"You identified our secret marketing campaign!" EA CEO John Riccitiello said of the large-scale piracy of a pre-release version of The Sims 3. "That was a very large scale – concentrated on Poland and China – demo program." How could Riccitiello be so cool about piracy? He told IndustryGamers that the incomplete leaked game served as an invitation to buy the full version, so despite the inadvertent leak, the value of the data from this "experiment" may outweigh the losses.

"A huge amount of the gameplay is an overlay for the community," he said, "where you are sampling assets created by other people. So for the pirate consumer, they don't get the second town, they don't get all the extra content, and they don't get the community. It was only concentrated on Poland and China, but I think of it as not being that different than a demo."

This kind of piracy only serves as a test for EA's ongoing move to online content. Riccitiello believes that EA is moving toward selling "services," by which he means longterm online games for which the initial purchase is either nonexistent or a small portion of the total payment for the game. "By the way, if there are any pirates you're writing for," he told IG, "please encourage them to pirate FIFA Online, NBA Street Online, Battleforge, Battlefield Heroes... if they would just pirate lots of it I'd love them. [laughs] Because what's in the middle of the game is an opportunity to buy stuff."

We certainly hope Electronic Arts built up some tough skin during the whole Spore piracy pandemic, as it looks like they'll be facing similar buccaneering with their upcoming plumbob-equipped title, Sims 3. According to media measurement group BigChampagne, the game was illegally download over 180,000 times between May 18 (the day the game hit the Torrentscape) and May 21.

Holly Rockwood, an awesomely named EA PR rep, responded to the downloads by explaining, "the pirated version is a buggy, pre-final build of the game," and that, "it's not the full game. Half the world -- an entire city -- is missing from the pirated copy." Based on the image seen above (sent in by an anonymous pirate), we don't think Rockwood is bluffing. For a more full-bodied Sims 3 experience, you'll have to wait for it to hit store shelves June 2.

The Sims 3 has quite a marketing push behind it for a game expected to sell more copies in its lifetime than there are digits in Pi. The upcoming sequel to the best-selling PC title is poised to attack store shelves on June 2 and honestly, we can't wait. In this video (showing off the game's movie-making magic), our Simlish-speaking pals show off their creativity in a hilarious Star Trek parody. If you thought J.J. Abrams knew pacing, drama and action ... Maxis is going to blow the brains out of the back of your skull.

Unconfirmed reports circulating around the net claim the upcoming life-sim, The Sims 3, has leaked online weeks before its retail release. The Electronic Arts developed title is scheduled to land on store shelves on June 2. According to SoftSailor, torrents for The Sims 3 clock in around 5GB, but have yet to be confirmed as the full, final version of the game.

The Sims 3 is the long-awaited sequel to the best-selling Dollhouse simulator, announced last year. Recently (after coming under fire for extensive DRM use in Spore -- which totally didn't work anyway) Electronic Arts announced The Sims 3 would not include any online authentication, relying solely on a serial number as copy protection. Joystiq has contacted Electronic Arts for comment and puts a bounty on the heads of all pirates everywhere. We're giving away cookies.

[Via GamePolitics]

EA announced all of The Sims 3's community and microtransaction features today. TheSims3.com will become the hub site for all community and marketing features when the game births June 2. Players can use "The Exchange," which allows megalomaniacs to search and browse content, plus the site also allows the creation of movies and stories. More importantly for EA, there is also "The Sims 3 Store," an online retail location where users spend real money for SimPoints, which grants access to premium content.

Meanwhile, Janco Partners analyst Mike Hickey predicts that Sims 3 could sell over 4 million units in 2009, reports Gamasutra. Hickey has no estimate about how much The Sims 3 Store's premium content will add to the EA coffers. Seriously, though, parents: watch that credit card when little Susie or Michael starts begging for plaid furniture for their virtual dollhouse.

Source - The Sims 3 Full Online Feature Set
Source - Analyst: Sims 3 Could Sell 4 Million In '09

Rod Humble, head of all things The Sims has announced that The Sims 3 copy protection will not include any kind of online authentication, but will rely instead on a good ol' fashioned serial code. Considering the unpopularity of EA's recent DRM efforts -- which apparently failed anyway -- the news can only be considered good for consumers. "We feel like this is a good, time-proven solution that makes it easy for you to play the game without DRM methods that feel overly invasive or leave you concerned about authorization server access in the distant future," said Humble on the official Sims 3 website.

But Rod, someone has to be concerned about the distant future. Otherwise, we'll be completely unprepared for the robotic DRM enforcement squads.

[via Rock, Paper, Shotgun]

We're going to go out on a limb and say the first thing everyone does when playing The Sims is find ways to torture the tiny virtual citizens. Yesterday, Shacknews reported receiving new screen shots of The Sims 3 via email with the subject line: 'The Sims 3 Vampire Screens.' Could it be? Can we start our own vampire war within The Sims? Unfortunately, the answer is no.

Electronic Arts told Shacknews that, while characters in The Sims 3 will be able to look like vampires, they will not possess any special abilities. You know, other than the ability to enjoy the writings of Stephenie Meyer. We kid because we love.

EA is apparently "evaluating the launch window" for The Sims 3, reports Eurogamer. The game was given a February 20 release date last August, but now European retailers are being told by the publisher to expect a delay. EA stated that it would have more information in the near future, presumably tying into EA CEO John Riccitiello's desire to make the third Sims a "huge success." The publisher sure could use the cash.

We've contacted EA to find out if it's "evaluating" the release date for North America as well. We'll update if we hear anything.

Update: Uh oh. EA responded: "We are evaluating the launch window. The game looks great and in the near future we'll have more information." Our Magic 8 Ball defines this as "outlook not so good."

Look, there's not a lot we can tell you about this. With something like 100 million copies of the Sims, Sims 2 and their various expansions sold worldwide and you, dear reader, being a person with at least a rudimentary knowledge of gaming, there's a good chance you know both what a Sim is and how they are made. This video isn't going to blow your mind or anything.

The graphics look good, it has a pretty groove-tacular soundtrack and your mom will actually contemplate upgrading her PC to play it. Electronic Arts also released three new images, which you can see in the gallery below.

Download in HD (10MB)

EA announced today that the collector's edition of Megalomaniacs The Sims 3 is available for $70 at all your standard video game purveyors. It appears the items packaged with the game, which releases next February, haven't changed much since they were originally announced at Leipzig two months ago.

The collectors edition includes: the game, Plumbob (the crystal thing over Sims' heads) USB Drive and stickers, in-game European-styled sports car and a "tips and hints" guide. We're still amazed it doesn't come with a copy of Machiavelli's The Prince or Plato's Republic.

EA has announced that February 20, 2009, will mark the rather momentous occasion of stereotypical gamers finally venturing into the brightly lit outside world ... in the game. It's the day The Sims 3, the latest interactive simulation of an annoying, fickle, selfish and lazy race of creatures, will be distributed -- both physically and digitally -- to a bunch of annoying, fickle, selfish and lazy creatures.

If you'd like to append "supercilious" to that list of adjectives, you should consider purchasing The Sims 3 Collector's Edition, which will include an exclusive in-game "Italian-style" sports car for you to maneuver through your envious neighborhood (no wonder those floating diamonds are green). Also included in the package will be a Sims Plumbob USB drive, a tips and hints guide, The Sims 3 Plumbob stickers and, oh yes, the game.

So, see if you can wrap your brain around this one. In the fall of 2007, EA released a boiled-down version of The Sims on Wii and DS called MySims, which went on to sell 1.5 hojillion copies. Now, perhaps looking to push it to the 2 hojillion mark, EA announced today that on October 27 of this year MySims will be coming to the PC ... so, does that make it a "boiled-up" version?

Yes, to be fair, the PC will be getting some new characters and new online features like the ability to play Tag and share your creations with friends. But you know what else the PC will be getting at some point? Sims 3. Just saying.

If you're a Sims fan you've probably been obsessively counting down the days until March 19 when EA would reveal more details on the next iteration of their profit center popular series: Sims 3. The official site seems to be down at the moment [update: it's back up!], but we received some details from EA in a written statement we can pass on.

Expect a new engine with a new, much more detailed Create-a-Sim feature. There are more physical and personality options for Sims, in fact, the release boasts over 700 million combinations. All of the objects in the world are going to be more customizable too. Also, as we already knew, your neighborhood is going to be a bigger factor in your gameplay. It all sounds promising, but don't get too excited just yet: There's no specific date, but EA says the game won't drop until 2009.

We always found The Sims to be sort of depressing. While creating a virtual replica of your life may seem like an amusing activity at first, you -- like us -- may find the distant view through an LCD window to be both startling and uncomfortable. Yes, we can see our house from here. And we can see that it's an empty, meaningless shell bereft of human interaction outside of the occasional pizza delivery boy teleporting into the driveway. Having said that, we're definitely keen to try The Sims 3, as it'll enable us to virtually do something we've never done before. Venture "outside."

You could visit different areas in earlier games, but according to 1UP, The Sims 3 will feature a large and seamless neighborhood where a step out of the door is a step into a "much bigger sandbox." The myriad of meters indicating your Sim's moods and motives will also see an overhaul, with players encouraged to be less anal about living and more focused on living it up. You can expect more information to be tucked within the April/May issue of the official Games for Windows Magazine. Don't forget to check back with on March 19th when the official Sims site stops teasing us.

[Thanks, TechNick]

If there was any doubt that EA would continue to milk the lucrative cash cow that is Will Wright's Sims franchise, that doubt can now be officially expelled. EA has created an official page for the next title in the series -- titled, appropriately enough, The Sims 3.

The site features little else besides the above image, which teases more details coming on March 19. Our Holmesian deductive reasoning lets us assume that this title will be a return to form for the Sims series, as opposed to another entry in the adorable but divergent MySims line. With work on Spore wrapping up after eight years, it's also possible that Mr. Wright himself may take an active role in the game's development. Guess we'll all have more information come March 19 (finally, something to anxiously look forward to besides Brawl).

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]