Romanian site SoftSailor is among those reporting the supposed leak:
For the moment we can’t tell for sure if the game is real as the packed/unpacked leaks are sized somewhere near 5GB. The small size of the game makes us think that this is not the actual game, but maybe it’s an unfinished version of The Sims 3 life simulation game...[updated] P.S. From what I’ve read, the game is real and many are playing it right now.
Well-known torrent site The Pirate Bay, whose operators are appealing their recent conviction by a Swedish court on piracy charges, currently has a 4.94GB file named The.Sims.3-Reloaded posted.
GP: Pending confirmation from more reliable sources, we'll call this one a rumor for now...
Based on comments to the article it looks like it has been leaked:
I have to wonder if EA will try to use this to justify stonger DRM.
Most of them are. As I've said, the hardcore pirates do it because they want to and no other reason. I'm not counting people who bought but lost the cd or those for whom Starforce messed up their drives or whatnot. The real full-time pirates as it were just do it because they can.
Most people pirate games because they don't have the coin in hand.. and later end up buying them when they no longer have to choose between amusement and starving to death.. or so I have heard.
Though there are idiots that subscribe to that philosophy around the "scene".. most of the notes actually encourage you to go buy the products.
Maybe so but there appears to be no effort on the part of the industry to police itself in anyway. There is a lot of false advertisement in the gaming industry and absolutely no consequence when you get home, open up the box, pop in the disc and find out the game doesn't work or the features listed aren't even present. I am not talking about games that aren't fun to play, I am talking about games where English versions have poor translations and errors messages left in German and Russian, multiplayer games that don't work if you have any latency whatsoever, features listed on the box and on the website that are then pushed into an expansion pack instead, and the games that only ever get a beta patch, if they are patched at all, because the company has shifted its resource to something else that will make them money.
Once you buy a game, you are stuck with it and out of your money. And if you wind up buying a game that didn't sell well, there is no support. Speaking of support, I can't tell how many times I contacted customer support for a game I legally purchased only to be told to wipe my hard drive and reinstall windows. I am going to reinstall windows just because two units that don’t' ever meet in 50% of my games don't calculate their battles properly?
So to sum it up we've got false advertisement, terrible translation work, lack of customer support for a game that may or may not have good game play and two types of people playing the game, those who paid and are brushed off by the company who (the customer) wind up losing time and money, and those who pirated it who didn't lose their money and seem to have way too much time on their hands and probably aren't expecting customer no service anyway.
Having said that. I purchased Sims 1 and most of its expansion packs. Sims 2 and most of its expansion packs. Ignored Sims 3 after EA announced it's Securom policy, and just started looking at it again after they backed off. EA's games are pretty well supported, including the Sims series, only ever encountered a problem with one of their other games that required me to alter the .ini file. I don't pre-order from anyone and reading reviews and, more importantly, info on forums keeps me from buying the worse games on the market.
People who are pirating the Sims 3 aren't fans, are just cheap and getting back at EA is just a child's tantrum excuse since it is not using the DRM many rebelled against.
Well on the one hand, it's not great publicity that such an anticipated game has been leaked onto the internet in an unfinished form. It shows an amazing lack of foresight.
On the other hand, have you noticed that people are talking about it? The unfinished game, I mean, not the leaking of it. They're pointing out what they perceive to be the flaws and also the good points. This means that, if EA were to delay shipping TS3, they might lose out on some big bucks immediately; but, they stand to make a bundle if they addressed those issues, capitalised on the game's strong points, and figure out how to deliver a game that doesn't overload your data bus and thus slow down to a crawl. If people buying the game at launch report the same unfixed stuff, sales will dwindle overnight because the truth is, the public knows a lot more about TS3 now than they were supposed to and most of them are not going to fall for another Spore.
The game is leaked in finished form. I've played it for about 10-12 hours and while I found it a lot of fun for the first 8 hours or so, once I got the highest career rank and a good number of the achievement upgrades (dont need to use bathroom, hardly have to eat or shower) it started to get boring really quick. 12 hours of entertainment isn't worth $70 to me. I've bought plenty of singleplayer games (recently) that I either could have downloaded or did download before buying, Sims 3 wont be one of those however.
The longevity of the game after accomplishing the above mentioned things lies in the building/designing your house just the way you like it, making it bigger, more floors, expensive fences and such. This aspect of the game doesn't appeal to me so much as the progression from 30/hr to 700/hr career and attaining the important achievements. I figure that a lot of people, and in particular girls will really be more into the design aspect though and will get their moneys worth.
The appeal of the Sims series is hardly about achievements and ranks of anything. More like watching and guiding. It is not for everyone, wasn't meant for for everyone.
By the same coin, The Sims is one of the most universally popular and bestselling games of all time. Imo, its the perfect casual game.
I wouldn't define the Sims series as a casual game simply because it appeals to some casual players. It's not simple even though its simple to play. It's not cheaply made nor does it have a a short lifespan for those who actually like this type of game. There are a lot of people who play the series for a variety of reasons, not just girls and not just people who typically play casual games.
I don't know what your definition of universally popular is, evidently it was popular enough for you to steal it, but that doesn't make its appeal universal. They marketed and targeted a larger group of people outside the young male consumer the gaming industry solely catered to for years, that also doesn't make it universally popular or casual. It only proved there is a viable audiance outside the stereotypical notion of what a gamer looks like and wants.
I like this type of game but it doesn't have much replay value to me. 12 hours is about it. You are right though, the main reason I pirated it was because it is so popular, I jumped on the bandwagon. I expected to play for 20 minutes and ended up playing 12 hours, but now I'm done. If I had of bought it, EA would of been the ones stealing. I call the game casual because it is light hearted non competetive fare, with no multiplayer and low difficulty level... And because it does appeal to adults and those who don't play a lot of games generally.
Well I am no fan of EA. They've managed to make a real mess of things for the sake of a few bucks, but I can't fault them for making a game that has entertained a lot of people, become a ridiculously succesful franchise, and make a lot of money doing it. I understand the bandwagon thing, I really do. I am a fan of the series. It's hard not jump on it myself but I am not going to. I have friends who will buy it on release day and tell me everything I need to know. I never planned on getting it right away anyway. There is probably a little excitement just getting your hands on something before release day. I don't think disliking a game makes turns the publisher into the thief though.
The original Sims came out when... 2000? Kids then are adults now, I assure you, and as an adult, I like a variety of games, and would love it if they figured out a successful way of bringing the sims series online (and try to forget the mess known as the times online all together). I just what to emphasize that the game appeals to adults and some who do not play a lot of games AND people who call themselves "gamers". I assure you, I have played and will play a heck of a lot of games, some of them competitive, some of them cooperative but the keyword I look for is just fun.
The interesting thing is you say you like this type of game but feel it has limited replay. I think Spore attempted to pull whatever interested you in the series (you and other people who like the sims but then don't like the sims) and make it into something a little more linear and use a different genre but, in my opinion anyway, failed pretty badily. Maybe a little multiplayer and a lot less DRM could have helped Spore.
Anyway, something Sims like with a genre, challenges and online play, I am there with you on that one.
edited for conciseness. Topamax is a hell of a drug to start at midnight.
I pirate because I can't find it (apogee games not available on GoG.com or abandonia.com) or it's not worth the money (Fallout 3's DLCs other then Broken Steel). It's kind of a fence-sitting position but it works for me. I bought and paid for Stardock's fine software because I respect them and their product. I bought and paid for the vanilla sims 1, 2, and 3 because I respected the product and what Maxis used to be. I didn't buy expansions for the first sims because I fell out of it. I bought the first couple of expansions for the sims 2 but realized the route they were going and pirated the rest of them. Whether EA gets my money depends on how much "love" they put into their expansion packs. I'm going to have it all, one way or another. The question is how much will EA get from me?
You folks at Stardock got it all because, like the Civ4 series, you offered "complete" expansions that weren't overpriced. I felt that I got what I paid for. Huzzah.
What??? If you had bought the game knowing that it doesn't have replay value for you and maybe only enjoy it for a few hours, it's your fault and not EA's that you spend the money. It's not like EA forces you to buy it, you know. Er... did I just defend EA?
Spore has about the same replay value as this, I was finished with it after about 10 hours, but those 10 hours were about 20% as fun as with Sims 3. I forced myself to play through spore so I could write a solid review of how bad it was.
So, essentially, TS3 is 500% better then Spore... Now how does that compare to, say, Alter Ego or something like that?
If it's not worth the money, how is it worth playing? You've got absolutely no right at all to play it just because you want to, overpriced or not.
Ah, I can answer that and it's really stupid. I feel like if I didn't have those two crappy expansion packs, I'd break the game. Stupid-stition, you know? I bought Fallout 3 and I enjoy it. I bought Broken Steel because I read the features and I said "that's worth my $10"
The curse of technology. Had I not known about piracy, I simply wouldn't have bought OA and Pitt. Now I'd pay $10 for BOTH of them... but not for each of them.
last sims I tried at my ex-girlfriends was the university expansion, i can see its mostly a game for women
As opposed to what, the millions of games out there mostly for men? Just because a game comes along that appeals to women doesn't mean it was a game for women. I know, crazy idea... after years of making games geared only for young men, to turn around and make a game that appeals to men, women and chidlren. What is the world coming to.
It appeals to me because I'm a manipulative ass. It comes with being disabled, adapting to this undisabled world, and having the blood I have. GO HERE! DO THIS! KNEEL BEFORE ZOD!
QFT
You know, as hard as it is for me to defend piracy, a recent game has made me consider it. And I haven't in a long time.
That game is Empire: Total War. I bought it for the promised multiplayer beta. The beta they held the game back for months developing. The beta that, as of two months after the games release, is non-existant.
Not only is the beta non-existant, but the game itself is crippled to a nigh-unplayable extent, as the AI is unable to perform naval invasions or defend forts or cities. It is without a doubt the biggest waste of fifty bucks I can remember, and I am one of the people who bought Spore on release day. It is a travesty and I will never buy another SEGA game untill they fix these things. I was lied to and sold a clearly unfinished and quite frankly crap product.
When companies do things like that they bring normal consumers like me a step closer to piracy just to ensure they're selling what they say they're selling.
Technically, Creative Assembly developed the game, although I am sure it is Segas fault for pushing the release date. However, Creative Assembly/Sega, did the same thing with the previous games in the series, released in kinda buggy and patched it up way later. I've got over 70 hours clocked into the game so far, but am holding off til more updates trickle in polishing the game.
No multiplayer beta on day of release, which is what I bought the game for. No multiplayer beta YET, so I couldn't care less what their excuse is... Don't promise something and state you're pushing the game back and then not deliver. This game needed another year or so in development.
The only games I could possibly see a justification for pirating are for games that use that russian made DRM that literally kills your hardware.
No game is worth replacing a dvd/cd drive for.
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