EA Closes SimCity Dev

[themodernagenb]

EA announced today (3/4/2015) that the developers to the SimCity franchise, EA Maxis, will close. This was a talented studio responsible for some of PC's greatest games. Maxis was best know for creating The Sims franschise and the polarizing game, Spore. They are the 10th studio EA has shut down in the past 5 years.

 

"Today we are consolidating Maxis IP development to our studios in Redwood Shores, Salt Lake City, Helsinki and Melbourne locations as we close our Emeryville location," said EA in a statement.

 

It should be noted that this news should not alter the work being done on latest installment of The Sims (The Sims 4), since it is being developed by a different studio.

 

Thoughts go out to all those affected.

http://www.beyondsims.com/55229/ea-closes-maxis-emeryville/

[Prikk]

Just EA doing their thing...

[Victorious Secret]

They did screw the pooch so...not surprising

[AlexGoesHigh]

10/10 great post, didn't even bother to mention this is the office that made sim city and spore while there's another office that make the sims, for a sec i though they killed all of maxis (though in reality is just a zombie now days)

[ObeseWalrus]

We need maxis to come back and make another PROPER SimCity game.

[themodernagenb]

10/10 great post, didn't even bother to mention this is the office that made sim city and spore while there's another office that make the sims, for a sec i though they killed all of maxis (though in reality is just a zombie now days)

You discovered how the sausage is made. Admittedly, I just post the bare bones so no bastard claims it's a repost, then I develop the post further.

[dlf]

We need maxis to come back and make another PROPER SimCity game.

 

A proper "sequel" to SimCity 4, systems now have far more system memory, video memory, multi monitors, higher resolutions. 16 x 16 km city squares?

[Snadzies]

Not shocked or upset by this.

My only hope is the people who made all the bad choices during the development of SimCity are the ones being let go and the people who had no choice but to follow orders are being merged into other studios.

[ACatWithThumbs]

No wonder after the massive failure Sim City was.
 

[ObeseWalrus]

A proper "sequel" to SimCity 4, systems now have far more system memory, video memory, multi monitors, higher resolutions. 16 x 16 km city squares?

Don't get me horny!

[pk-man]

they had it coming when they destroyed the SimCity franchise.

 

That being sad, It sucks that people will lose jobs because of this, and they probably had nothing to do with the terrible decision making.

[LeChef]

cities: skylines looks to be a worthy successor

[Jaybird]

so far, cities skylines looks way better than sim city. I am eager to purchase this game and replace sim city with it. however like all games, i will wait till a through review of the game has been released and i feel its worth its price tag. 

 

[asim1999]

EA got the Golden Poop award, so i am not surprised 

[MrRavens]

Oh wow, hope things work out for those without a job now.

[IPCharger]

That sucks. SimCity sucked because of the decisions EA made, but it was actually a pretty good game.

rip in piece maxis

sadviolin.mp3

[Fetzie]

so far, cities skylines looks way better than sim city. I am eager to purchase this game and replace sim city with it. however like all games, i will wait till a through review of the game has been released and i feel its worth its price tag. 

 

 

From what I've seen, it almost definitely will be worth the money. Not least because it's only 30 dollars (something like 21 on GMG). City plots, for example, start at 2x2km (the maximum you get in SC2013) and you can get another 8 plots of that size (another 24 if you use a mod menu checkbox).

 

[Arct1c0n]

I hate these fuckers even more each day.....

 

 

[Sharkyx1]

I hate these fuckers even more each day.....

 

 

This looks pretty much wrong across the board

 

Sure Visceral is a skeleton crew but they are still around

Dice? isn't closed

Bioware is still in full force

Bullfrog is just now EA UK (besides their head staff left to go make his own company)

I was going to write that Blackbox couldn't maintain the quality in the NFS games, but holy shit they made NHL hitz, the best hockey game RIP

Rip Maxis

 

Besides Origin is a good service, that way i can lend my friends my EA games without giving out my steam, same reason i like uplay now

[Sharkyx1]

That sucks. SimCity sucked because of the decisions EA made, but it was actually a pretty good game.

rip in piece maxis

sadviolin.mp3

I dunno, i'd like to believe that, but the whole game was massively inferior to the previous game, especially in the terrible design choices like the forced online and the one entrace to a city, the small city sizes, 

 

Maxis was dead after the Sims 2 for all i care

[IPCharger]

I dunno, i'd like to believe that, but the whole game was massively inferior to the previous game, especially in the terrible design choices like the forced online and the one entrace to a city, the small city sizes,

Maxis was dead after the Sims 2 for all i care

Well, the small cities were needed because of the always online, which EA probably forced Maxis to implement.

[ACatWithThumbs]

This looks pretty much wrong across the board

 

Sure Visceral is a skeleton crew but they are still around

Dice? isn't closed

Bioware is still in full force

Bullfrog is just now EA UK (besides their head staff left to go make his own company)

I was going to write that Blackbox couldn't maintain the quality in the NFS games, but holy shit they made NHL hitz, the best hockey game RIP

Rip Maxis

 

Besides Origin is a good service, that way i can lend my friends my EA games without giving out my steam, same reason i like uplay now

Yep, and Black Box also isn't really gone they moved them into Criterion and removed them again and changed the name to ghosts or something like that.

And criterion is working again on something new not NFS related while ghosts is making NFS again.

And the studio that was working on Medal Of Honor didn't get closed either they just renamed them to DICE LA.

 

[Sharkyx1]

Well, the small cities were needed because of the always online, which EA probably forced Maxis to implement.

I don't really believe in the Big Bad EA narrative here, old maxis was always moving in this direction with City connections selling water, electricity and stuff like that, i think they thought it was a good idea, They made the Cities smaller under the guise of performance on low end machines, but i think it was to get people to share materials and act like one big city, instead of a bunch of larger collected cities in an area.

 

The game was also massively simplified, lacked teraforming, subways, god mode, powerlines and water, the Agents stystem was broken the list goes on

[BobbyG2]

Spent a lot of time playing SimCity when I was a kid. Loved it. Sad to see Maxis' decline and eventual death. Truly a shame.

Looked into Cities Skylines. Looks very promising! Going to be eagerly waiting the reviews on the 10th.

[Arct1c0n]

This looks pretty much wrong across the board

 

Sure Visceral is a skeleton crew but they are still around

Dice? isn't closed

Bioware is still in full force

Bullfrog is just now EA UK (besides their head staff left to go make his own company)

I was going to write that Blackbox couldn't maintain the quality in the NFS games, but holy shit they made NHL hitz, the best hockey game RIP

Rip Maxis

 

Besides Origin is a good service, that way i can lend my friends my EA games without giving out my steam, same reason i like uplay now

 

Fine, if you wanna be anal about details. Its meant to show that the studios DO NOT make the same quality if games ever since EA took over them vs when they were stadalone development studios, irrelevant if they fully "died" or not.   Now go away, I need to cry

 

 

http://kotaku.com/an-updated-list-of-studios-ea-has-bought-and-then-shut-1689498614