SimCity

[20solskjaer]

Anybody else looking to pick this up? Its out on the 8th of march and im mega excited!!!!

Used to waste hours and hours building my city and have played all versions since SimCity 2000, havn't played SimCity 4 for about 5 years and didn't realise it had been so long since it was released

Heres the new intro video, followed by some gameplay videos and screenshots

Game Intro:

Limited edition trailer:

Gameplay:

Screenshots:

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[17Larsson]

Seriously? Sim City 3000 is right up there with some of my all time favourite games. What platform is this on? Just PC? This has me very excited

 

[20solskjaer]

Seriously? Sim City 3000 is right up there with some of my all time favourite games. What platform is this on? Just PC? This has me very excited

Yeah its windows only for now, ive preordered the collectors edition, its exclusive to game, you get the game in a Steelbook, a lenticular slipcover, the london neighbourhood set, the heroes and villains set and there might be some other dlc (not sure on that)

Pic of it below

Spoiler

 

[KingEric7]

That looks like great fun. I played one of the older ones and really enjoyed it. Do you need a particularly top end system to play this new one coming out?

 

[20solskjaer]

I dont think so, i manage to cover it with a 4-5 year old laptop

SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS

Processor:
AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual-Core 4000+ or better or Intel Core 2 Duo Processor 2.0GHz or better

Operating System:
Windows XP/Vista/7

RAM:
2GB RAM

Hard Drive:
10GB HD Space

Graphics Card:
ATI Radeon HD 2x00 or better*
nVidia 7800 or better*
Intel Series 4 integrated graphics or better*

Broadband Internet:
Minimum 256 kbps download, 64 kbps upload

*Minimum of 256MB of on-board RAM and Shader 3.0 or better support.

 

[iSparky]

Seriously? Sim City 3000 is right up there with some of my all time favourite games. What platform is this on? Just PC? This has me very excited

Windows only for launch date, shortly after that its on the mac store. Its taking a bit longer for mac because they are the one company out there making a native game and not a port. Looking forward to this game for sure.

 

[17Larsson]

Since I moved house I've only got an xbox. I'm going to have to fix that soon

 

[Cina]

Daaaang, it looks the shizzle. I will be getting it.

 

[Justin]

Don't quite have the PC the game deserves. Might wait until an upgrade, hopefully there'll be an expansion combo type of deal by that time.

 

[Count Orduck]

It's completely different to older SimCity games. Streamlined for the "casual" gamer, as everything else is nowadays:

• No option for 100% offline with single player mode.
• Always-on connection to Origin (EA servers). - you cannot play the game AT ALL without a perpetual internet connection.
• You will not be able to reload the city to a stage prior to disasters (Due to Cloud Saving on EA servers) - so if the game fecks you over with an annoying random disaster; well, tough shit.
• Random disasters (Unless playing in Sandbox mode) - even if meteor strikes are pretty fecking retarded, you're gonna get them anyway.
• No industry types in RCI meter. Industry types are determined by separate "Industrial Tech" level.
• Absence of terraforming. - terraforming was a huge part of the old games.
• Absence of agriculture. - no farming whatsoever.
• Absence of subways. - lolwut? no doubt being saved for an expansion by EA.
• Pre-designed maps and population road connections. - which means you're stuck on a limited number of maps; and the road connections between the maps are also pre-determined too, so when you start there'll be a few highway pieces SET IN PLACE that you have to build around and can do nothing about.
• Player doesn’t have direct control over the zoning by population density (The size of a road directly correlates to the building’s density level). - so if you want to make an area slightly heavy-density, you have to put ridiculously expensive and incongruous-looking roads there.
• Player doesn’t have direct control over a civic buildings funding. Player can turn a whole building on/off and/or add/remove Modules. - a key feature of the old games removed because casual gamers are idiots.
• Max Size of the maps is 2 km by 2 km (SimCity 4 Medium size). - which is actually really small; the screenshots in the first post are the entire city section you can play with.
• Max 16 maps per region and 10 regions save slots per Origin account. - and with no random maps that's a huge lack of replayability.
• Not being able to control the regional level transport. - all of the intra-region highways and connections are set in place before you even start.

It's a clusterfeck by EA, but what did we expect? Maxis went down the pan the moment EA bought them out like all of the other elite game developers they purchased. And the best part is this is more enforced Origin usage. It's hilarious how shit-scared of Steam they are.

 

[17Larsson]

Maybe I'll just get 3000 back out of the attic. Was 4 any good? It wasn't supposed to be as good as 3000 is that right?

 

[KingEric7]

I dont think so, i manage to cover it with a 4-5 year old laptop

SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS

Processor:
AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual-Core 4000+ or better or Intel Core 2 Duo Processor 2.0GHz or better

Operating System:
Windows XP/Vista/7

RAM:
2GB RAM

Hard Drive:
10GB HD Space

Graphics Card:
ATI Radeon HD 2x00 or better*
nVidia 7800 or better*
Intel Series 4 integrated graphics or better*

Broadband Internet:
Minimum 256 kbps download, 64 kbps upload

*Minimum of 256MB of on-board RAM and Shader 3.0 or better support.

Cool, think I may be alright on that then. I keep having to ask everywhere about this dreaded Intel HD Graphics card, but it runs some decent stuff it turns out. Not much but it's not too bad.

First I've heard of Cities XL whilst looking all this up, and it turns out I can run that. Is that in the same league as SimCity?

I've been really in the mood to play a game like this again recently and am torn between SimCity 4 and Cities XL 2012. Have no idea which one to go for.

 

[Justin]

Maybe I'll just get 3000 back out of the attic. Was 4 any good? It wasn't supposed to be as good as 3000 is that right?

No I think you'll find most will say 4 is the better game especially with the Rush hour expansion

 

[Castia]

Well apparently the US launch has gone horribly wrong. Constant server crashes, hundreds of bugs and log in queues for a single player game have caused outrage Amazon have already stopped selling the digital version because of all the complaints and there's multiple petitions ongoing at the moment. EA strike again, any serious developer wanting to work for these feckwits is just asking for trouble they are fecking useless.

 

[Drainy]

It's the same with every always-online game, and we're coming into an era of ever more obnoxious DRM including this.. It's only going to get worse.

 

[nimic]

This might possibly be the worst gaming experience of my long and illustrious gaming career. I've played a lot of games, both good and bad, but I'm not sure I've ever been this furious at one. It would honestly be better if the game simply didn't work. At this point it works just long enough for me to spend a good while playing it, at which point the server goes down and rolls back nearly everything I've done. What a magnificent idea always on DRM and server side saves turned out to be in a single player game. fecking tossers.

It's the worst release by a major publisher in the modern era. The Diablo 3 release went silky smooth compared to this debacle.

 

[RedMist99]

Yet another game I'll have to pass on due to my boycott of EA.

If enough people take the same stance, it may force EA to reconsider some of their practices. shitc**ts that they are

Unlikely though considering some of the franchises they own

 

[20solskjaer]

Im still mega excited about this, ive been off work this week and im getting up earlyish to go pick it up, hopefully i'll be able to play it tomorrow

 

[RedMist99]

In case anyone missed it in the 50k thread....

 

[Pexbo]

I thought he died when his car got stuck in the rapids at the end of Jurassic Park and the little dinosaurs ate him?

 

[shaggy]

yet another game franchise EA have ruined. God knows why people bought this, was always going to be a complete disaster.

 

[iSparky]

This "always online" thing sounds bollocks, people reporting too when you run out of resources such as water then that's it. There is no way of getting more, at all.

 

[Dargonk]

Would have given this game a shot, but the constant online thing kills that idea. After giving diablo 3 a shot with it, I'm never buying a single player game that requires it ever again.

I'll just wait until a pirated version appears and play the game without all the added online requirement headaches.

 

[Richter]

Would have given this game a shot, but the constant online thing kills that idea. After giving diablo 3 a shot with it, I'm never buying a single player game that requires it ever again.

I'll just wait until a pirated version appears and play the game without all the added online requirement headaches.

The always online thing is a protection against piracy and it worked with Diablo and I guess it will work with this too so there won't be a pirate version. The only victims are the paying customers but do EA and Activision care? Nope not as long as they get their cash.

 

[iSparky]

Oh dear, sales suspended by Amazon due to the server issues.

http://www.technobuffalo.com/2013/03/07/amazon-suspends-simcity-sales/

The way things are going, SimCity’s struggles will last indefinitely as its launch further edges into a nebulous swamp. Following a catastrophic first few days marred by server issues and stripped features, outlets are now refusing to sell the title outright until things are fixed. Case in point: Amazon has temporarily stopped selling digital copies of SimCity until things are smoothed out.

The game is currently listed as Unavailable, with no indication of when or if it’ll come back. Chances are it’s only a matter of time, but the lack of availability could lead to a lot of missed sales. And that’s an enormous shame for a game that showed so much promise—reviews have been bright thus far. But people can’t even play the game right now, a game people bought and own.

EA says it’s working on getting things back up, but an exact timeframe is still unknown. In the meantime, the company said players won’t get banned on Origin for requesting SimCity refunds, if that’s what you plan to do. Looks like you’ll have to shelf those city permits until servers are back up and running.

 

[Count Orduck]

Oh dear, sales suspended by Amazon due to the server issues.

http://www.technobuffalo.com/2013/03/07/amazon-suspends-simcity-sales/

The way things are going, SimCity’s struggles will last indefinitely as its launch further edges into a nebulous swamp. Following a catastrophic first few days marred by server issues and stripped features, outlets are now refusing to sell the title outright until things are fixed. Case in point: Amazon has temporarily stopped selling digital copies of SimCity until things are smoothed out.

The game is currently listed as Unavailable, with no indication of when or if it’ll come back. Chances are it’s only a matter of time, but the lack of availability could lead to a lot of missed sales. And that’s an enormous shame for a game that showed so much promise—reviews have been bright thus far. But people can’t even play the game right now, a game people bought and own.

EA says it’s working on getting things back up, but an exact timeframe is still unknown. In the meantime, the company said players won’t get banned on Origin for requesting SimCity refunds, if that’s what you plan to do. Looks like you’ll have to shelf those city permits until servers are back up and running.

What the fecking feck? Do they really have to come out and say that, as if there was even a chance that you would get banned?!

 

[Rudie]

Much better City building games out there, this one has been a disaster, did they even test it before release?

Some better games here: http://venturebeat.com/2013/03/07/simcity-not-working-for-you-5-alternative-city-building-games/

 

[Count Orduck]

Tropico 4 is actually brilliant, especially with the Modern Times DLC.

 

[I_live_cement]

EA is gaming poison, they ruin everything they get their hands on just to maximise profits.

 

[Arruda]

Count Orduck's post above is enough for me to want to give a miss to this completely.

I don't understand how a game with such issues has been getting "bright reviews", is everyone sold out?

 

[Chimera]

Much better City building games out there, this one has been a disaster, did they even test it before release?

Some better games here: http://venturebeat.com/2013/03/07/simcity-not-working-for-you-5-alternative-city-building-games/

I've played all those games on the list and after playing simcity for a while now I think it's way better than any of those games.

It probably should have been labelled as an MMO then it wouldn't have had as much grief. Server troubles aside, it's a damn good game.

 

[shaggy]

Count Orduck's post above is enough for me to want to give a miss to this completely.

I don't understand how a game with such issues has been getting "bright reviews", is everyone sold out?

It's only been getting good reviews from the professional review industry, which has been a mess for years.

 

[Castia]

Count Orduck's post above is enough for me to want to give a miss to this completely.

I don't understand how a game with such issues has been getting "bright reviews", is everyone sold out?

I dont know to be honest it's been getting some really bad reviews to. Gamespot give it 5/10 and on gamerankings.com it's average score is 76% by todays standards thats a really poor score.
Just looking at the user average on Gamespot and it's currently at 3.6/10 . £45 EA wanted for this via digital download on Origin, cheeky robbing bastards.

 

[Skywarden]

What the fecking feck? Do they really have to come out and say that, as if there was even a chance that you would get banned?!

There was something about this on neoGAF where a costumer had issues and wanted a refund. He was notified that his account would be banned. I can't recall it correctly, but if you look over there I'm sure you'll find it.

Polygon gave this game a 9.5/10. Why not just put a sign up telling us to go feck ourselves.

 

[Redlambs]

When the cloud portion of the PS4 (and 720) starts taking off, you'll be seeing much more of this sort of shit going on.

It's a brave (shitty, rip-off) new world.

 

[Adzzz]

Sadly I don't this is the end for DRM.

People should boycott the game as this issue affects all gamers. Imagine a future where building a museum in Sim City costs a real life £1 for the download.

feck that.

 

[RedSky]

I've been watching gameplay videos on Youtube of people who have the game. It looks a lot of fun to play, the first video the fella had to rebuild his city three times due to crashes.

It's one of those games that you stay well clear of for a few weeks until the game/servers are more stable.

 

[Skywarden]

People are well and truly pissed!

http://www.amazon.com/SimCity-Limit...dp_top_cm_cr_acr_txt?ie=UTF8&showViewpoints=1

That rating is quite something!

 

[rcoobc]

When the cloud portion of the PS4 (and 720) starts taking off, you'll be seeing much more of this sort of shit going on.

It's a brave (shitty, rip-off) new world.

Sim City is on PS4?

 

[Redlambs]

Sim City is on PS4?

You really don't comprehend things too well.