In light of SimCity's disastrous launch week, publisher Electronic Arts has suspended the marketing campaign for the game, according to an internal email obtained by Polygon.
The email, which was sent to all of EA's marketing affiliate partners, informs them that EA is deactivating links through LinkShare and that "we ask you to please remove any copy promoting SimCity from your website for the time-being."
From Polygon:
"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," the email reads. "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."
Yesterday, Maxis general manager Lucy Bradshaw assured Kotaku that they are adding servers in an effort to get the game running stably. "Our priority now," Bradshaw said, "is to quickly and dramatically increase the number and stability of our servers and, with that, the number of players who can simultaneously access the game."
We've reached out to EA for comment, and will update when we hear back.
(Hilariously apropos top image from SimCity's TV ads. No pants, indeed.)