Metacritic user score 2.0 based on 1274 ratings

[kgpurrs 107]

All you EA haters are clueless, this has nothing to do with EA, and everything to do with Maxis.  This is MAXIS FAULT!  I've worked a very large company like EA, you may have heard of it: Comcast, and I was responsible for the finances of 4 of their R&D subsidiaries (i.e. software companies) in the bay area.  Maxis is a subsidiary company of EA, and Maxis has their own CEO, their own Director of IT, their own project managers and programmers, and they totally dropped the ball on this one.  EA simply funds Maxis, and pays all their bills, and allocates all of Maxis revenues into their own high level corporate finances.

 

Maxis screwed this up, trust me.  The reason why the "artist" is responding is probably because his job title is QA, quality assurance.

[nhgriffith 179]

What? No. Mr_Maison. A fan of the SimCity series can't give a SimCity game a fair, objective view.

I don't pay too much attention to journalists, but typically how video games are reviewed by any publication of decent size, is they are broken into genre.

There's a sports guy. He massively enjoys playing sports games. And what's more, he plays every sports game that comes out. So when he writes a review on Madden '14, he's writing it from the standpoint of how this game stacks up to other football games, and other sports games in general.

There's a shooter guy. There's an MMO guy. There's a RTS guy. There's a mobile games guy (for some publications). There's an XBox Live Arcade games guy. There's an indy games guy. And yep, there's a sim guy.

So a professional publication that's any decent at all has a guy that's played literally every sim game out there. That means he's played and is familiar with the SimCity series. He's played and is familiar with The Sims. Spore (basically anything Maxis). But it also means he's played and is familiar with other things like Cities XL, Transport Tycoon, Airport Tycoon, Farming Simulator, whatever. Whatever is out there, this guy has played and reviewed them.

A fair review doesn't put SimCity (2013) down next to SimCity 4 and compare the two directly. And a fair SimCity (2013) review isn't done by a hardcore SC4 fan that's been playing SC4 for the last ten years either. A fair SimCity (2013) review will take SC4 into consideration and give some compare/contrast (along with the other SC games as well), but it will also take into consideration a lot of other games as well.

And ultimately, the number one factor in the final score of any review isn't "how in depth is it?" "How big are the maps?" "Did they take subways out?" While these things can factor in to the final rating, they're no where near the most important factor: How ENJOYABLE is the game to play?

And while right now I'd have to rate it pretty low due to the fact that it's not very playable due to launch issues (that I completely expected), I'll still maintain that the game is extraordinarily enjoyable to play.

Is the map as big as I'd like? No. Will I quickly get over it based on how much I'm enjoying the game? Absolutely.

[Camlon 50]

 I'll still maintain that the game is extraordinarily enjoyable to play.

Is the map as big as I'd like? No. Will I quickly get over it based on how much I'm enjoying the game? Absolutely.

I think you will quickly get bored of the game, and frustrated due to bugs when the server problem is fixed. Such as the lack of water, and the broken trade system.

 

The reason I am saying you will get bored is because the game lacks content. There are not many options in gameplay style. 

[nhgriffith 179]

Trade system is broken because region play is buggy because of the server lag and latency.

Lack of water is a complete non-issue. Combo your water/sewage with one or the other cleaning (or both) the sewage, and you've got an infinite supply. I've been told that placing pumps next to bodies of water is supposed to also provide infinite supply, but even if it doesn't, there's already a way (which mirrors the real world) to keeping your water supply up.

EDIT: And to say that this game lacks content relative to the release version of any previous SimCity is a pretty interesting statement. I've played SimCity 2000 on and off for nearly 20 years. Does it have more content than SimCity (2013)?

[Vihzel 9]

 I'll still maintain that the game is extraordinarily enjoyable to play.

Is the map as big as I'd like? No. Will I quickly get over it based on how much I'm enjoying the game? Absolutely.

I think you will quickly get bored of the game, and frustrated due to bugs when the server problem is fixed. Such as the lack of water, and the broken trade system.

 

The reason I am saying you will get bored is because the game lacks content. There are not many options in gameplay style. 

 

Broken trade system is connected to server issues. Lack of water is a bug? Do you have any proof of that it is actually a bug or do you think it is because you don't have a firm understanding of how water works in SimCity? 

 

Can you explain how there are not many options in gameplay style? 

[Mr_Maison 2,426]

What? No. Mr_Maison. A fan of the SimCity series can't give a SimCity game a fair, objective view.

I don't pay too much attention to journalists, but typically how video games are reviewed by any publication of decent size, is they are broken into genre.

There's a sports guy. He massively enjoys playing sports games. And what's more, he plays every sports game that comes out. So when he writes a review on Madden '14, he's writing it from the standpoint of how this game stacks up to other football games, and other sports games in general.

There's a shooter guy. There's an MMO guy. There's a RTS guy. There's a mobile games guy (for some publications). There's an XBox Live Arcade games guy. There's an indy games guy. And yep, there's a sim guy.

So a professional publication that's any decent at all has a guy that's played literally every sim game out there. That means he's played and is familiar with the SimCity series. He's played and is familiar with The Sims. Spore (basically anything Maxis). But it also means he's played and is familiar with other things like Cities XL, Transport Tycoon, Airport Tycoon, Farming Simulator, whatever. Whatever is out there, this guy has played and reviewed them.

A fair review doesn't put SimCity (2013) down next to SimCity 4 and compare the two directly. And a fair SimCity (2013) review isn't done by a hardcore SC4 fan that's been playing SC4 for the last ten years either. A fair SimCity (2013) review will take SC4 into consideration and give some compare/contrast (along with the other SC games as well), but it will also take into consideration a lot of other games as well.

And ultimately, the number one factor in the final score of any review isn't "how in depth is it?" "How big are the maps?" "Did they take subways out?" While these things can factor in to the final rating, they're no where near the most important factor: How ENJOYABLE is the game to play?

And while right now I'd have to rate it pretty low due to the fact that it's not very playable due to launch issues (that I completely expected), I'll still maintain that the game is extraordinarily enjoyable to play.

Is the map as big as I'd like? No. Will I quickly get over it based on how much I'm enjoying the game? Absolutely.

Wow! I didn't make that statement to argue with anyone, it was just an observation. But since you took the time out write such a long post in reaction let me ask you this....How can there be a Sim City Reviewer by Job Title when a Sim City Game has not been released for ten years? Ok lets say a City Builder Guy.......How often does a City Builder game get released? This guy must have some serious food stamps. Out of which arse are you pulling things to argue with people from?

[nhgriffith 179]

Asking for a "City Builder Guy" is like asking for a "Football" guy for the two football games that come out every year. I didn't say there was a football guy, did I? No, I said there's a sports guy. And there are plenty of sports titles released every year.

And I didn't say there's a City Builder guy. I said there's a simulation guy. As for how often simulation games are released? Here's a pretty quick list of quite a few simulation genre games: http://store.steampowered.com/genre/Simulation/

[Camlon 50]

 

 I'll still maintain that the game is extraordinarily enjoyable to play.

Is the map as big as I'd like? No. Will I quickly get over it based on how much I'm enjoying the game? Absolutely.

I think you will quickly get bored of the game, and frustrated due to bugs when the server problem is fixed. Such as the lack of water, and the broken trade system.

 

The reason I am saying you will get bored is because the game lacks content. There are not many options in gameplay style. 

 

Broken trade system is connected to server issues. Lack of water is a bug? Do you have any proof of that it is actually a bug or do you think it is because you don't have a firm understanding of how water works in SimCity? 

 

Can you explain how there are not many options in gameplay style? 

Isn't this game supposed to be simple. Its not the average player who lurks on this forum. The average player will run out of water and have no clue what to do, Making the game simultaneously hard and easy is not a good tactic. 

 

There are not that many ways you can create your cities, because there are no choice in zoning, less options in terms of plopables, etc.

[Vihzel 9]

 

 

 I'll still maintain that the game is extraordinarily enjoyable to play.

Is the map as big as I'd like? No. Will I quickly get over it based on how much I'm enjoying the game? Absolutely.

I think you will quickly get bored of the game, and frustrated due to bugs when the server problem is fixed. Such as the lack of water, and the broken trade system.

 

The reason I am saying you will get bored is because the game lacks content. There are not many options in gameplay style. 

 

Broken trade system is connected to server issues. Lack of water is a bug? Do you have any proof of that it is actually a bug or do you think it is because you don't have a firm understanding of how water works in SimCity? 

 

Can you explain how there are not many options in gameplay style? 

Isn't this game supposed to be simple. Its not the average player who lurks on this forum. The average player will run out of water and have no clue what to do, Making the game simultaneously hard and easy is not a good tactic. 

 

There are not that many ways you can create your cities, because there are no choice in zoning, less options in terms of plopables, etc.

Is this game supposed to be simple? Are you saying that it should be simple across the board? You know what that would bring? Complaints complaints complaints over it being "dumbed down" and not challenging enough. There has to be aspects that are simple enough so new players can understand it yet aspects that are difficult and challenging to fix (water, traffic, pollution, etc.) for more veteran players can grasp. 

 

I highly doubt you have even tried making various cities and finding all the different ways you can build a city and are just pulling things out of your... 

 

Now I understand why my friend told me to avoid any forums because it's a cesspool of stupidity, complaints, and just plain negativity. Simtropolis is almost as bad as SimCity forums, which is very surprising to me. 

[SirChick 184]

Maxis is nothing to blame, it's all EA's fault like always.

 

Quite a low score, but yeah based on launch problems it's logic.

 

 

Maxis - is EA. EA bought them many years ago. July 28, 1997 to be precise.

[snick25 384]

 

I figured this would happen.

 

So, all of those who love playing on the cloud... how's that whole online-only thing workin' out for ya?

 

It's very interesting to see the discrepancy between the "official" game reviewers' scores and those of people who bought and actually played the game, or at least tried to. This just goes to show that customer reviews are almost always more trustworthy and reliable than those of people who do it for money.

 

Heck, not even Monte Cristo's online play wasn't this big of a disaster. Not on the opening week, at least. Yep, this is totally a good sign for the future of SimVillage.

[RyanMorgan95 144]

The Metascore for Simcity now stands at 82 - "Generally favourable" - after several "Mixed" reviews. This is two points below SimCity 4 (vanilla). User score is also down to 1.7 - "Overwhelming dislike" - presently. 

 

This is hilarious.

[logintime 93]

The Metascore for Simcity now stands at 82 - "Generally favourable" - after several "Mixed" reviews. This is two points below SimCity 4 (vanilla). User score is also down to 1.7 - "Overwhelming dislike" - presently. 

 

This is hilarious.

 

A lot of reviews also are not factored in. IGN, for example, has a review in progress but has not released their final verdict. Ditto for a couple other sites. And the reviews in progress have turned sharply negative as the online issues have mounted, so I expect SImcity's metacritic score to fall further.

 

I need to add I take little joy in this. While I smelled a disaster coming months ago, and personally despise DRM, I really did want Simcity to succeed. I love this franchise. It's one of my mainstays and has been since I was a child. Now the first simcity in 10 years is turning into a very public debacle, and I take no joy in the prospect that we might not ever see a Simcity 6 if this continues the way it's going.