Fail Of A Sale Of The Century

As most of you will have noticed, EA’s been offering some of the older expansion and stuff packs for half price, which has brought in a whole new load of happy customers.

Okay, so we lied!

As AMariseS says, now that they have everyone’s money, they have no scruples about continuing to sell their bugged product and leaving it up to the consumer to find solutions via third party help and more often than not third party mods.

Minov39 and Gdurma will far from be the only ones that have suffered the problems with the careers in Ambitions that were supposed to be its main selling point – in this instance the perv over firemen firefighter and the ghost hunting careers.

Unfortunately until the day comes that software companies are prosecuted for doing this (and that’s going to require a whole load of changes in the law you can be sure the buggers – pardon the pun – will fight tooth and claw to prevent), caveat emptor will remain the case as far as computer games software is concerned.

Until then, as TucsonRosie says, there’s always Twallan. For Sims 3, at any rate.

CottonKittyKat’s Getting On Down To The Point

Ah, God loves a trier!

It would be too easy for people to start downloading their own stuff or to use bots to repeat download them in order to generate income. More to the point, the exchange would be flooded with even more crap than it currently is as the more items people have on, the better their chances of getting any sort of download.

It’s bad enough currently where people compete for downloads only for the sake of ego – if they started doing it because a financial incentive was at stake (even if it is only a ‘truck’ payment), chaos would prevail.

Okay, chaos would prevail even more…

CoryMach Leaves It Too Late

Needless to say, this post was completely ignored.

No wonder.

Monte Vista was done to death so much last year the entire forum stank of oven baked pizza for weeks.

Coming up next, CoryMach tells us all about his switch from Betamax to DVDs.

 

Misgav Used To Be A Simmer Like You (Then He Took An Arrow In The Knee)

In Hammerfell they’ve got curved swords. Curved. Swords.

Meanwhile, Sharkloverplayer was either showing his approval…

… or letting slip he’s been shacking up with Enderie at Radient Raiments lately!

Modders of course have produced curved walls but for those who refuse to use them AshleyAdorable had in fact shown a sneaky little way you can have curved walls a while back, and all it takes is a little bit of patience (no, Twallan doesn’t have a mod for adding that!).

Copied and saved for future reference against the time EA pulls the plug on the EA forum or finds some obscure reason to scrub the thread!

 

Not Very Illuminating

Some mothers do have them!

Whoopee. Graham Nardone groupies.

 

Anyone after the last four years of fiasco after fiasco that honestly believes that any of the Simgurus care two custard flans about the fans as anything but revenue generators needs to get out more.  You only have to look at the case of Grant Rodiek, who jumped ship when the furore over Late Night bugs was in full sway and came crawling back after everyone else had fixed the mess under his watch.

Simgurus are about as much friends with you as the United States government is friends with you – so long as you keep doing what they want, don’t ask awkward questions and don’t rock their boat.

EA Forum Constipation

Poor MadameLee. She makes posts about her game on the EA forum General Discussion…

… only to find it causes EA forum constipation.

That is, no one gives a shit.

 

Except for Fuzzyslipers45 – bless her – who won’t see anyone ignored.

And as per usual, MadameLee got stroppy over someone daring to disagree with her.

 

Story Progression is an NRaas mod, you immature fuckwit.

Truly Fuzzysliper45, you deserve a medal at times.

Yib-Yib-Yibble Bib Dribble (Part 2)

Back on the topic of the whole YibSims nonsense of EA, it will come as no surprise that with Inge Jones rattling the stick in the bucket about it, matters swiftly spilled over to the EA forum, where a certain well known World Adventurer took a trip to Cologne, passed Go! and got §200.

You stood up and said ‘thanks so much.’

Oh dear.

   

Fair enough though, it’s easy enough to get caught up in the atmosphere at times like this, and Rflong7/13’s fangirl flushings for the pin-up boy of the Simming doily set are hardly unique.

However, posts like these – and Rflong7/13 having changed her locations to ones that appeared rather Sims 4 fangirlish to the cynical eye (here’s the previous one that appeared from May onward) somewhat encapsulated the latent fears amongst some that those who went were going to end up like Simon Cameron’s definition of an honest politician, as the YibSims thread subsequently proved elsewhere.

Bit unfair the ‘praise the game beyond fandom’ charge, but Gamekitten’s post illiustrates the feeling amongst many that certain people had sold their Simming souls for a corporate freebie.

Matters were exacerbated as 3FansForever said by the ‘Top 40 Simmers’ line made by EA in their broadcast about those in attendance.

As Freudian slips go, this one was pretty damning – if anything betrayed how EA perceives its customers, this was it.

Conorsim was equally as annoyed by this ‘top player’ routine.

Rflong7/13 came along to do some damage limitation.

She went on to stress – like Crinrict before her – that she was not a YibSim – which was beginning to sound a dirty word and that if she wasn’t happy with things she’d say so – subject to the embargo, of course.

But as DarkMirage pointed out later, the whole ’embargo’ business is a piece of nonsense anyway. If anything is leaked out, how will they ever know which attendee did it? It could even be someone outside of their precious YibSims is already in the know – if their security at Gamescon is anywhere near like the security of their own website for Sims 4 proved!

By the pricking of our thumbs, something wicked this way comes…

Oh come off it Ruthless_KK, you know very well why you were picked – being a serial brown-noser and EA sycophant to the extent you were appointed a EA forum moderator with undue haste after another moderator resigned in principle over the handling of the Simspoints scandal in the autumn of 2010  – until of course you were sacked after the twin scandal of first using us to do your job instead of watching the forum properly, followed by your attempts to abuse your position to post false information on the EA forum and to post black press against Pescado as part of your arsebucket ‘master plan’ to get back at us for exposing you for the two-faced backstabber you are.

(Think we just about covered that one…)

No surprise to us that EA’s rounding up even disgraced past toadies – shows how desperate they were for anyone that would wag their tails to order, and they’d only be doing that if they feared what they had to show for themselves wasn’t much cop.

Poor LeeCoxall. Poor foolish mouse.

KMSim15 made a good post, but spoiled it with a quite flabberghasting viewpoint.

‘I love watching LGR’s videos and I really appreciate his honest opinions… But he is not just a Simmer, he reviews hundreds of other games.’

 

That’s supposed to be an argument justifying EA excluding him?

Surely to plumbob – as someone with an expertise in more than merely every single Sims 3 expansion and stuff pack to date (along with some other releases for it like Diagon Alley, er we mean Dragon Valley) – Phreakindee was exactly the sort of person they’d want along to get honest well honed feedback in preference to one-game anoraks?

One lot that were never to turn up in all this were the Simgurus themselves. As per usual when the manure truck hits the wind turbine, they’re nowhere to be found. They were even less likely to be found when Crinrict turned up and in a few short snappy sentences stated exactly what the privilege of being at SimCamp YibSim ‘Top Player’ really mean.

Rflong7/13 coroborated this version of events.

Everyone else got ten minutes to try the new Create A Sim? Why the hell did they even bother? How many demo computers did EA have at Gamescon – or did it not even stretch into the plural?

Doesn’t sound quite as good now, does it? Travel all the way to Germany to be allowed to jump the queue for a demo of the only part of the game they were happy to let them mess around with, and get to see some presentations on the other parts they could easily have saw on another of their half-arsed broadcasts (eventually!)

The discussion sprouted another attendee, in this instance SaraDeMoor the Sprout, also to say that she didn’t think being one of EA’s ‘chosen people’ made her above the rest.

Rflong7/13 elaborated that even with the embargo, EA still refused to answer them on occasions, as well as quite simply not having answers to give. With a year to go, you’d think they’d have all the answers for a new game slotted in for one of the quarters next year, right?

Meanwhile Inge Jones also made a rare appearence on the EA forum, realising what she’d said over at Mod The Sims had probably helped kick off events on the EA forum in the first place – albeit saying what plenty were muttering…

Crinrict elaborated further on what exactly had been embargoed.

But that’s what makes it all so silly. EA has released two videos of Sims 4, one of which bloody well shows the sort of animations to expect (translated: nothing we’ve not saw in Sims 2 or Sims 3 and none of it exactly groundbreaking or even wind breaking).

Therefore, why the coyness? Are they that paranoid about bad press? Or is it someone’s been reading their Ladybird Book of Business Psychology and reckoned if you tell their YibbleYibbleSims they’re party to a big sooper secret, they’ll be even more enthusiastic for the product than they otherwise would be.

Don’t knock it people, the sad truth is that it works.

People love to think they’re getting a march on others, even when they claim they’re don’t. Ask any store manager about the number of times they’ve done the same ‘daily deal’ to that one ‘special’ customer’ – ‘but please keep this to yourselves – I’d get fired if HQ ever found out!’ – who will doubtless tell their neighbours what a great store that one is.

For Cinebar, this was all a matter of what she’d been warning coming to pass.

For Roseridge the bottom line was this ‘top Simmers’ bumnuggetry was EA’s faux pas, not anyone elses and certainly not the attendees (although as Enjoji had mentioned before Sims VIP‘s obnoxious owner Alexurt had been rubbing everyone’s noses in it every opportunity she had – quelle surprise!)

Rflong7/13 made a very good reply that the community is only divided if it allows itself to be, and that it has always been divided anyway (which in the latter case is hardly an argument for a corporation encouraging it amongst their consumers but never mind…)

All that’s needed now is for Rflong7/13 to upload a video of her Simself singing Edith Piaf’s signature song!

 

Unfortunately both she and Crinrict truly ruined it for themselves with their disparagement of Phreakindee – whose non-invitation has been a major bugbear for many as the surest sign that EA has something to hide.

If ever there was a sign that some people have been suckered into barfing the EA corporate line – for all their protests – this was it.

As to Crinrict reiterating the ‘he’s a gamer, not a Simmer’ bullshit, do you honestly think EA – for all their ‘Top 40 Simmers’, ‘YibSims’ etc, care two flying ducks whether someone is a ‘Simmer’ or not so long as they’ll buy their products? And if they don’t, why the freaking plumbobs should anyone else get precious about it.

But let’s come to the crunch. If we’re going to start disparaging Phreakindee because Rflong7/13 feels he doesn’t somehow demonstrate ‘playing’ it enough (despite the extensive videos he produces showing that he does that have been watched by over 8 million people…), that cuts both ways. Rflong7/13 makes lots of worlds and homes for Sims 3, but how much does she actually play the game either?
 

Most of you will have guessed where this one’s now going… if you’ve shouted out the response we reckon you just did!

 

How can you Rflong7/13 and Crinrict – or anyone else – dare question whether someone else plays Sims 3 ‘enough’ for their opinion to be valid, when Sims 3 is a sandbox game where plenty of people will cherry pick the elements to play and all but ignore the rest.

Why is Phreakindee’s opinion less valid as a ‘gamer’ than for example Crinrict, who by her own admission doesn’t care a stuff about anything beyond base game? At least he has played them all – he’s got the videos to prove it! But is there anyone out there dumb enough to say that Crinrict did not deserve to go?

Halle_M and Crinrict crossed swords at this point, with Crinrict coming off very much the worse.

Crinrict’s responses became increasingly ludicrous.

Yes, Phreakindee confirmed he was NOT invited.

‘Would he represent you or his opinion?’

He’d be more likely to represent the opinion of the general Simmer than – for example – Alexurt or Ruthless_kk for starters that at best will only represent their own narrow circle jerk.

‘Not enough fan-base to be invited’?

With eight million views of his Sims 3 videos alone?As to what free time he may have to ascertain accurately what other Sims 3 players may want to represent them at Gamescon… again, the same question can be thrown right back at Crinrict, or anyone else that attended: unless EA has surveillence software hidden in Sims 3 relaying back to Redwood the amount of time people spend on Sims related websites and reading SIms related posts, the question is patently absurd.What does ‘prove’ having a ‘very deep insight’ into the Sims community’s wants, needs, hopes and fears anyway? We mean, we post practically bugger all on the EA forum but we can say we’re clued up enough on it from the fact that the bloody EA moderators have been caught out using us to help them police it!

As Halle_M put it, judging by Rflong7/13, Crinrict, SaraDeMoor and the others demonstration of ‘representing’ the Sims community up to now, they’d not impressed her for starters.And to be fair, Crinrict asked for that, especially after this:‘Their’ field and ‘their’ fans? And what ‘field’ or ‘fans’ does Alexurt represent? The ‘field’ of regurgiating every other Sims news site and passing it off as your own c/o ‘fans’ bought by ludicrous amounts of EA Store gifting? It may represent the sort of fanbase EA wants – one in dripslobber thralldom in return for the prospect of dispensed digital ‘rewards’, but it sure as hell doesn’t represent those found in the likes of  – for example – Black Pearl Sims or Garden Of Shadows.

Which brings us all back to Inge Jones (and Cinebar’s) warnings about EA seeking to divide and conquer – and Rflong7/13’s that it will only happen if you allow them to…

For the record, we don’t believe every one of those that attended has been magically transmogrified into a fangasm squeeing sycophant.

You only have to look at Berrypie – High Priestess Of The Berry Sweet Cult and Keeper of The Ribenic Seal who had the time of her life there but will be right back to saying ‘did you see that crap EA’s got for sale in the Store now? No way am I touching that!’ this time next week. You know it. We know it. They’ve been trying to ‘buy’ her since 2009 and all the EA Site ‘interviews’ and ‘Featured’ uploads still haven’t turned her head.

But perhaps there are other matters Simmers need to look to regarding the events and aftermath of Gamescon. Not to Sims 4, but to themselves – attendees and non-attendees alike.

It may save a lot of unpleasanties later at a time the community can ill afford it.

 

Yib-Yib-Yibble Bib Dribble (Part 1)

Still dealing with the fallout from GamesCon (the last syllable emphasised as far as EA’s concerned) and SimCamp, one of the moans before, during and after was the feeling that there seemed to be a certain ‘more equal than others’ mentality EA were doing their best to install in their beloving Simmers community.

Back on the 19th August, Inge Jones over at Mod The Sims put the match to the torch illuminating how unhappy she was with the whole YibSims definition being given to those attending – which was later continued into the brand new EA Sims 4 forum.

Clearly Simlogical‘s owner wasn’t the only one feeling standard were going down the pan.

You will notice Phreakindee being mentioned by Enjoji  – he was to become a familiar theme throughout.

Lewisb40 wished those who were going well, tempered by the proviso they’d not be influencing their final decision whether to buy: Inge Jones meanwhile was a little more blunt.

To be honest Inge Jones, EA have been setting up schisms in the Sims community since the Sims 2 days – and those familiar with the way they treat their fanbases in their other titles will know that it is par for the course for them to treat a small group as their ‘speshill fwiends’ in order to get others competing to get into the club.

If you divide and conquor your fanbase, you’ve less reason to worry about such matters as organised consumer boycotts by them or any other humptiness if you choose to sell them a pup.

Tempscire wasn’t sure what to make of the whole Yib concept, although she understood the motive behind it.

As did HappySimmer3 in her Tangie0906 guise.

HappySimmer3 was later to consider that the whole YibSims may merely be a platform from which to make the online aspects of the game more palatable to the Simming community as a whole (‘look, all the cool people are YibSims, you should be one too!’)

Which of course opens a can of worms in itself as to whether those ‘YibSims’ want to be associated with the ‘social’ features – literally or by proxy – but that’s another matter entirely…

AnnaIME was later to say she found the whole name a touch revolting:

Which begs the question as to which Simmer does she know that said to her ‘I’ve been invited to SimCamp – I’m so excited I yibbed in my pants!’

Inge Jones continued to cast serious doubts on the wisdom of EA’s actions, as Enjoji told that Alexurt was doing what Alexurt does best of all, bumming off ‘look how popular I am’.

Oh well Enjoji, at least this time it wasn’t mummy’s pockets she was buying her popularity with, but EA’s – oh wait a moment, that’s nothing new either!

 

The mention of Alexurt touched a bit of a raw nerve:

Regular readers here know that as far as we’re concerned Alexurt is a daft and dangerous Walter Mitty, after she and her mates tried dragging us into their crackpot ‘Alexurt Is Innocent’ schemes back in 2010 and turned nasty when we refused. After that fiasco, Alexurt decided to ‘buy’ her way back to ‘respectibility’ by starting the webshite Sims VIP which cut and pasted news from other websites (in particular Sims Programs) and encouraged readers to post on the EA forum about the ‘news’ they’d just read at Sims VIP. to gain it credibility as a news source.

It’s perhaps a sad indictment of the Simming community that so many played along with it in the hope of getting goodies gifted to them from the EA Store in return for yapping and wagging their tails to order.

Or as we’ve long said…

 

A tequilla short everytime a Simguru says ‘uncanny valley’ and you’ll be clinically dead from alcohol poisoning within the hour!

ButchSims (and with a name like that Innuendo19 will be PMing him within the hour!) really cranked up the cynicism over EA’s ‘chosen people’ and what effect they’d have on his decision to buy.

At this point, one of those that was going on – Crinrict – stuck her tuppenceworth in, making it clear she did not feel part of any sort of clique, ‘special’ or otherwise.

Points to note – the lack of transparancy being given to those attending:

‘I’m honestly a bit unsure what is expected of us, Some things are very clear, some things are very unclear.’

In other words the ‘chosen few’ were equally finding that what they were being told was both ‘chosen’ in quality and ‘few’ in quantity even when it came to the basics. By keeping them unsure as to what was and what wasn’t expected, it obliged them to have to run by every little thing they posted on the net, etc for ‘clearance’ before they did it.

Sneaky little bumnuggets, aren’t they?

A certain recently deceased person cropped up again, as DigitalSympathies mentioned that they’d saw all this sort of ‘special people’ gimmickry in the past with Sims 2, whilst Orilon again brought up the matter of Phreakindee’s non-inclusion.

At this point, we have to say ‘whoa!’ to the moot about it being people that have never had a negative view of EA or the Sims 3. Alexurt for starters was threatening law suits against EA back in 2011 for having the audacity to permaban her account for, erm, helping herself to free Simspoints exploiting an EA Store site glitch (back in the days before she was cutting deals with them in the hope of replacing the Isacssons as their ‘Bestest Besties In The Whole Universe’); Berrypie made her feelings pretty much known about the Katy Perry Sweet Treats stuff pack; and anyone that says that Rflong7/13 has never had a negative view of EA or the problems in Sims 3 hasn’t been paying much attention to her ceaseless moans about CAW problems and occasional swipes at EA’s lack of interest when children are bullied on their forum.

The leading question however came up as to whether Inge Jones had been invited – in other words was there an element of sour grapes involved?

The answer was of course ‘no’.

It’s a little disingenious of Inge Jones to say it was no surprise she wasn’t invited. Simlogical And The Dead End Knights is something of the Bletchley Park of the Sims 3 community – making up for lack of numbers in terms of what they produce and the research into modding concentrated there: this on top of her involvement with Mod The Sims would have made her a logical candidate. Indeed it is something of a mystery that whilst Graham Nardone has been so keen to do the PR routine over at MTS, it’s strange that this desire to be chummy did not extend to inviting an MTS representative along – especially since Inge and Peter would have faced a far shorter journey to Cologne than those flying across the pond.

Were EA worried that they might still be that sore in Cologne for us bombing them back into the Stone Age in 1942 that a British accent might give offence? Or was it the case ‘no awkward squad allowed’?

And that including those making mods that in real terms are actually game fixes. But that being the case, why invite Crinrict, who points out all the bugs? Somewhere along the lines, logic appears to have got lost in EA’s invitation list.

As Inge Jones pointed out, this was most of an expo event, not a true show and tell that EA were indulging in. This was to be all about ‘hey, look what great people we are and how much our players love us!’ (something EA are a little bit sensitive right now about after the Sim City disaster).

ButchSims made a point that on reflection wasn’t a good one.

Yes, but that doesn’t mean to say that he won’t be trying out Sims 4, does it? It seemed he was left out for the sole reason he was a reminder of the complete mess EA made of the coding and their indifference to fixing them once they had everyone’s money for the buggy product concerned.

Crinrict, now feeling a little more sure she wasn’t going to get torn to pieces over it (as if anyone would – that would be like kicking a puppy), elaborated a little more as to what was happening.

Hopefully she got to see some of the Roman ruins and wasn’t just taken round all the cheesy stuff like Hohenzollern Bridge.

However, we soon got the impression that Crinrict was beginning to swallow the charm offensive hook, line and sinker?

‘Trying to change their ways?’ Didn’t the lack of anyone technical there kind of give the game away from the off that this whole event was a charm offensive and any feedback given would be taken in the same way HM The Queen takes posies from obnoxious nose picking little shitehawks sweet little girls on walkabouts?

Or are we being cynical again.

(Probably!)

Whatever the case, it was not winning over any of the listeners to the idea that EA were finally listening to anything except what they wanted to hear (ie. unstinting praise and squees)

But for all the talk about cliques, it’s useful to be reminded that such talk cuts both ways. EA doing a ‘Some Are More Equal Than Others’ stunt is one thing, but the inverted snobs saying ‘Some Are More Simmer Than Others’ is equally as bad.

‘Hardcore Sims Fans’ indeed! Show us a ‘hardcore’ gamer of any kind, and we’ll show you someone whose lovers have all been inflatable.

As Nightracer and Issie said, the bottom line was EA was paying for these people to be fed, watered and entertained – and only the naÏve went along thinking there were no strings attached – written or unwritten. But there’s also the matter than anyone that had gone along only to crucify them during or afterwards would equally had been treated with contempt by the majority of Simmers as plain bad form. Just as there is the onus on a host to be gracious, so there is on a guest.

In the event, Crinrict was in her surmise – between the lines – to somewhat damn EA’s future baby with her faint praise.

‘We only got a hands on for CAS. Everything else was a presentation they had tested and prepared. They only showed us stuff that’s working well…

…and if you don’t like the graphics you see now, you probably won’t like the game.’

So came the first telling statements amid all the tweeted gushings from SimCampers (‘Yib De Yib!’) elsewhere as to the true nature of the beast supposed to be ready for release sometime next year…

WTF? Jennisims Pirating And Reselling Sims 3 University Life Clothes!

The prize for sheer cheek of the week goes to Jennisims for the following.

We all know that they like to do things a little bit differently in Brazil, and have different concepts of justice – ya know, like letting train robbers stay and make a side line as pop stars.

But we think even in Rio they’d consider brazenly taking items from the University Life expansion and putting them up for free a bit cheeky.

To put them up and have people clicking an Adfly link to make her money out of it – that is really crapping in the ice cream and calling it chocolate sauce.

Now there’s been a lot of people out there of late that love to talk a big game and shoot their mouths off on the EA forum and elsewhere about ‘doing stuffs about stuffs that bothers us and stuffs’ (translated: they want everyone else to do it and then take the credit if it happens – ho hum!).

Well kiddies, here’s the difference between us and you. You talk – we do.

We didn’t bother contacting Graham Nardone or any of the other Simgurus this time. They’ve proven so feeble and so desperate to bury bad news at every turn even when they have it handed to them on a plate they’re not worth keeping in the loop.

EA’s legal department however is:

The rest is up to you EA – if you do nothing about it, you don’t deserve to have people spending money on your products.

 

Nightracer Will Be Judging You (Boo Hoo!)

Another aw diddums moment.

Yes, confronted with washed out Pixer graphics and Simmies with Playmobil figures hair, out comes the Yous Is Hating line like Boxxxy is making a comeback (heaven forbid!)

No one is saying they like Sims 3 over Sims 4 – Sims 4 isn’t even out yet (in case you have forgotten). What they are saying is that – in view of what information has been given – they have everything from misgivings to being dissatisfied with the product they are being proffered, including some of those that were having multiple fangasms at the announcement back in May. That is their right as consumers.

We’d say that all the petted lips and hyper-defensiveness of the Sims4vangelicals is the unacceptable face of Sims 4.

It isn’t.

This is the unacceptable face of Sims 4.