Origin Breaks Its Concurrent Users Record ‘Thanks’ To Sim City

29 responses to “Origin Breaks Its Concurrent Users Record ‘Thanks’ To Sim City”

1. 

   tadmod

   March 19, 2013 at 10:56 am

   I think everyone has forgotten how hated Steam was as a service for the first few years of its’ life as well. Revisionist history, methinks.

   I see potential in Origin. It will take a while, but it will slowly become a robust competitor to Steam and Desura.

   Reply
   1. 

      thom

      March 19, 2013 at 11:14 am

      I hate this argument. The fact is, we’re not comparing steam way back when to origin now. We’re comparing steam now to origin now, and one of them is a lot better. The other problem is EA has probably the worst customer service on the planet, so I really doubt it will ever be as good as steam.

      I’d love to be wrong about this, but EA’s track record just doesn’t bode well.

      Reply
      1. 

         tadmod

         March 19, 2013 at 12:05 pm

         You have clearly never tried to contact steam support.

         Also, you can hate an argument as much as you like – that doesn’t mean it’s invalid.

         Reply
         1. 

            single_malt

            March 19, 2013 at 12:17 pm

            Late market entries have a significant advantage over early entrant competitors because they have the advantage of hindsight. Origin / EA had plenty of time to look at the mistakes Steam made and correct them in their own offering. They failed to do this.

            Reply
         2. 

            thom

            March 19, 2013 at 1:15 pm

            I have contacted both. Steam is definitely mediocre. EA was without a doubt the worst support I’ve ever dealt with. They basically deleted my access to my DLC because their automated system linked in all to some random email address they acquired from another online service (possibly xbox live, they wouldn’t tell me). Even though they agreed this was an error, they still couldn’t restore access. Lost about $150 worth of stuff across every platform. I gave up after googling the problem and finding a lot of people were effected.

            Then there is the constant outright lies, the lack of features, the lack of stability and the nickel and diming. But most of all, I can never see them supporting something like the Steam Workshop. Free content is not in their DNA.

            Reply
   2. 

      benj

      March 19, 2013 at 12:17 pm

      I still hate steam, probably more than Origin.

      Reply
   3. 

      brent3000

      March 19, 2013 at 12:28 pm

      See the difference is Steam is actually good and had some good development cycles in the first few years of its life…

      Origin is only around still because of EA feeding it exclusive titles… If EA didn’t force users to jump onto Origin it would have died long ago… WHere at Valve put the gamers first in a number of cases and look at where it is now,

      Origins user base isn’t there by choice, unlike other digital stores…

      Reply
      1. 

         tadmod

         March 19, 2013 at 12:52 pm

         Steam is better than origin. There is no question about that. Steam has also been around far longer than origin.

         “If EA didn’t force users to jump onto Origin it would have died long ago… ”
         And when Steam started up:
         “If Valve didn’t force users to jump onto Steam it would have died long ago… ”

         I’m just saying that people should give Origin a chance. They’ve made mistakes, undoubtedly, but I think that something good will eventually come from this kind of healthy competition.

         Reply
         1. 

            thom

            March 19, 2013 at 1:16 pm

            I’m still confused why its acceptable that a service that was released later is allowed to be worse. That is like the opposite expectation of basically everything.

            Reply
            1. 

               tadmod

               March 19, 2013 at 1:30 pm

               Because they didn’t have access to the Steam development code?

               Software Development isn’t anywhere near as easy as people think it is. Also, think of the amount they would have to invest into Origin in order to bring it up to Steam’s quality levels right off the bat. It would be ridiculously high. From a business perspective it was a better idea to start simple and work up. Had they developed the entire system straight away, Origin would be far worse (and have far more problems) than it currently is (and currently does).

         2. 

            brent3000

            March 19, 2013 at 2:30 pm

            I give origin a chance, however EA games and their regional pricing have no chance, at least Valve keeps their prices even around the world and does not charge us for being aussies..

            WHen steam launched it was always an extra level if you wanted, then valve started to build around the steam engine for online play…

            I remember the early days of Steam when the friends lists would always be offline or ‘Down for Maintenance’… Those were the days…

            Reply
            1. 

               tadmod

               March 19, 2013 at 2:37 pm

               This is pretty much all true. I’m not refuting that Origin needs work – I’m just remembering how much I hated Steam when it first came out as well!

   4. 

      ambrew

      March 19, 2013 at 3:43 pm

      Steam was hated when it first came out? As of next month I will have been with Steam for 10 years and I liked it when it first came out and still like it now. I started on Origin with BF3 and I hated it. Since I no longer play BF3 I uninstalled it from my pc. I don’t like the way it tracks everythig you do and use up my valuable pc resources. Origin would have potential if EA wasn’t behind the wheel.

      Reply
2. 

   prospekt86

   March 19, 2013 at 11:13 am

   I would be one of them and yes it is no steam.

   Reply
3. 

   phlaiman

   March 19, 2013 at 11:16 am

   So Simcity has sold 1.1M units? Surely that is disappointing considering the insane amount of marketing and general public awareness.

   Oh, also I’ll point out that other games are generally optional to be played through Steam (except for the Valve games). So EA don’t get to brag about anything.

   Reply
   1. 

      hayden

      March 19, 2013 at 11:20 am

      Based on the quality of the game I’d say they didn’t spend a lot of money making it. Unless the good parts are yet to be released DLC.

      Reply
      1. 

         kaflooey

         March 19, 2013 at 11:40 am

         I agree. Given the hype, and all the negativity was mostly focused on the always online crap, I was very dissapointed in the game’s complexity (or lack thereof) and the oximoronically dumb AI.

         Reply
4. 

   Dunnowhathuh

   March 19, 2013 at 11:47 am

   Wanna know why EA can get away with the crap they do? Because people keep buying their games. This whole sim city shitstorm should have deterred people from buying and playing it but nope, that doesn’t seem to be the case.

   Reply
5. 

   moloko

   March 19, 2013 at 11:51 am

   Most people wouldn’t know about all the crap.

   Reply
6. 

   beeawwb

   March 19, 2013 at 12:21 pm

   How many of those concurrent users were actually playing a game, as opposed to being on the menu screen trying to get in to a game? I’d assume that Steam considers me connected and playing when I’m sitting on the main menu in a game, why would Origin be any different?

   Just a thought.

   Reply
   1. 

      phlaiman

      March 19, 2013 at 12:23 pm

      Yep, you are spot on. It counts your hours whilst on the menu screen (I had 9 hours logged even though I just left my screen on to download all the starting updates) so I have no doubt they are counting that as well.

      Reply
7. 

   brent3000

   March 19, 2013 at 12:24 pm

   WHen you with hold some class A titles to your own system its bound to get a few users here and there… If EA didn’t lock its own games down to Origin it would have died long ago like it should have…

   Reply
8. 

   trex

   March 19, 2013 at 1:04 pm

   1.3 million forced users

   Reply
   1. 

      n0neoftheab0ve

      March 19, 2013 at 1:26 pm

      Just saying: I was forced to use Steam when Valve reneged in their promise to update the Xbox version of TF2.

      Reply
      1. 

         trex

         March 19, 2013 at 3:43 pm

         I hear what your saying but how many people open Origin on a daily basis if they’re not actually playing games?
         First thing I open when my PC boots up is Steam, even if I’m not planning on playing any games. I check the store page, see if any friends are on then leave it running in the background until I shut my PC down. I also choose to install games through Steam even if given the option not to.
         Origin couldn’t be more opposite. I open it once or twice a month for a quick go of BF3, never look at the store page and close it as soon as I’m finish with it. If I have the choice of installing with or without Origin I always go without (Crysis 2 was the last game to let me.)

         Good on EA for opening an online store to bring some competition to Steam, its not really competition if you charge $20-$40 more, but they should of stuck with just a store. We don’t need another game client/DRM, when Steam’s perfectly fine (for most people).

         Reply
9. 

   dmag

   March 19, 2013 at 1:47 pm

   I bought Simcity soon after launch. I was aware of the issues and still thought it would be worth trying out as I like the franchise. I have played around 20 hours of the game now, and love it. Only once did a city I was working on have issues processing, and I lost around 10 minutes of progress. The rest of the time has been problem free. A friend bought the game too, and it’s been really fun playing around with the more social features, such as sending resources between cities, viewing other people’s cities as they work on them, etc. Plus, now I get Dead Space 3 just because of the problems other people had with the game. Couldn’t really be happier with Origin/EA right about now.

   Reply
10. 

    poweredbyme

    March 19, 2013 at 1:53 pm

    Simply, I hate Origin.

    I already have Steam, I am happy with Steam, Steam is all I need as it has all my games in one location, all my friends use steam.

    I hate Origin, I don’t need another game library service, I don’t want Origin collecting data from my computer, Origin is completely unnecessary. Majority of people already have steam.

    Fuck Origin.
    Fuck EA.

    Forced to use Origin in order to play broken games

    Reply
11. 

    lambomann007

    March 19, 2013 at 2:18 pm

    I thought people said they wouldn’t be buying SimCity…

    Reply
    1. 

       brent3000

       March 19, 2013 at 2:32 pm

       1.1 million units isn’t much,

       Reply
12. 

    dokrau

    March 19, 2013 at 6:34 pm

    At the end of the day the market is providing a choice for the consumer so you can go with the one you like therefore everyone wins, it doesn’t matter how many excuses you can come up with on how much you like or dislike something you still have your preference at the end of the day.

    Reply