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What has happened to TSO?

  • Thread starter Smokey The Bear
  • Start date
  • Watchers 0
S

Smokey The Bear

Guest
Ok, hey guys!

I have been gone from TSO for about 2 years now,
and just now took a quick curiosity to see how
everything is doing online. But, everything is in EA-Land esque,
and i was wondering (you'd probably be updating me with old info,
but Ive been away for 2 years) what happened to TSO?
Did something called EA Land take it over? I'm really confused.
And now, i cant get back online. Is everything shutting down or what??
 
K

Katheryne

Guest
Reader's Digest version:

EA was on the verge of sending us the 90-day notice about this time last year, when Luc Barthelet stepped up with ideas and plans for turning TSO around and making it profitable again, thus giving the game a stay of execution. As part of the deal, EA made it clear they wanted to put some distance between TSO and their other Sims line, so TSO was renamed to EA-Land. Meanwhile, Luc, Lee Fancey, and more than a dozen other developers went to work completely overhauling the game, updating its aging, archaic code; building in DX9 support for future conversion to Sims2 graphics; brought in custom content; effectively merged all of the production cities into one huge map; introduced free accounts; and worked on a number of anti-bot processes.

Fast-forward to mid-April, 2008. Despite the huge amount of effort and progress that has been made, along with the upswing of subscribership that resulted, EA in their infinite "wisdom" decided things weren't moving fast enough for their liking (as in, miracles didn't literally happen overnight), they forcibly removed the entire dev staff from the project, resulting in a total communication blackout (before this, we were getting news almost daily, with game updates at least weekly) that lasted for two weeks, ending on April 29th with EA's 90-day notice. EA will completely pull the plug on August 1st, 2008. To add insult to injury, even though EA promised us that the subscription for the remaining time will be free, they continue to bill everyone, canceling the accounts of anyone whose billing fails or who removes their billing information to avoid being billed. Many free accounts were terminated with no option to resubscribe. A number of EAL devs quit EA in disgust, and Luc, now free of EA's bureaucracy, is now working on a new game. Nancy Smith, VP of EA's Sims department, effectively pretended that TSO never existed during a recent press interview.

So, there you have it in a nutshell. You should read through the threads in City Hall to get more details about what all has happened since all of this has transpired.
 
G

Gilly

Guest
Yes a lot has happened in the last year. :sad3:

Long story~short:

A very bad exploit dumped millions and millions into the game and made a very big mess, that caused a big drop in subscriptions.

Part of the original design team tried to save the game by updating the code, finally bringing in Custom Content, merging the cities into one, and a lot of new features. They got a reprieve for the game last June (EA was set to close it then), if they: turned the game into EA-Land and distanced it from the Sims franchise and brought up the subscription numbers.

But in spite of a jump in membership and a lot of enthusiasum from players, EA Games, abruptly, pulled the plug in April.

Players are seriously PO'ed with the way EA Games handled the whole situation.....and so were many of the design team, some of whom, left the company. (see thread on Tirnua)

The game is shutting down, July 31 is the last day the servers will be operational. :sad2:

Some links for the longer story:
Luc's Blog, for the story of how the redevelopment started and where it was headed.
TSO Wiki, where players were invited to create game features with the developers.

Unfortunately Stratics suffered a catastrophic server failure, that we are still trying to recover from, so the old message board threads on these subjects are not currently available. :stretcher:
 
B

Big Mac

Guest
Ok, hey guys!

I have been gone from TSO for about 2 years now,
and just now took a quick curiosity to see how
everything is doing online. But, everything is in EA-Land esque,
and i was wondering (you'd probably be updating me with old info,
but Ive been away for 2 years) what happened to TSO?
Did something called EA Land take it over? I'm really confused.
And now, i cant get back online. Is everything shutting down or what??
Yeah, they decided to shut it down in August. Then an article dated earlier this month appears saying Sims will have a sociable future.
 
M

Milton

Guest
Then an article dated earlier this month appears saying Sims will have a sociable future.
That's because TSO never existed. It was all just a dream. Like when Bobby Ewing was run over by a car and died.

*wonders how many people are scratching their heads now*
 

NikiKing

Grand Poobah
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Was that when at the beginning of the next season Pam walked into the bathroom and he was in the shower all "Hi honey" and she was "OMG your not dead!!" lol
 
C

Cinnamon

Guest
Was that when at the beginning of the next season Pam walked into the bathroom and he was in the shower all "Hi honey" and she was "OMG your not dead!!" lol

... as was featured in an episode of Family Guy.

Actually I probably would have said like the final episode of Newhart. But that would have been even more obscure.
 
K

Katina

Guest
... as was featured in an episode of Family Guy.

Actually I probably would have said like the final episode of Newhart. But that would have been even more obscure.
I must thrive on obscurity I saw both episodes.
 
S

Smokey The Bear

Guest
Ok, thanks guys so much for the info!
I'm sad it had to end that way... =(
 
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