Giant Bomb Video Game News

After seeing SimCity Creator in action on the DS, I'm not entirely clear what that title is supposed to mean. I think “SimCity Civilization” would make more sense, though I could see some copyright issues, and the ensuing knife fight between Will Wright and Sid Meier, preventing that. (As an aside, who do you think would win that knife fight? Discuss!) Still, confusing title choices aside, this seems like an interesting direction for the franchise.

The gist of SimCity Creator isn't too different from past SimCity games, and I'm told that the general level of complexity is about on par with SimCity 3000. The twist is that you'll play through a series of different ages, starting with the stone age and ending with the nuclear age. Since cavemen have a hard time with stuff like fire, it's unsurprising that your build options will be limited to residential areas and roadways at this point. You'll need to meet age-specific milestones in areas like approval rating and population before you're given the option to advance to the next age, at which point the look of your city will change, and you'll be given access to new technologies. As such, the game becomes more and more complicated as you progress from one age to the next.

SimCity Creator is being developed by the same Japanese team behind last year's SimCity DS, and graphically, it looks roughly the same, though your advisor has taken on the look of a character from MySims. While the changes being made to the SimCity formula are interesting, I came away feeling like it would make more sense as a single mode in a larger SimCity game. If you're hankering for a new portable SimCity experience, though, this looks like it will probably fit the bill.