Xenocity

Not worried. I don't play on full settings for any computer game. Though I doubt I'll go back to a desktop due to my mobile nature.

Lol, you know me too well! Tend to become obsessed and focus in on 1 game for a period of weeks sometimes months! Gotta have ALL dlc. I must be a bit OCD. I know that feeling... Goes back to breeding Eevees in hope of hatching a shiny....

@mutton No problem, don't go to DLC crazy at once.

I'm the opposite. I love the colorful and cartoonish graphics/style. ------ Though I am curious to find out how well the game ruins on my Late 2011 Macbook Pro With my minimum specs: My iCore 7 Processor >>>>>>> than the minimum My graphics card > than the minimum Systems RAM (16GBs) >>>>>>>>>>> than the minimum (6GBs) I am also running the current OSX

Because we don't know if Skylines will be any good, especially after how bad Cities XXL turned out (it's worse than Simcity 2013 in both user reviews, user complaints and official reviews). Though if I have the money by then, I'll buy it and report back You compare apples and oranges. Cities XXL we all knew was just Cities XL. Nothing more nothing less. Cities Skylines is completely different game, from different company, different publisher, and we have plenty of material to see that they mean business. Just watch the 45 min gameplay video - interview from last week. Actually we were promsied a whole bunch of stuff with Cities XXL that never came to pass that caused a lot of people to buy into it. Granted I didn't expect Cities XXL to be any better than the XL 2012, so it didn't bother me. Skylines despite all they have shown, could still go horrible wrong. I mean this is the gaming industry where developers big and small regularly hide stuff and mislead gamers. I hope it turns out well, I am excited yet highly skeptical with good reason. I'll probably be one of the first to own it, money providing (It helps that is on OSX). As the saying goes "don't count your chickens before they hatch" We will find out shortly one way or another.

Actually hardcore gamers do not play simulators, especially city simulators and builders. They make fun of people who do. The main genre which hardcore gamers play are first person shooters, with it's flagship gaming being Call of Duty. Simcity has always been seen as a casual/kiddy/nerdy game that hardcore gamers wouldn't touch if you paid them. So if you play Simcity (or any other simulator and/or city builder) you are either a casual gamer, kiddy gamer, or nerdy (maybe all 3). But you aren't a hardcore gamer/real gamer according to market research (yes market research is heavily used to determine what developers produce and to segment gamers). Maxis literally broke the bank trying to make a full 3D city simulator in the late 90s according to Will Wright interviews. This game was supposed to be Simcity 3000, but due to development hell and PC specs, Maxis was forced to develop Simcity 3000 as an isosymetric game to pull of psuedo 3D graphics. The full 3D city simulator was delayed and was shifted to be come Simcity 4, but EA now in control of Maxis and canned the project due to costs and sales projects. Maxis by this time had spent the better part of 8 years and countless millions making a full 3D city simulator. EA ordered Maxis to develop a traditional Simcity, which became Simcity 4. Simcity 4 and Rush Hour both sold so badly, Rush Hour selling only to 1/3rd of the Simcity 4 base, prompted Maxis to cancel all the expansion packs they were working on. Maxis also stopped development of all patches they were working on and let modders fix Simcity 4. EA and Maxis then employed market research to find out why majority of the people who bought Simcity 3000/3000U didn't even bother to buy Simcity 4. According to Will Wright in his last interview before he left Maxis stated majority of the responses stated Simcity 4 was too complicated for the majority of Simcity fans. He claimed that plans were in the works to reboot Simcity franchise into a much simplier game to meet majority of the Simcity fans who refused to purchase Simcity 4. Simcity 3000/3000U sold over 5M+ according to EA, Simcity 4 struggled to hit 1M in 2005 at the last sales update. EA has not updated numbers since then and will only mention Simcity 3000/3000U, because it is currently the best selling mainline title. As much as it pains me to say this, EA is best off making Maxis a Sims only studio and killing all other simulation based projects. There is very little money in making a simulator of any sort. @Robotica Bayonetta sold so bad with the orignal game, that Sega canned the sequel and the other games Platinum had in development. No publisher was willing to Bayonetta 2 or any other canned games until Nintendo came along. The question is did Bayonetta sell better or worse than Simcity 4? You need to stop peddling this rubbish. I remember you doing it ages ago. You weirdly mix unspecified "market research" judgments on gamers with other gamers judgments on gamers, with liberal use of the English language. I have posted NPD market research on this board and the gaming board. As of May 2014 NPD market research firm (the main people who survey developers, publishers, and gamers while tracking sales) issued their findings on what gamers are today. Here is my post from the gaming board when I posted the findings. Are you saying NPD after surveying 7,900 core/hardcore/real gamers in the U.S. they got it wrong? NPD market research is the main information that the Western developers and publishers use when making business decisions I've also posted links to NPR, BBC, and other news outlets that reinforce the NPD results. NPR did 2 story about hardcore and casual gamers in November of 2013, the main game mentioned is Call of Duty! http://www.npr.org/blogs/alltechconsidered/2013/11/29/246747168/hard-core-and-casual-gamers-play-in-different-worlds http://www.npr.org/blogs/alltechconsidered/2013/11/15/245387937/will-new-playstation-xbox-click-beyond-the-hard-core-gamer Also another story about hardcore gamers from NPR http://www.npr.org/blogs/alltechconsidered/2013/03/22/174940443/after-conquering-consoles-hard-core-gaming-shifts-to-mobile BBC from E3 2013 on how console makers are alienating hardcore gamers in pursuit of bigger marketshare by attracting casuals. http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-22885595 Also from BBC from E3 2012 about Nintendo's then new Wii U: From the same article On harcore/serious gamers: http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-18334462 The rea/core/hardcorel gamers as described above in the NPD report buy more games, more DLC, and spend more money overall than everyone else to date. They are also more "reliable" and less "fickle" than everyone else. They are the reason why gaming is in it's current state of cinematic and shooters with endless seas of browns, blacks and grays. Did you get one of the last Simcity survey that came out in January 2013? http://www.pcgamer.com/leaked-simcity-survey-hints-at-some-potential-futures-including-offline-mode/ It leaked Cities of Tomorrow and stuff. Simcity 2013 being in development was leaked via a Simcity survey as EA tried to figure out what it would take to get people to buy Simcity after Simcity 4's horrible sales figures. I could post more information and you should go read up on the NPD January 2015 results to see what sold in January in the U.S.. Read the leaked NPD findings here on NeoGaf. http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=991085 NeoGaf and NPD are the highest authority on all things gaming if we like it or not. NeoGaf also has lots of developers, other industry people and analysts as regular members. Anyone is able to join NeoGaf though are currently backlogged with the number of people who signed up. Now what does this have to do with this thread (or members on this forum)? Many of the users who regularly whine and complain about Simcity 2013 and hate on EA/Maxis claim to be real gamers/core gamers/hardcore gamers. They regularly hate on casual and kiddy gamers Those users like most who posted in this thread aren't real gamers/core gamers/hardcore gamer, but part of the casual and kiddy gamers they hate on. Market Research shows those gamers who "grew up" and went to "mature" games and platforms are the new real gamers/core gamers/hardcore gamers. We aren't in the 80s or 90s anymore. NPD also shows that Simulation and City Builder genres are "casual/kiddy" games now while being reduced to niche status. NPD shows what gamers in the North America are buying (North America always mirrors the U.S. in gaming purchases). BBC, NPR and other news outlets echo NPD's findings BBC is the gold standard in news Not listed here, but the PC gaming market hasn't recovered to 2006 levels yet (which is lower than 2004). As for industry data, it is a paid subscription only including NPD. Subscribers are not allowed to report/leak any data and no site/publications are allowed to publish it without permission. There is legal consquences for doing so. It is also quite expensive. Some of the data is published from time to time, but actual sales data and market research is kept private due to certain hardware makers (Sony started it in 2007) and certain publishers. The only other public soure for market research and data is Nintendo's quarterly and yearly earnings reports. Though $%&^! and NeoGaf regularly "leak" the data. Am I a real gamer/core gamer/hardcore gamer by today's standards? OH HELL NO!!! Am I a casual/kiddy/smart/omnigamer (multiplaform) gamer by today's standards? YES Does playing Simcity and the like prevent me from being a real gamer/core gamer/hardcore gamer by today's standards? DEFINITELY! Does playing Simcity and others in the same genre make me a nerd? PROBABLY... Will I correct anyone who regularly poses as a real gamer/core gamer/hardcore gamer by today's standards? YOU BET (I HATE POSERS) Do I like how the definitions have changed? NO, but it is what it is... Do I label myself as a gamer? NOPE! Just a gamer here, who likes too many games and dislikes most violent and realistic games. If anyone is tired of seeing me on this forum, they can go to Edit Profile > Ignore Preferences and enter my name (make sure to click the post box at the very least). TADA you no longer see any of my posts forever (or until you unblock me)...! P.S. if you use an RSS News Feeder, it makes getting all the gaming news and reports that much easier (it works for most sites). Also good for non gaming stuff too.

Because we don't know if Skylines will be any good, especially after how bad Cities XXL turned out (it's worse than Simcity 2013 in both user reviews, user complaints and official reviews). Though if I have the money by then, I'll buy it and report back As for the DLC upgrade, if you can wait you should be able to get it for less than $10 on sale on regular basis. The complete edition has the Plumbob Park that was only for Origin users who preordered and includes the expasion pack (which is well worth it in my book). Now for pros of having the city sets: British DD Buses carry 100 Sims, while the normal buses only carry 80 sims German High Speed Rail Station (and train) carries 500 passengers while coming more frequent than the regular station (regular station carries 400 passengers) French police station has less capacity than a regular police station French police station is smaller in size than the regular police station French police station does patrols more frequent than teh regular police station Has French police cars and sirens instead of regular ones. Download mods to turn them into a full large police station The three land marks will change the normal American looking buildings into the corresponding foreign building designs Obviously Eiffle Tower gives you French buildings, Brandonburg Gate gives you German buildings, and Big Ben gives you British Buildings. The three landmarks can also attract tourists and shoppers, while generating profits for your city Cities of Tomorrow Expansion Pack: Mega Towers (the first one is in China in real life) and they have: recycling centers schools Parks Power Plants/Power Plant crowns Air Scrubbers (cleans air) Tourist attraction crowns They can be linked together I'm probably forgetting something You can download mods to better balance them and build more of them Magnelev which is a futurstic high speed monorail type of transport Can be buried underground with a mod New more powerful powerplants New and better water pumping stations Garbage Atomizer add on for the dump (it vaporizes your trash instead of burning it) Ground Scrubber add on for the dump (it cleans the ground pollution up) Launch Arcology (you can send the criminals and homeless into space along with everyone else) Omega and Omega Corp (makes your cities wildly profitable though expensive to make Omega) Drones Futuristic regular buildings and roads) The Academy - which is the buidling you need in your region to research most of the futuristic buildings before you can use them ControlNet - it powers all the new futuristic buildings New parks New disaster - Outworld 6 wich is a pesky robot from outerspace that rains destruction on your city I think that is it... Heroes & Villians pack: Maxis Man will aid your police and help the sims for a price each time He will boost the police force Not normally worth the price or the land his building takes up Dr. Vu is evil genius who will turn your city into a crime ridden evil hell hole. Only useful if you want to have said evil city Nissian Leaf DLC (Free): Acts as a high well park Increases Sims happiness Increases the amount of electric cars on your roads Decreases traffic pollution Progressive DLC (free): Give you 1 Progressive office per city Gives you the option of insuring your city up to 90% cost coverage Gives you up to 90% of cost of the building that was destroyed You must pay a yearly premium if you want insurance Also acts a shopping place No longer offered, but you may be able to find the file on the internet Great building if you are playing online or not in sandbox mode Airship DLC: Allows for workers to travel to other cities in the region via airships Medium and high wealth sims use it to travel to other cities in the region Smaller than airport Less passengers than regular airport None expandable Can have more than 1 per city Can only commute to other cities with Airhangers placed Also has 2 hot air balloon parks included Amusement Park DLC: Gives you three attractions Each holds 130 sims Each is extremely profitable Dependent on tourists I own all the DLC because I could only buy $20 Origin cards and I wanted the Cities of Tomorrow expansion pack when it launched. MegaTowers are great for housing low wealth sims and for utilities/education buildings (it's great not having them taking up ground space). I personally love the Cities of Tomorrow Expansion pack due to all the futuristic stuff.

Well to Microsoft's defense a good amount of people are still buying PCs with 32bit processors in them. Intel and AMD still produce 32bit processors in significant quantities. You can go into most retailers these days here in the U.S. and easily and cheaply buy a PC with 32bit processors for $400 or less. The market won't move on until PCs with 64bit processors hit that price range.

I know this is a week old, but developers have finally shown us the info/data views. They are actually quite well done and have pushed me over into the buy camp (If I have the money). http://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/showthread.php?833752-Cities-Skylines-%96-Dev-Diary-9-Info-Views&p=18811903#post18811903 Beware it has lots of pictures to load.

Only when the goods justified it (or the lack of supply).

http://store.steampowered.com/app/255710/ Steam has preorders for both standard and deluxe editions. I hope this game turns out well. You just need Steam to log in and boot the game. No retailer has listing for this game. You can only order a Steam code from the official site. It is safe to assume this game is digital only.

It's official... U.S. company Redbox is leaving Canada. For those who don't know what Redbox is, here is the dirt. It is a video rental kiosk that costs $1 for one day rental. It despenses the movie of your choosing after paying the fee. Some also carry video games for a higher price. They are highly popular everywhere but Canada... The final day to rent a movie from Redbox Canada is February 13th! The final day to return a rental is March 5th. Is it due to Canadians hating all things American? Or is it that Canadians don't like movies?

It has finally happened the U.S. Retailer, Target is finally leaving Canada. Target Canada is now under bankruptcy protection as it closes all 133 stores. 17,600 Canadians will be freed from a capitalist job. Was Target's Canadian branch mismanaged or is it indeed true that Canada hates all things American? If losing Target wasn't bad enough, Sony has announced it will close it's remaining 14 Canadian stores due to a lack of business from Canadians within 2 months! Anyone want to guess which foreign business will leave Canada next?

Adelman: It really comes down to the business case for these publishers. Nintendo consumers buy Nintendo systems primarily for the first party content. There’s a bit of a self-fulfilling prophesy in that publishers feel that they can’t compete with Nintendo first party, so they choose not to invest in making high quality products for the platform. There are some notable exceptions to this over the years like Rayman Legends but many times third party publishers set low sales projections for their games, and then decide a development budget based on that. I can’t say outright that they’re wrong either. There have been cases where companies decided to pull out the stops and make a great game for Nintendo platforms only to find that consumers weren’t interested. And it could be because consumers have been burnt by third party games on Nintendo platforms before. For Nintendo to break this cycle, I think they need to invest and absorb some of the risk for third parties who try to embrace the features of Nintendo platforms and help communicate to consumers which games are on par with Nintendo first party games in terms of quality. Sony and Microsoft spend a lot of money securing exclusives – or at least exclusive features – on the top games and since Nintendo doesn’t really do that, third parties focus on the other systems. I’m not sure about Sony, but I know Microsoft also has a team of technical people that will go work with a studio for a few weeks or even months to help them make their games as good as they can be on those platforms. If Nintendo doesn’t want to be a first-party-only system, they may need to be more aggressive in securing those games and making sure that they’re high quality. Dan Adelman use to work for Microsoft in securing 3rd party support before joining Nintendo as their man incharge of Indie support. He has since left Nintendo to pursue other ventures. You can read the rest of the article here.

Reggie is just a mouth piece for marketing. Iwata is the CEO of Nintendo and the head of Nintendo of America. Reggie is his subordinate at Nintendo of America. Iwata at the end of the first quarter of the 3DS being on market and the same for Wii U, told the investors they chose to focus on the 15 - 35 males who buy primarily buy shooters and M-rated games. He said this group are what the market defines as hardcore gamers in the West. He stated the Wii and DS had too diverse of a user base for 3rd parties to be successfully. He claims this is what he was told by EA and other Western Developers. The non hardcore gamers aren't as "reliable" as the hardcore who lap up shooters and M-rated games. Nintendo has never released a blockbuster/AAA game in their life. Smash bros, Mario Kart, Zelda, and others don't meet the definition nor do they meet the definition of hardcore! Nintendo doesn't have a hardcore game to their name. To date Sony hasn't released any 1st party Blockbuster/AAA games on PS4 outside of GT and TLoU. Nothing in their 2015 lineup as of now looks to be blockbuster/AAA! What is a Blockbuster/AAA game? It is a game that has production value, budget, and marketing that rivals a Hollywood Blockbuster movie! Anything less is just a video game and falls into one of the other categories. How much money does a Blockbuster/AAA game cost to develop? At last NPD report it was a minimum $50M. Nearly every blockbuster/AAA game that EA, Square, Capcom, Konami, Activision, Ubiosft, etcetera release are normally cost over $100M (marketing included) to make. This is why nearly every game released is not blockbuster/AAA. Ratings and reviews do not determine what games are classified, budgets do! If you are a 15-35 male who primarily plays Shooters and M-rated games, YOU ARE A REAL/HARDCORE/TRUE/DUDEBRO gamer who plays on his Xbox or Playstation console. This group is the bread and butter for 3rd parties. They don't care for any other consumers. If you don't fit into this group you are one of the casual/kiddy type. You could be a PC gamer, Mac gamer, a woman, kid, an omnivore/multiplatform gamer, a man who doesn't play shooters and most M-rated games, or someone who just like to play games. IF YOU FIT INTO THESE GROUPS, you are a CASUAL/KIDDY GAMER!! There's no debate about it, maker research doesn't lie... Right?! So please finally admit you're a casual/kiddy gamer like the majority of us gamers. If you are a shooter fan, then you are a real gamer and I apologize for assuming you are a casual/kiddy gamer. Please do not try to use the old 80s gaming definitions, if you want to be taken seriously as a gamer!

Target is not a cheap place to shop. Target is middle end, while Walmart is cheap. Hell Canadians regularly take buses across the border to just to go shopping at American Targets. I've these buses since I live in border area. You normally get 3-5 buses bringing over hundreds of Canadians for shopping. Canadians are one of the biggest segments for Target outside of Americans in their 20s. This is why Target thought it would be a good idea to bring the stores to them... you right about the impoverished part. Theres a red box in every walmart. There is also a Redbox in nearly ever American grocer and decent sized store. At Near me: Meijer - a middle end grocer/market Kroger - a middle end grocer/market Walmart - hmm not sure how to classify the one near me since it is new and not cheaply done like the old ones. Target - middle end Hollywood market - just a small grocery chain The local university - college kids love cheap movies CVS - mainly just a pharmacy/mini mart Walgreens slightly better than CVS etc... Redboxes are typically in high traffic areas. Many people regardless of wealth love them because they are cheap and accessible. They don't want to go to the library and hope they can get a new release even though it is free. They don't want to use Netflix (or other services) and eat up their data and/or pay the price (if you only watch an occasional movie, it is much cheaper than Netflix) They don't want to go to the local video store and pay $3-$5 for a new release or $3 for a newer movie, or $1-$3 for an older movie. Most people just want to watch a movie once and be done with it.

The point is the guy in question, used to work at Microsoft money hatting 3rd parties. PS4 has an ever widening amount of 3rd party games compared to Xbox One Sony with PS4 has done the following: Reduced 1st party output compared to PS3 Makes damn sure 1st party releases aren't in the way of 3rd party releases or competes against them. Spent more money than Microsoft currently on 3rd party support Though the only two third parties in Microsoft's camp are EA and Ubisoft. Microsoft on the other hand: Has increased 1st party output Has increased the number of 1st party games that compete with 3rd party games Has spent the bulk of the money to become EA's lead system and their exclusive content On Xbox 360 and Xbox original, Microsoft spared no cost at getting 3rd party support, spending over $1B just on 360 alone. As long as Microsoft continues to chooses to spend their money on 1st party output instead of buying 3rd party support, they will continue to lose said 3rd party support. if Microsoft was smart they'd greatly reduce their 1st party support and rapidly increase spending on 3rd parties in order to obtain partiy with PS4. 3rd parties hate doing on business on a system where there is a huge 1st party output. They require you foot the bill for their support. The lesson is you cannot get 3rd party support, if you are going to take away their sales with 1st party games. What 1st party stuff is Microsoft spending it's money on? Barely anything. You forgot to mention that Activision is also in Microsoft's camp when it comes to Call of Duty. In 2013, what Microsoft 1st party games offered any significant competition to 3rd party games? In 2014, what Microsoft 1st party games offered any significant competition to 3rd party games? In 2015, other than Halo, what Microsoft 1st party game will offer any significant competition to 3rd party games? The answer is: none! Name more than one Microsoft 1st party exclusive, other than Halo 5, confirmed to be coming out in the next year or so that has the potential to seriously interfere with the sales of a major AAA 3rd party game. Sony's PS4 has just as many 1st party games as Microsoft's XB1. They haven't reduced their 1st party output, they've increased it. In February The Order 1886 is going up against Evolve, a major 3rd party game. In March Bloodborne (not 1st party, but exclusive) is going up against Battlefield Hardline and Project CARS. Uncharted 4 will most likely be released in the fall going up against many huge 3rd party titles. If anything, 2015 is going to be Sony's most prolific year in terms of 1st party games in a very long time. You don't see that scaring off 3rd parties. As good as Last of Us and Uncharted are, no 3rd party is afraid that they are going to significantly impact their sales. You don't see 3rd parties backing out of Playstation simply because it has a lot of high quality 1st party exclusives. The theory that 1st party games "take away sales" from 3rd party games is wrong. It is mental gymnastics style rationalization. All games are in competition with each other and have the potential to "take away sales". It doesn't matter if they are 1st or 3rd party. As I've stated before, the only reason Nintendo 1st party dominate 3rd party games on the WiiU is because the audience for 3rd party mature rated games simply isn't there. It isn't a question of taking away sales. People don't buy WiiUs so they can play Assassin's Creed or Call of Duty. People who like to play AAA 3rd party games generally buy MS or Sony consoles simply because those games perform much better on those systems and there are more incentives to buy them on those consoles. Their online networks, especially Microsoft's, helps them maintain a player base for 3rd party online games like Call of Duty. Partnerships with 3rd parties also helps them push their consoles as the lead platforms for those games. Nintendo's 1st party output isn't even that prolific. They released 2 major 1st party titles last year - that's it. Release dates for games like Zelda, Xenoblade, and Star Fox are nowhere in sight. Why aren't games like Evolve, Battlefield, Witcher 3, and Arkham Knight coming out on WiiU? Those games have nothing to fear from Nintendo 1st parties. The release calendar is clear of any opposition from Nintendo 1st party games may pose. They could easily position their games to be released at a time when Nintendo doesn't have any 1st party games coming out. Why don't they? Actually Microsoft spent/is spending $1B on new studios for 1st party content. Microsoft has promised to announce more 1st party titles at E3 for release later this year. Their most recent 1st Susent Set Overdrive. According to NeoGaf, PS4 has 40 more 3rd party games planned than Xbox One. SFV is the biggest one yet. Capcom said PS4 had less competition for fighting games and had better online policies. Also Project Cars is not a major 3rd party title! It is an Indie title that some how gained a following and publisher. Right now Sony is blocking EA from implementing EA Acess and blocking Ubisoft from doing something similar. This is why EA and Ubisoft are buddy buddy with Microsoft. Sony has been paying a very big money hat to Activision to get tons of exclusive content for Call of Duty and Destiny. Anyways regarding Wii U Launch: ACIII was shoddy port with many issues including frame rate. It also lacked a lot of content that the other verisons had. Ubisoft shipped very few copies to market and it was hard to find CoD:BOII: was a decent port No DLC was announced two weeks before launch No preorder content Very few copies shipped to retail No digital copy on eShop Was announced in 1 month before launch Ninja Gaiden 3: RE was the best version of the game, but it didn't matter since the name was toxic. Mass Effect 3:SE - EA made sure that this game wasn't worth the price It had no DLC Shoddy port The ME Trilogy launched for $60 on the other systems and PC a week before this game (Why buy this game when you can buy the trilogy for the same price?) EA shipped very few copies of this game to market. ZombiU: A broken game at launch panned by American media across the board American reviewers hated the game, saying it was an awful shooter They said was too boring The game did receive a massive patch a few months later fixing it True horror games don't sell well on any system (RE is now action game) ZombiU was a game that was stuck in development hell as 5 different games. on 3 different systems over 10 years, which cost Ubisoft a pretty penny. Here is Gamespot's damning review which has since been edited. Here is IGN's damning review as well. ZombiU was bunlded from the beginning in the EU, eventually bundled in NA. Batman: Arkham City was missing content on the Wii U version and it was under shipped Darksider II was shipped in limited quantities originally due to a licensing issue, then was reissued recently for all systems. Tekken Tag Team 2 sold the same as the Xbox 360 version, but both bombed compared to the PS3 version. As you can see the 3rd parties at Wii U's launch shipped very few copies for the most part of the titles listed and complained of low sales. Many also were missing content that the other versions. Wii U's 2014 Retail releases were: DKC: Tropical Freeze Mario Kart 8 Wii Sports Club (People demanded a physical release) Hyrule Warriors (Sold over 1M in the West) Bayonetta 2 (This had more press than all the rest) Smash Bros Captain Toad (Sold better than expected) NES Remix It turns out Hyrule Warriors is selling better than expected in the West blowing past the 1M mark in under 4 months. While Mario Kart 8 is selling extremely well. We don't have enough data on Smash yet. 2014 is a decent year for Nintendo in output, especially since they have 5,300 employees. 2015 should be even better. Though Nintendo has been taking Splatoon and other games around the U.S., Japan, and EU by holding events at malls and other places. They want as many people as possible to play Splatoon and others. They are purposely giving Splatoon the pre E3 spot light in the West. At E3 you'll hear 3rd parties whine about Nintendo's release schedule and how it's not 3rd party conducive. Nintendo stated repeatedly with Wii and DS that 3rd parties told them that their games weren't selling due to Nintendo releasing too many games in the same period. Nintendo also stated that 3rd parties told Nintendo to let them have the 3DS and Wii U launch with no major 1st party titles, in order to get 3rd party support. Nintendo purposely delayed their major titles until a later date, so 3rd parties could establish themselves. As for Sony: The Order 1886 isn't previewing well and there is no guarantee this game is going to sell well. Though Sony's titles typically sell no more than 5M, other than GT and TLoU. So it really isn't a threat to 3rd parties. The other major Sony title for the first half of the year is MLB 15! With that said, Sony openly says they plan their release schedules to benefit 3rd party releases. They openly work with the 3rd parties to determine the optimal release time for 3rd party games. This is why Sony never releases a major 1st party game alongside a major 3rd party title. Though the best time to release a game is September through January, this when most of the sales happen in the West. May through August is the dead period in gaming sales traditionally in the West. February through April is the slow post holiday period. That the reason why most games release between August and February. As for Evolve, Battlefield (EA), Witcher 3, Arkham Knight and etc... First off EA has no interest in developing for Nintendo outside of the occasional FIFA reskin. EA was unable to secure the deal they wanted from Nintendo, in order support Nintendo systems. EA claims they won't develop for another Nintendo system again regardless of how well it sells until Nintendo agrees to EA's terms. For the rest of Western developers, they want to make hardcore games for the hardcore consoles. They do not want to make games for Nintendo because they believe Nintendo systems are for kids, families, women, and casuals. Also they don't like the fact that Nintendo won't give them money hats and help them port the code over like Sony and Microsoft do. Sony has a whole studio for porting 3rd party games to their systems. Dan Adelman has been working with 3rd parties since 2000. He was tasked with securing 3rd party support for both Xbox and Xbox 360 before he took the short lived job at Nintendo. He is just telling what 3rd parties told him when he worked with them. Are you saying he has it wrong?

The point is the guy in question, used to work at Microsoft money hatting 3rd parties. PS4 has an ever widening amount of 3rd party games compared to Xbox One Sony with PS4 has done the following: Reduced 1st party output compared to PS3 Makes damn sure 1st party releases aren't in the way of 3rd party releases or competes against them. Spent more money than Microsoft currently on 3rd party support Though the only two third parties in Microsoft's camp are EA and Ubisoft. Microsoft on the other hand: Has increased 1st party output Has increased the number of 1st party games that compete with 3rd party games Has spent the bulk of the money to become EA's lead system and their exclusive content On Xbox 360 and Xbox original, Microsoft spared no cost at getting 3rd party support, spending over $1B just on 360 alone. As long as Microsoft continues to chooses to spend their money on 1st party output instead of buying 3rd party support, they will continue to lose said 3rd party support. if Microsoft was smart they'd greatly reduce their 1st party support and rapidly increase spending on 3rd parties in order to obtain partiy with PS4. 3rd parties hate doing on business on a system where there is a huge 1st party output. They require you foot the bill for their support. The lesson is you cannot get 3rd party support, if you are going to take away their sales with 1st party games.

We hate all American things! We don't like movies! Nah, in all honesty I can't be bothered with such a thing. Netflix is what killed it. Physical moves are pretty much a dying business. This is one casualty. Well at least someone admits it. Phsyical sales of movies have leveled and aren't dying.. They just have found a natural market point. Netflix is the one that is in danger as they are unable to compete against Amazon, Microsoft and Sony for content. Movie studios are also reluctant to support Netflix. ISPs are also throtttling Netflix all over the world, when they aren't blocking it. We hate all American things! We don't like movies! Nah, in all honesty I can't be bothered with such a thing. Netflix is what killed it. Physical moves are pretty much a dying business. This is one casualty. movies rental stores/Kiosks, record stores and book stores. the list of things that digital downloading/streaming has killed keeps growing. I will miss the book stores None of that is going to die unles they are mismanaged. Many rental chains such as Family Videos are expanding and reporting profits alongside an increase in costumers. Digital sales of music are falling as well as customers have stopped buying it. These consumers haven't switched back to physical media either. Movie streaming and downloading has leveled in growth. Physical book sales have stablized as digital book sales have tanked. The point is digital media isn't doing well etiher these days.

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I'd love it, if someone the other arcologies from Simcity 2000 into mods for Simcity 2013. Maybe a mod to fix the tourism and transport bug. To be fair, the Simcity 4 community has a core set of users who do most of the posting.

The forums are up. I'm able to access them right now. EA has been having server issues today that has caused many of their forums and online games and modes to go down. If that makes you feel any better Sony still has regular server issues knocking PSN out for many PS4, PS3 and PSV users. Though it seeminly effects PS4 users more and they are the ones paying $50 a year for it. This is normal for PSN to go down and it's not caused by hackers. As long as you're not paying for an EA online service, just find something else to do until the server issues are worked out. Just be thankful EA runs its server side better than Sony.

EA has gone through three different CEOs and top management since 1997. The new managment at EA is put in place by shareholder revolt to increasse profits and restructure the company around products with the most profit and micro transactions. EA also had to abide by the terms of acqusition when they acquired Maxis and Bioware. This is why Maxis until recently had a free hand in doing what they wanted. Bioware was able to make 5 Dragon Age games, with Dragon Age Inquistion bombing spectacularly in every territory. FIFA on the other hand is widely popular because outside of North America because it's the official soccer game. Though it's sales have been trending downard every year for the past few years now. Simcity 1 - 4 ran on the statistical engine to power the games. The stastical engine in simple terms is a glorified Excel Spreadsheet. Simcity 4's problems are caused mainly by the stastical engine being dated and not usable for a massive city simulator. Simcity 2013 decided to use a Glassbox engine, which used real time agents to power the simulation. The problem with Simcity 2013 and the Glassbox engine was the fact they downgraded the game to prevent Simcity fans from needed to upgrading their PCs. Maxis learned their lesson from Simcity 4, when they were given a massive backlash from Simcity fans when they couldn't run Simcity 4 on their existing rigs. If Maxis would have kept Simcity 2013 and the Glassbox engine targeting the original specs, we would have had a better game. There are multiple open source City Simulators based on Simcity. They just aren't popular. Micropolis is the open source version of the original Simcity. As for your mobile question. People who play on smart devices didn't console or PC game. They have shown very little if any interest on gaming on other devices, because they like the pick up and play factor of their phones and don't like having to pay any real money for games.