SimCity Demands Nine Minutes of Your Time

I Really liked how easy it looked. But what I loved about past Sim games was their attention to detail. Seeing little things like the Garbageman not picking up garbage bins or people having super standardized stories kinda made me sad. I know such attention to detail is a lot to expect in a modern game with all the other things they put in their games, but it's the main draw for me at least.

wow, this guy is such a dirtbag,

"lets give em jobs and then a way to buy happiness in some stores"

"lets just dump all the shit and trash over here and hope they don't notice"

"I want these turists spending all their money in my casino"

couple more minutes and he'd start with the sim genocide

I kept thinking the Grudge girl was about to get me every time that weird sound played.....

Looks fantastic. I want it now :D

I'm waiting for a James Howard Kunstler-branded sustainable city simulation.

I think this game looks great, and that's a shame since I wont be playing it due to EA's artificial restrictions. Is CitiesXL a proper Torchlight to SimCity's Diablo 3?

@FuzzYLemoN said:

@hi_im_rob said:

@FuzzYLemoN said:

Water travels along roads?

The fuck is this.

Water pipes under the roads. All cities do this.

Okay, but why make it part of the game then? It's pointless to have a water tab if it's just under all the roads. And the annoying part is that you're going to have to put random unnecessary roads just to get water to certain areas.

The water tab is for making water plants (Towers, pumps, ext) like the power tap is for Power factories.

And why would you want water to an area that's not connected by road anyway? Are you going to be building some separate city that's not connected to the main one? All your buildings will be connected by road anyway.

@Portis said:

My girlfriend and I just watched this. My reaction: WANT! Her reaction! WANT! Want. She also peed herself.

you've got her locked up in a small room without a door in the back of your house don't you, you sicko!

@hi_im_rob said:

@FuzzYLemoN said:

Water travels along roads?

The fuck is this.

Water pipes under the roads. All cities do this.

Okay, but why make it part of the game then? It's pointless to have a water tab if it's just under all the roads. And the annoying part is that you're going to have to put random unnecessary roads just to get water to certain areas.

@ArmedBear said:

You seen this Simcity game? It's got curved roads. Curved. Roads.

I used to be a mayor like you, until the Mob capped my knees for not taking bribes.

Looks great. Don't know how much time I could sink into a game like this though. Far too many other things I need to play.

While a part of me is super excited for this, another part of me is saying "I already have what they're selling... it's called Cities XL." I'm hoping that Simcity can bring more to the table than Cities does (ie an engine that doesn't break when cities become large, but that was a problem with Simcity 4 back in the day, too...)

The issues @Uberdubie raised are definitely things that concern me as well, but I'm willing to withhold judgement until the final product is released. Hopefully Simcity retains the things that kept it great in the past (I personally loved terraforming as much, if not more, than actually building cities) while moving forward to catch up (and hopefully surpass) the other city building game(s?) out there.

My favorite part about the Sim franchise is the little things, of course I'm talking about those tiny people that inhabit your creations :D They all have a name, desires, and their own personality. Something about them that really makes the game for me. It's what got me hooked into Roller Coaster Tycoon series as well.

Zombie mode would be great here

@Portis said:

Want. She also peed herself.

You might want to start building a sewer out in the forest.

BONER 

Sold

Wowzers.

I can't see myself playing it, but this is still all very impressive.

My girlfriend and I just watched this. 
 
My reaction: WANT! 
 
Her reaction! WANT! 
 
Want. She also peed herself.

@BigD145 said:

So, roads are the avenues whereby water, electricity, and sewage flow, but it's a bad thing if sewage gets into your water supply? Hmm. Seems like a recipe for disaster. Why are roads the magic bullet for EVERYTHING?

Because in reality all those systems flow under roads. Even in older Sim City games, most people followed their roads for laying pipe. That's right, I said "laying pipe".

Almost everything is connected by a road anyway so there is no reason to have the game mechanic of manually placing pipes or sewage systems. I know this is a game, but it is still a simulation. You wouldn't build water pumps and not connect some sort of access road to them.

@Bevinsky said:

EA, please, please please for the love of God, don't mess this one up.

You probably will anyway.

I want to believe it will be good too, but I'm just waiting for them to pull the curtain back and reveal their true intentions with this. The Sims 3 was barely more than a "free-to-play" game that was priced at 60 dollars up front (day one micro-transactions up the wazoo). With Maxis barely an entity of its own anymore, I'm kinda expecting the same thing to happen here.

They're already doing the "digital delux" version thing for this, just like ME3. So it will cost 80 dollars on release to get all the content. That alone is enough to kill my interest.

But agreed, please prove me wrong, EA.

So, roads are the avenues whereby water, electricity, and sewage flow, but it's a bad thing if sewage gets into your water supply? Hmm. Seems like a recipe for disaster. Why are roads the magic bullet for EVERYTHING?

That was a great video. If they're forcing online I'm out though.

@ArmedBear said:

You seen this Simcity game? It's got curved roads. Curved. Roads.

DO NOT WANT!

I was really starting to get a little worried until that beautiful 90 degree angle turned up at the end of the industrial zone. Hopefully it's as easy as a button click. Games that basically only let me build wonky roads unless I spend literally hours carefully eyeballing each new addition for how to get straight roads and perfect corners are really not for me :(.

SimCity will demand nine months of my life. February is going to be such an awesome month for video games.

I think one of the best ideas in this game is the fact that water/power/sewage just go along the road ways, it just streamlines something you would have to do anyways. That said, I cringed a lot watching this game, sure it looks great but the scale seemed really limiting. The plots were huge and and each building took up a lot of room compared to the amount of land, it doesnt seem like you can build a truly massive metropolis like in previous SC games. I am also worried about complexity, I am all for needless actions and extra button clicks to be streamlined, but I dont want them to water down the amount of statistics, details, zones, taxes, policies, overlays.... etc. The details are what has kept me playing SC4 for almost a decade. I am just worried that this game might turn out like Civ V did for me, a very pretty but much more simplified game

Man, it's going to really suck when my nice little city gets hit by a tsunami-hurricane-earthquake-alien attack.

I am liking everything they have shown so far.

Please take my money already.

The new road functionality is great with it handling power & water and the game looks like it will be even easier to try and recreate towns.

My only issue with the whole video was him connecting a train track at 45º. It is not an intersection! Who the fuck does that? That looked shitty and the train is just going to derail. lol

Too bad I am boycotting Origin, I hope this comes out on Steam. I don't feel like paying $30 more for this just cause EA thinks its special.

I will give you all the minutes you demand, oh great SimCity master!

Dat aliasing.

i dont understand why you hate drm =) if you dont pirate it u have nthing to hide?

Uniting the water, power and roads into one network is excellent. I remember in SimCity 2000 how confusing it was to lay a pipe network underneath the road network. I'm still glad you have to worry about water and power, but this little simplification is one I like.

Got to say, this video sold me on SimCity. I am now officially excited for it.

All it needs is some kind of sandbox mod.

How about you stop trying to make me buy this game and just let me buy it. I need this, now!

@Uberdubie said:

As much as I want this game, there are far too many glaring problems keeping me from purchasing it. Hands-down the biggest thing keeping me from getting this game is forced-online and forced-cloud saves. This means none of your cities will actually be on your own computer, and far more importantly, you cannot even re-load incase you make any mistakes, purposely cause disasters, or even want to test something and revert back to a previous state. Whatever you do is perminent; you're forced to live with the consequences. Kinda defeats the purpose of playing a Simcity game IMO.

And as highly popular as multiplayer is in most games these days, very few Simcity players are clamoring for it, especially since we don't get a choice. I don't think I could ever imagine Simity being anything other than a solo experience. I'd much prefer having a region of multiple towns looking and acting just as I see fit. Being forced to rely on other players also doesn't appeal to me at all. Not to mention you'll very likely be forced to use EA's horrifying "Origin" service whenever you're playing.

As mentioned above, small city size is also a concern of mine. I understand if many computers can't handle a very large city with this engine, but at least give the option. Also, for some reason you can no longer do most forms of terraforming (aka edit the land how ever you see fit). If they can manage to come to their senses and remedy many of these issues, this game will sell FAR better. But sadly I wouldn't count on it, and it's frustrating to see what they're doing with this franchise.

I think any complaints against Origin are unfounded - the UI is better than Steam's in some ways and,as a service, it's totally functional. I don't get the hate at all.

That being said, I had no idea about the cloud-save/persistent online features until you mentioned it. That's crazy and potentially a huge deal breaker. It changes how you play Sim City in so many ways and limits your ability to fool around - especially if the terraforming is also gone.

It looks so damned good but I'm starting to feel conflicted.

MY BODY IS READY!

I'm pleased to see that EA hasn't dumbed the game down. Earning stuff through actually building a successful core model, THEN get to cooler stuff. Too many games are blowing their load because they're afraid players will get bored and lose interest. SimCity would be an easy target for EA to do exactly that. Props, so far.

EA, please, please please for the love of God, don't mess this one up.

You probably will anyway.

I've been addicted to SimCity Social on Facebook, just waiting for this game to come out. While @paulwade1984 pointed out plenty of issues with the game, what is presented is still a hell of a lot better than what we've been handed over the past few years, and I'm more than excited for it. I'm just debating on whether I wanna get it immediately or wait until an eventual sale price hits.

@paulwade1984: Both of you, I think you are overestimating EA's necessity to appeal to a hardcore Sim City fanbase to sell this game.

@Uberdubie said:

As much as I want this game, there are far too many glaring problems keeping me from purchasing it. Hands-down the biggest thing keeping me from getting this game is forced-online and forced-cloud saves. This means none of your cities will actually be on your own computer, and far more importantly, you cannot even re-load incase you make any mistakes, purposely cause disasters, or even want to test something and revert back to a previous state. Whatever you do is perminent; you're forced to live with the consequences. Kinda defeats the purpose of playing a Simcity game IMO.

And as highly popular as multiplayer is in most games these days, very few Simcity players are clamoring for it, especially since we don't get a choice. I don't think I could ever imagine Simity being anything other than a solo experience. I'd much prefer having a region of multiple towns looking and acting just as I see fit. Being forced to rely on other players also doesn't appeal to me at all. Not to mention you'll very likely be forced to use EA's horrifying "Origin" service whenever you're playing.

As mentioned above, small city size is also a concern of mine. I understand if many computers can't handle a very large city with this engine, but at least give the option. Also, for some reason you can no longer do most forms of terraforming (aka edit the land how ever you see fit). If they can manage to come to their senses and remedy many of these issues, this game will sell FAR better. But sadly I wouldn't count on it, and it's frustrating to see what they're doing with this franchise.

this.

I need that game.

As much as I want this game, there are far too many glaring problems keeping me from purchasing it. Hands-down the biggest thing keeping me from getting this game is forced-online and forced-cloud saves. This means none of your cities will actually be on your own computer, and far more importantly, you cannot even re-load incase you make any mistakes, purposely cause disasters, or even want to test something and revert back to a previous state. Whatever you do is perminent; you're forced to live with the consequences. Kinda defeats the purpose of playing a Simcity game IMO.

And as highly popular as multiplayer is in most games these days, very few Simcity players are clamoring for it, especially since we don't get a choice. I don't think I could ever imagine Simity being anything other than a solo experience. I'd much prefer having a region of multiple towns looking and acting just as I see fit. Being forced to rely on other players also doesn't appeal to me at all. Not to mention you'll very likely be forced to use EA's horrifying "Origin" service whenever you're playing.

As mentioned above, small city size is also a concern of mine. I understand if many computers can't handle a very large city with this engine, but at least give the option. Also, for some reason you can no longer do most forms of terraforming (aka edit the land how ever you see fit). If they can manage to come to their senses and remedy many of these issues, this game will sell FAR better. But sadly I wouldn't count on it, and it's frustrating to see what they're doing with this franchise.

Argh I want this so much. CitiesXL was a disappointment, and that Paradox transit sim from last year (the name escapes me) felt like it was just a mechanic in a city-builder.

Gamers will always find something to whine about. I don't even know why devs bother.

Looking forward to building a pretty shady city.

@LarryDavis: Yeah, I hope so. It did seem like one of the plots (The one to the top-left) might have been bigger. I just know that if they're rendering EVERYTHING in a city (Which is HUGE, and obviously Simcity 4 could have never did) to preserve performance they might be making plots smaller.

Game looks great either way, just something I'm looking at.

@FuzzYLemoN said:

Water travels along roads?

The fuck is this.

Water pipes under the roads. All cities do this.