Albereth
Honorary Master
I am very disappointed. I was so looking forward to this game but it is a DRM disaster. This is exactly the game I want to play offline but are forced to be connected all the time. WTF was EA thinking?! They are promoting piracy like nothing else I've seen. Nobody wants to pay R400 for this eff-up system of playing games. One pays R400 for an access token to play an online game here. Cities XL as proposed by AJ seems a far better option. EA can go to hell.
The problem with the game is that it is way too popular. Sure, EA should have known better. There should have been more servers, etc etc yada yada.
But if you leave DRM aside, there are huge benefits in 'forcing' people to play online. It creates a dynamic world where commodity prices fluctuate. That means that alloys and plastics are not going to be game breakers. It also means that each game will be different because you will be influenced by a 'global' market.
If we all played offline that wouldn't work.