No, I have been working with SimCity since 1991, when I developed and in 1993 distributed online an actual multiplayer version of SimCity for X11 myself (it even had "node locked" and "floating" DRM, but worked fine offline or on a local private network, like when I showed at the ACM InterCHI '93 conference in Amsterdam, but of course I removed the DRM for the open source educational OLPC and "Micropolis" web based versions in 2008). So I know and worked with the people involved at Maxis and EA, and they told me the inside story of what actually happened at the time.
Multi Player SimCity for X11 is now available from DUX Software!
It was all about EA wanting to roll out Origin as their online distribution channel like Steam, and Origin wanting SimCity to be the showcase product that they used to force people to install the Origin downloader in order to play SimCity, and the stubborn insistence that SimCity be "online only" as DRM, and refusal to admit it was a mistake and fix it in response to user demands, all came 100% from Origin, and was forced on Maxis against their will and better judgement.
Then Maxis senior VP Lucy Bradshaw had to take the public flack for that, fall on Origin's sword, and make the false announcement that SimCity wouldn't work offline, even though she opposed it and knew it was bullshit.
And the server meltdowns were all Origin's fault, because they simply didn't have their shit together.
Lucy's a good person who was put in a shitty position by EA management, and she and Maxis and Emeryville Studios and SimCity players and the franchise itself all got screwed and suffered because Origin fucked up, and insisted Lucy and Maxis publically take the responsibility and consequences for Origin's idiotic and stubborn mistakes.
So I wouldn't be shocked and surprised if Cities: Skylines 2 problems with production and shipping before it was ready had more to do with Paradox than Colossal Order.
>It has been suggested that the poor performance of SimCity was responsible for the 2015 closure of Maxis' Emeryville studios, and the end of the franchise.[44][45]
>Bradshaw became senior vice president of Maxis in 2013, after serving as the studio's general manager.[5] Bradshaw oversaw development of SimCity, The Sims, and Spore.[6][7] She encountered controversy due to technical issues with the 2013 reboot of SimCity.[8][9]
Maxis explains what went wrong with SimCity and what the developer is doing to fix it:
