Can I play Sim City?

EA Forum updates:
http://forum.ea.com/eaforum/posts/list/9337881.page#27456857

Server status:
http://harding.ae/simstat/

Idk if this one is a true check, but its funny:
http://simcitystatus.com/

Wow!
http://www.ign.com/articles/2013/03/08/simcity-marketing-pulled-by-ea

In a memo sent to affiliates (and obtained by IGN), EA asks for active promotion for SimCity to cease. The company has deactivated all links in Origin’s LinkShare program, which a lot of companies use to promote EA games.

The full memo can be seen below:

"Hello Affiliates,

EA Origin has requested to pause all SimCity marketing campaigns temporarily, until further notice. We have deactivated all SimCity text links and creative and we ask you to please remove any copy promoting SimCity from your website for the time-being. To be clear we are continuing to payout commissions on all SimCity sales that are referred, however we are requesting that you please stop actively promoting the game. We will notify you as soon as the SimCity marketing campaigns have been resumed and our promotional links are once again live in the Linkshare interface. We apologize for any inconveniences that this may cause, and we thank you for your cooperation.

Sincerely,

Origin.com Affiliate Team"

Sounds like someone ran out of servers. I hope this opens the eyes of the people trying to use the always online drm. I look back Now at Diablo III and see how well they handled it compared to this.

Good news, gamers who purchased a copy of SimCity will receive a free digital PC title, Electronic Arts announced last night. Those with an activated copy of SimCity by March 18 are eligible for the free game.

Maxis general manager Lucy Bradshaw announced the news tonight as part of a blog post addressing the SimCity server woes and how the company plans to get back on track.
Bradshaw's entire blog post is below.

"Here’s a quick update on the problems we were experiencing with SimCity--and a little something extra for people who bought the game.

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. More people played and played in ways we never saw in the beta.

OK, we agree, that was dumb, but we are committed to fixing it. In the last 48 hours we increased server capacity by 120 percent. It’s working--the number of people who have gotten in and built cities has improved dramatically. The number of disrupted experiences has dropped by roughly 80 percent.

So we’re close to fixed, but not quite there. I’m hoping to post another update this weekend to let everyone know that the launch issues are behind us.

Something Special for Your Trouble

The good news is that SimCity is a solid hit in all major markets. The consensus among critics and players is that this is fundamentally a great game. 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.

And to get us back in your good graces, we’re going to offer you 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.

I know that’s a little contrived--kind of like buying a present for a friend after you did something crummy. But 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 is a GREAT game and the people who made it are incredibly proud. Hang in there--we’ll be providing more updates throughout the weekend. "