EA giving away free game to SimCity players

Following a troubled launch, the publisher wants to apologize to the players

Posted on Mar 9, 2013 - 4:08pm EST

Following a very troubled launch of SimCity this week - including inability to play at all due to the game's always-online nature and servers unable to keep up with demand - publisher Electronic Arts has sent out a note offering all SimCity players a token of their apology.

"The server issues which began at launch have improved significantly as we added more capacity. But some people are still experiencing response and stability problems that we’re working fast to address. So what went wrong? The short answer is: a lot more people logged on than we expected," reads the note. "But this SimCity is made to be played online, and if you can’t get a stable connection, you’re NOT having a good experience. So we’re not going to rest until we’ve fixed the remaining server issues."

To get EA back in players' good graces, the publisher is offering a free PC download game from the EA portfolio. On March 18, SimCity players who have activated their game will receive an email telling them how to redeem their free game. There is no word on any potential limitations of this offer such as price or release date of the eligible free game.

"We feel bad about what happened. We’re hoping you won’t stay mad and that we’ll be friends again when SimCity is running at 100 percent."

SimCity launched this week for PC.