How will the online play work? Will it be tied to my Origin account? If so, I may want to create a new account as I’d prefer to be identified by a pseudonym rather than the real name on my Origin account.
By the way, I saw a commercial for this game earlier today. That’s weird, as SimCity always seemed to be too nerdy and specialized for a commercial on a national broadcast channel. (I once tried to explain the appeal of it by telling a friend that it tuned urban plannng into a game.)
No way, Sim City is one of those PC games that transcends.
It pays to market it a bit more widely, simply because it’s likely to appeal to people who don’t keep up with gaming, or haven’t done so in a while.
It’s funny in that your typical average Joe Gamer is less likely to be enthused about it than casual gamers or gamers with a history with the franchise (like most PC gamers).
Also try changing your Origin name. I think they let you do that at least once before needing to talk to someone.
I’m Kinthalis on Origin as well, btw.
You can change your privacy settings to not show your real name.
I’m TerminusEst920 on Origin. I’ll see about organizing a Doper region (maybe in a separate thread?).
I did. Couldn’t resist the Eiffel Tower.
For those who want to join me and other Dopers in city-building fun, I’ve posted a separate thread: Simcity 5 Doper region organizing thread.
Since the game has been out, what do you guys think?
I kinda want to get it, as I loved the last one, but I really don’t like the requirement that I have to be constantly online.
I assume that the online-always requirement is mostly meant to prevent piracy. It bothers me a little, but not enough not to play the game. And I’m online all the time anyhow. I downloaded the game today but haven’t spent much time on it yet.
Ignoring the whole “alway online” aspect of it, I find it’s both easier and more complex than SC4. It’s easier in that you can very quickly get your city up and running. But the underlying simulation is deeper, so that there are always more things to do, even after you’ve supposedly filled up the city. And, yes, the city size seems quite small.
The East Coast Servers are all full so I didn’t pick one. I have no intentions of playing with others so does it really matter what server I pick?
It shouldn’t matter which server you pick. But why don’t you come and join us over in Ceciltopia?
That might be fun but all I saw was East US, West US, Europe and Oceania. Users can make their own servers?
No, sorry. Ceciltopia is the private region I created specifically for multi-Doper play. You can find it on the “North America East 2” server. Friend me on Origin, username TerminusEst920, and I’ll send you an invite. See the previous link for more details.
I posted this on the multiplayer theread, but it’s relevant even if you’re playing alone, so I’ll repost this here:
Yeah, it isn’t a brilliant idea to blow your starting simoleons to build roads that support high density when there’s absolutely no demand for it, yet. Otherwise you’ll have to take out a loan to build that fire station (or add fire trucks) or you can fiddle while watching your town burn to the ground.
These are some absolutely essential components for getting a new town up and running, plan accordingly (aside from the obvious power and water):
[ul]
[li]Fire station[/li][li]Medical clinic[/li][li]Sewer outflow[/li][li]Garbage dump[/li][li]Police station[/li][li]Elementary school[/li][/ul]
One other thing I’ve learned that’s been an adjustment from older versions of Sim City: it’s important to save space around these important buildings. All of them are expandable, and will definitely need to be expanded at some point, and it’s tough to do that if you plop them down on top of each other. When you plop them, you can see a white outline for the expandable space around each building. I recommend keeping it clear. This is true for many ploppables in the game, including universities, power stations, town hall, the mayor’s mansion, etc.
ETA: don’t build things a small town doesn’t really need, such as large parks, extensive public transportation, etc. Save them for later, when your resource base is stable.
I just bought it but haven’t really had time to play it very much. My initial impression is that the small city size, fixed regions and fixed highway and rail transportation fucking blows. I mean unless you want to make Hoboken NJ (1x1 mile) or Vatican City over and over again.
I spent a very little time on it last night. I was annoyed that several of the servers were either full or busy. (Eventually I connected to one in Oceania.) Initially, at least, I just want to work on my own city, so I don’t need the multiplayer option. It shouldn’t matter that their servers are busy. I just wanted to get an open terrain and start building.
One annoyance is that they don’t allow you to switch servers on the fly. You have to quit and restart the game to change a server. And if you connect to a new server, you have to sit through that damn tutorial again. (Yes, I know you can quit the tutorial. You still have to watch it fire up, though.)
I do hope at some point in the (hopefully, relatively near) future the modding community will be in full swing and we’ll have things like larger city maps sizes and so forth.
But I have begun to appreciate the depth of the simulation, which actually truly is much deeper than previous Sim City incarnations. I could see how it might have some fairly serious computer resource demands at very high city densities. Nonetheless, if someone has the rig that can run it (and I think I do) why not allow the bigger cities?
For now, though, I’m having a great time tinkering with all the inner workings of the simulation. It’s quite polished, and really a lot of fun. (The online server issue is less polished … but every popular PC game’s launch is like this these days. I hate it, but what are ya gonna do?)
For all the bitching about having to be connected to a server I suspect that is where much of the processing for the simulation actually happens.
Plus when was the last time you used a computer that wasn’t connected to the internet all the time?
I believe the developers have promised larger city maps in the future. I forsee a greater variety of regions as well.
I agree about the depth of the simulation. Instead statistical approximations of city effects, you’ve got individual Sims going about their business. It’s fascinating to watch all the little Sims get up in the morning, go to school or work, go shopping, then come home at night to do it all again the next day.
Judging from developer comments, something like the SC2000 Urban Renewal Kit will be implemented eventually. They love seeing what the community can create.