The blogs from England where my other game is based are verbose about both Sims 3 and Spore, with no real answers for people. I was directed at one point by Microsoft to one site that offers a Registry Edit to fix this issue and the edit is very bad.

EA as a company seems to kill games on purpose. One of my older games Disciples 2 (a favorite) wouldnt run at all because it would not pass copyright. $50 dollars for a game and they couldnt tell people that copyright was case sensitive?

It seems like they just kill the fun. I finally had another tech tell me that all EA games have to have the cap locks on to pass copyright. *sigh* No one at the site knew anything about it because they thought I had an illegal copy. It was a toll call that I didnt make. I just tossed the thing aside for about 2 years and boycotted EA.

The only reason I bought the Sims at all was because the guys didnt want to support the dollhouse. I spent about 2 hours on a call that didnt get resolved because her Sims 1 kept crashing on her new Vista Laptop, and made the machine run hot. Sims 2 made the fan noisey.
How do I fix that?

LOL! wut?

(I am sorry but PLEASE check what the word "copyright" means)

I think the poster is talking about the serial code that you enter to get past the copyright protection on the disc. This is the first I've head of this problem. I know there was a lot of bitching and complaining about it before the Sims 3 came out, but nothing since and I assumed that it was a non-issue. I guess I should look into that, since I do a clean install every EP and I think it was based on how many times you could install the game.

I really can't see EA backing off the cash cow that is the Sims 3 expansions. I have no doubt that they will expand downloadable content, but I will eat my keyboard if they stop producing EP/SP's. It is possible, though, that they are delaying an announcement about the next pack until after Sims Medieval launches in the hopes that people will buy it (SM) out of boredom. IIRC EA usually ends up announcing a game a few weeks after there's been a leak and speculation is rampant. LOL. Of course it wouldn't surprise me if the leaks were planned

From what i have read, it was stated by the CEO, or maybe the CFO, (Can't remember... D: ), that they are planning a sims 3 Pets EP. This was stated before the first EP came out. Seeing as how it would be marginally hard to implement it with an open neighborhood, they might have finally worked out the bugs. It lends credence to the Farm Living part, as i know that one of the people that EA brought in specifically to work on the sims 3, worked previously on Harvest moon. Will it be the next EP? Probably not. The one after that? It's a big possibility.

I think that Kestie means the code that you enter to register the game is case sensitive. That's how I read it anyways.

I hope not! The sims would not work as multiplayer or online. How can you run your sims' lives effectively if other players are allowed to interact with them? Also, if the sims were an online game, the lag problems would increase, and very likely it would be reduced to one of those pathetic mindless facebook games, where you work on it a little bit each day out of habit, but never have any fun.

Well that is also what I think its hardly copyright and its usually know as CD Key (its name is actually "Product key", they are use to validate the installation of the product).

But complaining about then being "case sensitive" is rather bizarre since passwords also are case sensitive" and the fact its typed ****-HGPU-**** and not ****-hupu-**** should be a tip on WHAT the key actually is, not to mention they are commonly used by pretty much ANY software.

The registration code may be case sensitive, but I never type it in that way. I use lower case letters and when I go to the next box, the letters are capitalized.

Well whatever the problem is tech support should help the player (aka customer). Nobody likes it when the game gives them a problem nand when dealing with EA it could be hit or miss -- you can either get someone who knows what they're doing or someone who doesn't. People seeking tech support aren't really looking for a hit or miss situation.

Of course EA is keeping Sims going --it is a solid and steady performer for them. The possibility of it going online is in addition to the individually played game we have now and not in lieu of. But when EA says they're going to work titles harder they mean they are going to publish it in more ways -- disc, digital download, console, mobile, facebook, etc -- spread it out amongst as many applications that can run it (or some form of it)to increase the number of revenue streams per title.

I don't think Sims is going anywhere soon but if they don't cut the crap it is possible that players will go elsewhere--some threaten to and some already have. That they don't make us all happy (myself included) with EPs or SPs isn't nearly as detrimental as their playing with the initial formula that is what made sims so unique and beguiling in the first place. Personally, I'd like them to stop planning the game play so much for us and revert to a more sandbox style while giving us the accuetrements (animations, behaviors, objects) that enable us to really create our own stories and personalize the game play to suit ourselves. I believe that is what has enable the game to sustain the large interest that it has for so long (11 years).

Its the letter number combination that you have to type in to make the game start the first time you load. All the other ones I had experienced were NOT case sensitive since numbers dont have caps. So in this case EA went against the trend of other games and didnt doccument. They also kept it a secret.

Now .... we had to make them ....

Thanks With Microsoft now confusing those two terms, I say Copyright or copyright protection. But the loss to the customer base was large enough EA finally responded didnt they, as it autocaps now like the rest.

I have Maxis games on single floppy's Like Sim City, and what hooked me is a guy with a 386 brought his game over to load it on my computer to see if it would run on a brand new 486 because I had way better video. I have always had true color or as close as you can get to it.

I went out and bought the new one to show him how much better it was. Those were DOS days.

EA has been the customer pool educator .... at some large losses for Maxis, since some lessons are so stupid no one goes back.

I have not noticed that to be the case. It would never occur to me to not type it in exactly the way it was written down, as almost all passwords/codes are case sensitive. A good tech support person would probably think to ask you if you were entering the code properly, but if you were a good tech support person, you wouldn't be working for EA