With the new Sim City coming out soon I should warn people not residing in America that I have attempted two Maxis products now, each have 'mysterious' issues that close out regions abroad.

Check EA Tech and Help forums for "Error 73003"

Just like the Dick Smith Electroncis shop, that sold me this dead game for $20, has no obligation to return the game, EA has no obligation to answer anyone honestly and let us over here know that Maxis Servers will not let us in.

That sounds like utter crap. So they won't even activate the game?

You're perfectly justified in cracking that, imo, that's just bullshit...

To clarify, are you trying to activate on Origin? Origin can only directly activate the games on this list. For other games you have to use the following (depending on the game):

https://activate.ea.com/gameactivation.do
https://activate.ea.com/activategame.do
https://activate.ea.com/applyentitlement.do

After activating on the appropriate page they show up in the Origin account as expected.

Found a few cracks but don't know how to use them....not sure if those cracks are up to date with latest patches.

Nothing from Maxis that I've purchased can connect to Maxis servers from New Zealand yet they still sell all the crap over here.

Darkspore was purchased from a local retailer. Nah, the key registered the game in my library....once after installing and all patches I got an error connecting to the Maxis Server.

Had same issue with previous Maxis games too. Wouldn't be a problem if I could still play offline but EA insists using DRM that forces you to log into a master server.

Pretty big heads up for those outside US considering Sims 3 and Sim City....pricey games that people might not be able to play at all.

After hearing about this I tracked down my disc and installed the game
Came up with the same error message, loaded up Origin and noticed that darkspore was installed in it,
tried to run it from Origin and it came up with the same error message, clicked on the darkspore overlay and all of a sudden the game started patching and says the server is online?

edit: The game loaded up without any problems.

I'm sticking with Simcity 4 with my BATs.

And publishers complain about piracy and therefore require their software to phone home in order to prevent piracy and then cut off the authorization servers. Because this will totally convince people not to pirate and crack the software

IIRC Darkspore has/had activation error bugs. My Steam copy is detecting that the server is online, but it too has had trouble patching in the past (took 5 hours to get it patched once).

If you suspect a region lock on activation, I would check using a VPN to confirm first.

What is a VPN?

Virtual Private Network, in practice a way to get a different IP, usually used by companies so people outside the building can use a building IP. Works with countries as well.

Virtual Private Network. Basically, a way to get an IP address from a different region. I tend to use a paid for VPN, as it's never let me down when I needed it. There are free ones, but I don't tend to trust those ones.

Thanks for the info, guys.

Sounds much more efficient than HideMyAss.com

(M)axis of evil

As far as I know, that doesn't work with Steam. The VPN I use does and I've never had any problems when using it (just don't try to buy from them when connected to a VPN!)

Ha ha - What happens if you try to purchase from Steam while on VPN? =D