You make a lot of good points. But I've argued this before: it seems highly unlikely that EA is doing any kind of expensive calculation server-side that couldn'

You make a lot of good points. But I've argued this before: it seems highly unlikely that EA is doing any kind of expensive calculation server-side that couldn't be equally done offline in a single player mode. It's possible for providers to install hardware where each player gets computational resources that rival their own -- OnLive does it. But OnLive also charges a monthly fee for it. And the offloading is only significant compared to, essentially, thin clients, not gaming PCs. So the simulation offloading argument is just bogus. But of course it's consistent to argue that SimCity is a multiplayer game, full stop, that a single player version, while feasible, would simply be so unattractive that they aren't going to support it; just like Actiblizzard doesn't offer offline WOW. But I assume lots of people are in fact playing essentially single player in a private region, and of course SimCity was a solitary experience in the past.