SimCity was expected to be one of the biggest PC games to launch in 2013. But one week after its launch, the game is proving to be a dismal flop. Electronic Arts Maxis Studio General Manager, Lucy Bradshaw said that the game publisher was close to an “all clear” which translates in English to meaning that effortless game playing should be expected by users.

But that hasn’t been the case. Gamers report being unable to log on to the game network since the launch date, while others have been kicked off while playing. Why? The game is too popular, and EA can’t handle the heat.

EA, a technology company with a market capitalization of over $5 billion, could not muster the online servers necessary to handle an influx of players looking to build their cities. This was entirely a problem of EA’s own making, as SimCity was not designed with an offline mode. Even if you don’t want to team up with others and join your cities together, you can’t just build your personal metropolitan layouts in peace: Every player must be constantly connected online, as a draconian step to crack down on piracy of this PC-only game.

Bradshaw wrote on the studio’s blog that game crashes have been reduced by 92% since day one.

Tonight and tomorrow we’ll be monitoring each server and gameplay metrics to ensure that the service remains strong and game is playing great. We need a few more days of data before we can assure you that the problem is completely solved and the game is running at 100 percent.

But that’s not what gamers are saying. Even when they do manage to log on and play, users are reporting that error messages pop up when it’s time to save, resulting in hours of lost game progress.

Apart form the Digital Rights Management issues, some game reviewers have given the game a “thumbs up.” Metacritic.com has given SimCity a solid 71/100, which is more than can be said for game user reviews, rating the game at a measly 1,6/10.  

Obviously, Bradshaw is putting on a brave face.

The good news is that tens of thousands of new players are streaming into the game every day and the confidence our fans have shown is truly humbling. Our biggest fear was that people who love this franchise would be scared off by bad reviews about the connectivity issues.

Electronic Arts is also offering all customers who purchased SimCity a free game in light of the recent issues.

[Source: Forbes, YouTube, Wired]