Sim City 4

TrailerParkJawa · Post by **TrailerParkJawa** » 2003-01-17 01:20am

Saw it in the stores today. I was wondering if anyone has picked it up yet, or plans to?

I found Sim City 3 to be a let down, but Im keeping an open mind on this one.

Post by **Vympel** » 2003-01-17 01:25am

I'd rather just buy Republic: The Revolution instead. You can have fight clubs. And kill people. None of this zoning crap. Actually it's a totally different genre, but Sim City 3 bored the shit out of me. Nothing new, same old, same old.

Faram · Post by **Faram** » 2003-01-17 02:48am

Just boght and installed it. No time to play but will give it a spin during the weekend.

BTW you can download my neigbur(sp?)

The Globe arena.

It's a fucking huge arena for conserts, hockey and stuff like that

http://www.globearenas.se/browse.asp?sid=26

How large is the Globe?
The Globe has a diameter of 110 metres, the interior height is 85 metres and the volume is 600,000 m3. It would take 40 years to fill the Globe with water from a tap.

Max approx 16,000 persons
Ishockey 13, 850 persons
Concerts 6,000 – 16, 300 persons
The Globe "small stage" 1,000 – 3,000 persons
Conferences up to 4,500 persons
Banquettes up to 3,500 persons seated

Post by **Sea Skimmer** » 2003-01-17 02:50am

The original and 2000 where good. Sim City 3 didn't hold my interest. I won't be buying four.

PeZook · Post by **PeZook** » 2003-01-17 06:48am

I actually liked Sim City 3000 just fine, expect for those dumb-looking fusion powerplants.

There was nothing that could be compared to watching your giant hard-built metropolis covered with pollution from far away

What new features does SC4 have? And what the hell is Republic?

Post by **Vympel** » 2003-01-17 07:34am

Republic is a game set in a fictional former Soviet Republic. You start off small in one of the shitty little towns, your objective being to become President by Any Means Necessary (TM). It looks like it's gonna be great.

RedImperator · Post by **RedImperator** » 2003-01-17 10:48am

I drool for this game. Unfortunately, drooling is all I'll be able to do, because I have a laptop that cannot be upgraded with a 3D card and my desktop is so obsolete I'd be better off building a new system from scratch.

Crazy_Vasey · Post by **Crazy_Vasey** » 2003-01-17 10:55am

Vympel wrote:Republic is a game set in a fictional former Soviet Republic. You start off small in one of the shitty little towns, your objective being to become President by Any Means Necessary (TM). It looks like it's gonna be great.

I remember drooling over that game years ago... Does it still have the massive size and detail it was hyped up to have?

Post by **Vympel** » 2003-01-17 10:57am

Crazy_Vasey wrote:
I remember drooling over that game years ago... Does it still have the massive size and detail it was hyped up to have?

I'm pretty sure there haven't been any major changes

TrailerParkJawa · Post by **TrailerParkJawa** » 2003-01-17 12:17pm

It looks like there is a significant upgrade in graphical detail from Sim City 3 to Sim City 4. In Sim City 3 they took out many of my favorite features from 2000. The ability to put sign's in your city. ie) TrailerPark's TrailerPark , SeaSkimmer Naval Base, Darth Wong University, Mr Bean Parking Lot, etc.

They removed the mayors house which tells gave you statistics on the city. IIRC they removed the water supply model, etc. Im basically hoping Sim City 4 has some of the old micro managing of the earlier games.

Darksider · Post by **Darksider** » 2003-01-17 12:37pm

i thought the first sim city was relativly enjoyable but the genre quickly lost my interest by it's complete and total lack of combat in any form in my games i just don't want to build anything unless i'm gonna use it to smash the crap out of somthing else

Alferd Packer · Post by **Alferd Packer** » 2003-01-17 12:48pm

I enjoy it, because you're no longer limited to one city. You now have a "region" of up to 50 separate cities to work with, so you can make one a huge industrial park and several around them "bedroom" communities which commute to work.

And you can drop meteors. Big, explosive meteors.

Darksider · Post by **Darksider** » 2003-01-17 12:50pm

Alferd Packer wrote:I enjoy it, because you're no longer limited to one city. You now have a "region" of up to 50 separate cities to work with, so you can make one a huge industrial park and several around them "bedroom" communities which commute to work.

And you can drop meteors. Big, explosive meteors.

you can drop meteors???? count me in

PeZook · Post by **PeZook** » 2003-01-17 12:50pm

Darksider wrote:i thought the first sim city was relativly enjoyable but the genre quickly lost my interest by it's complete and total lack of combat in any form in my games i just don't want to build anything unless i'm gonna use it to smash the crap out of somthing else

I personally found dealing with numerous crises and catasrophies VERY satisfying. But, well, to each his own

Darksider · Post by **Darksider** » 2003-01-17 12:55pm

personally i like to build a huge military base and cause some "catastrophes" of my own like in starcraft nothing beats a triple nuke strike followed up with 20 seige tanks

phongn · Post by **phongn** » 2003-01-17 01:43pm

SimCity 4 is excellent, and much more challenging than the earlier games. It also has some major bugs right now (memory leak, crash-to-desktop) unfortunately. My computer's peak commit charge hit 710MB when I looked at my task manager logs(!) Time to get some more RAM....

It is much, much better than the travesty that was SC3K.

Water management is back, though pumps now get water from an underground aquifer than from some surface water. They also cost maintenance, so you can set it's output proportional to your city (and budget, for that matter).

AFAIK you can't place signs anymore, but you can title virtually everything.

You cannot turn off disasters anymore. OTOH, the only ones that will occur by themselves are the nuclear meltdown and fires - everything else is toggled by the user. Yes, that means you can unleash lightning strikes, tornados & meteors (and you can guide them), volcanos and earthquakes.

The nuclear meltdown is more of a groundbursted nuclear detonation than a true meltdown, though.

Shadowhawk · Post by **Shadowhawk** » 2003-01-17 02:48pm

I bought SC4 last Sunday at Gamestop.

I've played it a few times since then, and I'm struck about how much more difficult it is than previous SC games. In SC2, I could typically be profitable within a couple years; towards late-game, I'd be making thousands a month with low-ish taxes. Now I'm struggling with half my taxes at or above the 10% mark.
In my large city (only about 2500 people), I'm 12 years into the game, and I'm only making about $50 profit a month, and that only because of the $350/month the Army base is paying.
Everything costs money now. Schools have a normal budget (affects # of teachers and # of students it can support), and a busing budget (which affects the radius in which students attend). It's actually cheaper to push your budgets to the maximum than to place another school--keep your residential districts clumped!
Pipes and pumps cost money every month. Mass transit sites cost money every month (although they do make money with fares, it is a paltry amount). Even your power plant costs you money every month.

My people are demanding inordinate amounts of Agricultural Industry, which bring in crap for taxes, considering the zone sizes. They barely want commercial or the higher-end industry.

I'm not really sure how the region system will work--yea, they say you can have core industrial regions, outlaying residential regions...but I don't really see it happening that way when you've got to build up each city as normal in a region.

The music's nice, though, and the menu system is pretty good (although I'd prefer some nice hard numbers rather than unclear graphs).

ArmorPierce · Post by **ArmorPierce** » 2003-01-17 04:59pm

I might get it when the price of the game drops to ~$20

phongn · Post by **phongn** » 2003-01-17 07:07pm

Shadowhawk wrote:Everything costs money now. Schools have a normal budget (affects # of teachers and # of students it can support), and a busing budget (which affects the radius in which students attend). It's actually cheaper to push your budgets to the maximum than to place another school--keep your residential districts clumped!
Pipes and pumps cost money every month. Mass transit sites cost money every month (although they do make money with fares, it is a paltry amount). Even your power plant costs you money every month.

The key is to expand slowly, and ignore services until you can really afford them. Also, built out then up - that is, build low-density out the wazoo, and then begin replacing them with high-density zones.

My people are demanding inordinate amounts of Agricultural Industry, which bring in crap for taxes, considering the zone sizes. They barely want commercial or the higher-end industry.

If you're going to build a farm town, you more or less have to do the entire map (roughly) to be of worth. Otherwise, I-Ag isn't worth it.

I'm not really sure how the region system will work--yea, they say you can have core industrial regions, outlaying residential regions...but I don't really see it happening that way when you've got to build up each city as normal in a region.

Nope. For example, I have a tiny industrial city on one side, and a residential area on another city. They're linked by roads. It works perfectly, though the commute time is rather long. For another example, look at the London region map - it shows you such a scenario.

phongn · Post by **phongn** » 2003-01-17 07:08pm

Darksider wrote:personally i like to build a huge military base and cause some "catastrophes" of my own like in starcraft nothing beats a triple nuke strike followed up with 20 seige tanks

I started dropping meteors on my city and obliterating random grid squares, the municipal airport, the AFB...

salm · Post by **salm** » 2003-01-17 07:11pm

they should implement a feature to model your own houses in a 3D program which you can then import to the game.

phongn · Post by **phongn** » 2003-01-17 07:27pm

salm wrote:they should implement a feature to model your own houses in a 3D program which you can then import to the game.

It is being considered (SC2K had it as an add-on, IIRC SC3K had downloadable tools).

Asst. Asst. Lt. Cmdr. Smi · Post by **Asst. Asst. Lt. Cmdr. Smi** » 2003-01-17 09:51pm

I'll probably by buying it this weekend, as I enjoyed playing SimCity 2000, as well as SC3.

Darksider · Post by **Darksider** » 2003-01-18 01:19pm

phongn wrote:
Darksider wrote:personally i like to build a huge military base and cause some "catastrophes" of my own like in starcraft nothing beats a triple nuke strike followed up with 20 seige tanks
I started dropping meteors on my city and obliterating random grid squares, the municipal airport, the AFB...

sounds like fun

CmdrWilkens · Post by **CmdrWilkens** » 2003-01-18 01:27pm

Well as soon as my new motherboard arrives and I actually have a decently fast computer I might buy the game.