Looks like a 2013 release date (hopefully early 2013).
Sim City was one of the first PC games I played, probably a lot of you guys first PC games played too, and I still go back to Sim City 4 from time to time.
The art (possible screenshots?!) for the sequel are looking mighty sweet as well.
Ok, so what’s next? Neverwinter Nights 4 gets announced? The gold box games in HD? Commander Keen: Revelations?
I dunno; it seemed to me that Sim City had kind of hit a dead end and needed a whole new way forward. They tout the online, connect-to-other players aspect, but to me the fun of Sim City was always individual and aesthetic; I don’t want anyone else’s world intruding into mine, and I don’t give a crap how my city scores on some leaderboard.
It looks pretty, but I don’t see anything really new. Obviously, though, there’s more to come.
My interest is certainly piqued. Sim City 4 was the pinnacle of the franchise, and making it more expansive and bigger would probably be very taxing on a lot of computers. It’d also make managing a large city a massive chore. They may just have to make a way for you to automate some functions, like laying sewage and water pipes and things like that.
furt, You may say that Sim City had hit a dead end, but from another point of view, it had also reached a kind of perfection. A Sim City 5 that is just more or less Sim City 4 with no grid and with modern day graphics would be completely awesome, and I think that’s what a lot of players want. Hopefully they won’t focus too much on the multiplayer aspect - that was a mistake in Cities XL, and there’s no reason for Maxis to make someone else’s mistake over again.
One thing that really I hope it retains is the ability to easily add user created content: The plethora of mods and user created structures is what kept Sim City 4 going for so many years. That, and a good map editor - part of the reason why Cities XL was so gawd-awfully boring was that you couldn’t make your own maps. Also, I’m hoping for more focus on building stuff and less on gameplay compared to cities XL - SC4 was always at its best as a big sandbox, less so as a game (the same thing can be said about the Sims).
I trust Maxis to get it right, they always seemed to know what they were doing.
Heck I played the original SimCity on the Commodore 64, and I’ve had every version since then. I haven’t played it (or any other game, for that matter) in forever, but I’d be interested in seeing what they do with this version.
Maybe so. For me, the best improvements in the games came from a sense that the sim was getting deeper and more realistic, with more and more interconnected systems; but the problem was also that the more systems you have, also the more tedious micromanagement and less “fun.” Will Wright has said much the same thing, IIRC.
Personally, the thing I’ve always wanted to see was politics: a city council and/or elections that are actually difficult. It’s too easy to execute farsighted 30-year plans that real-life mayors can only dream of; I’d love the challenge of having to horsetrade with SimCityCouncil, SimBoardofEducation, etc.
I’m happy to hear about this. I love the fourth game but it has this insanely annoying bug where it will either randomly ctd or freeze when I try to save.
I agree all around. I wanted to Like SImCity4 - but it was just too much work for too little reward. I would be happier with one (really huge) city, more complex interconnections, and citizens with clearer goals and needs.
I do not think anything in that video is out of the realm of possible with today’s PC tech. The movie plays more like actual gameplay with areas highlighting where a certain building can and cannot go and plopping down new buildings and so on.
I am playing Mass Effect 3 right now and there are in-game cut scene sequences that use the game’s engine (i.e. not a pre-rendered scene) and the results looks almost pre-rendered (I have a good PC so it looks really nice).
