre-ordered AND has actually got the game and the CD key and is able to play PLEASE POST HERE, to give us poor left out in the dark people some hope that it really does exist and will arrive sometime?

THANK YOU. 

[gnomonite 0]

the more i am being made to wait, the more i am gravitating towards cancelling my order. I did NOT pre-order to wait!

I know I dont have the game yet but still, I would like to receive *something*!

Its like they took my money and said..ok now u wait while we cater to the PO subscribers first!

http://www.citiesxl.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=966&Itemid=128quote>

[wolfpost 0]

I have the game and the activation e-mail but it won't activate when I register. Says basically that it's pending. That is well over an hour now. I try to reregister and it says I can't because I already am waiting on a previous registration.It said it was sending me an e-mail with firther instructions but no e-mail.

[drcacklefanny 0]

So...has anyone figured out how mail order folks can download the game? I still can't find a link anywhere...and I will be without disc until Nov. No replies or anything to my email. I wouldn't blame them, once a customer gave me money I'd just forget about 'em.

Thanks.