# Sim City? No thanks, give me Cities: Skyline! New City building Sim from Paradox!
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sim-city-no-thanks-give-me-cities-skyline-new-city-building-sim-from-paradox/714129
**Category:** The Game Room
**Created:** [March 3, 2015, 8:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sim-city-no-thanks-give-me-cities-skyline-new-city-building-sim-from-paradox/714129 "2015-03-03T20:14:11Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 9
### Author:  [@GargoyleWB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GargoyleWB)
#### Post date: [March 16, 2015, 9:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sim-city-no-thanks-give-me-cities-skyline-new-city-building-sim-from-paradox/714129/161 "2015-03-16T21:20:10Z")
Had several hours of fun with this over the weekend. One must-have custom mod to look for is the “auto-bulldoze” which cleans up abandoned / burned lots without intervention.
I’m having serious traffic problems, but I kind of deserve to be. I look forward to having a major upgrade of roads with some actual thought given to it. There are also tons of custom cloverleaf interchanges on Steam that will make things interesting.
I experienced the bus stop congestion someone noted upthread. Adding more overlapping bus routes seemed to fix this, I don’t know if the game factors passengers taking transfers to other bus routes though.
Budget adjustments from taxes are near-instantaneous. I’ve gotten myself out of a few jams with some quick tax hikes. I’ve noticed if a power or water hiccup happens, residents flee immediately and revenues plummet into a death spiral before I can often react.
The game twitter makes note of “sound barriers” to mitigate noise problems, don’t know where or how in the game to do this though…
I feel guilty about just pumping all of my waste into the river…but it’s so easy…_crying old native guy_
My pet project in the near future…I have an old 1920s gas station roadmap of Seattle at home, I want to try and model old pre-interstate Seattle and see if I can solve the hideous interstate implementation 🙂
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### Author:  [@fachverwirrt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fachverwirrt)
#### Post date: [March 16, 2015, 10:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sim-city-no-thanks-give-me-cities-skyline-new-city-building-sim-from-paradox/714129/162 "2015-03-16T22:35:34Z")
> [@GargoyleWB](#):
>
> The game twitter makes note of “sound barriers” to mitigate noise problems, don’t know where or how in the game to do this though…
Trees, tree lined streets, and office zones all act as noise buffers. If you zone office between your commercial and residential districts, you’ll have less noise pollution. I don’t, generally, because I hate my citizens.
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### Author:  [@Kinthalis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kinthalis)
#### Post date: [March 16, 2015, 11:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sim-city-no-thanks-give-me-cities-skyline-new-city-building-sim-from-paradox/714129/163 "2015-03-16T23:17:46Z")
> [@fachverwirrt](#):
>
> Trees, tree lined streets, and office zones all act as noise buffers. If you zone office between your commercial and residential districts, you’ll have less noise pollution. I don’t, generally, because I hate my citizens.
There is also a variant of the highway that has sound barriers along the sides. You need to unlock it though.
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### Author:  [@fachverwirrt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fachverwirrt)
#### Post date: [March 17, 2015, 12:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sim-city-no-thanks-give-me-cities-skyline-new-city-building-sim-from-paradox/714129/164 "2015-03-17T00:06:34Z")
Yeah, but they cost more to build and maintain, and those ungrateful assholes don’t deserve it.
I may be over-personalizing some of my citizens’ complaints…
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### Author:  [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)
#### Post date: [March 17, 2015, 12:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sim-city-no-thanks-give-me-cities-skyline-new-city-building-sim-from-paradox/714129/165 "2015-03-17T00:56:01Z")
Can someone explain the difference between Commercial and Office?
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### Author:  [@fachverwirrt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fachverwirrt)
#### Post date: [March 17, 2015, 1:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sim-city-no-thanks-give-me-cities-skyline-new-city-building-sim-from-paradox/714129/166 "2015-03-17T01:00:05Z")
Commercial provides jobs, requires employees, goods, and customers. Basically retail. Makes noise pollution.
Office provides jobs, and requires employees, but no goods or customers (at least I don’t think they need customers). Because they don’t require goods, they don’t generate as much traffic. No noise pollution. Office fulfills industrial demand, not commercial demand.
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### Author:  [@Jophiel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jophiel)
#### Post date: [March 17, 2015, 1:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sim-city-no-thanks-give-me-cities-skyline-new-city-building-sim-from-paradox/714129/167 "2015-03-17T01:07:29Z")
> [@fachverwirrt](#):
>
> Office fulfills industrial demand, not commercial demand.
That’s the short answer. Office is “advanced” industrial – law firms, publishers, software companies, etc. It should be colored orange since it takes from the same demand pool as industrial but the developers foolishly made it a shade of blue which makes you think it’s a form of commercial.
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### Author:  [@BrianJ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrianJ)
#### Post date: [March 17, 2015, 12:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sim-city-no-thanks-give-me-cities-skyline-new-city-building-sim-from-paradox/714129/168 "2015-03-17T12:27:20Z")
I just started playing this game a couple days ago. I spent an hour just trying to get a highway connection looking right. heh.
Does anyone else notice the game is a bit blurry in spots, if you zoom right in? I meet the required specs I think. Graphics card is Nvidia 660, but only 1.5 g graphics memory. All details in the graphics settings are on high.
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### Author:  [@SenorBeef](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SenorBeef)
#### Post date: [March 17, 2015, 1:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sim-city-no-thanks-give-me-cities-skyline-new-city-building-sim-from-paradox/714129/169 "2015-03-17T13:06:41Z")
There’s a tilt-shift camera effect by default to make it look like you’re looking at miniatures. Turn the tilt shift amount to 0 in the options if you don’t like it.
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### Author:  [@Jophiel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jophiel)
#### Post date: [March 17, 2015, 1:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sim-city-no-thanks-give-me-cities-skyline-new-city-building-sim-from-paradox/714129/170 "2015-03-17T13:50:43Z")
There’s also mods to clear away the “soft focus” effect if you want.
I find it a little annoying that you can’t district things agricultural until your population reaches a certain point. As though, in the course of human history, we’ve been unable to farm or cut down trees until you had enough ice cube factories and freight yards.
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### Author:  [@SenorBeef](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SenorBeef)
#### Post date: [March 17, 2015, 1:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sim-city-no-thanks-give-me-cities-skyline-new-city-building-sim-from-paradox/714129/171 "2015-03-17T13:59:44Z")
There are mods to unlock all milestone capabilities from the beginning.
Speaking of which, I just hit 75000, a metropolis, which unlocks the final tier of milestones I think.
I ended up deciding to record a [tour of my city](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IpfECeIePeg). I was aiming for like 8 minutes but somehow ended up with 22 talking about districts and traffic and various things, so just skip around a bit if you want to see my city.
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### Author:  [@BrianJ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrianJ)
#### Post date: [March 17, 2015, 5:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sim-city-no-thanks-give-me-cities-skyline-new-city-building-sim-from-paradox/714129/172 "2015-03-17T17:11:53Z")
> [@Jophiel](#):
>
> There’s also mods to clear away the “soft focus” effect if you want.
>
> I find it a little annoying that you can’t district things agricultural until your population reaches a certain point. As though, in the course of human history, we’ve been unable to farm or cut down trees until you had enough ice cube factories and freight yards.
I didn’t know that was intentional, thanks!
> [@SenorBeef](#):
>
> There are mods to unlock all milestone capabilities from the beginning.
>
> Speaking of which, I just hit 75000, a metropolis, which unlocks the final tier of milestones I think.
>
> I ended up deciding to record a [tour of my city](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IpfECeIePeg). I was aiming for like 8 minutes but somehow ended up with 22 talking about districts and traffic and various things, so just skip around a bit if you want to see my city.
I watched your video, looks good!
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### Author:  [@Jophiel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jophiel)
#### Post date: [March 17, 2015, 6:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sim-city-no-thanks-give-me-cities-skyline-new-city-building-sim-from-paradox/714129/173 "2015-03-17T18:57:45Z")
> [@SenorBeef](#):
>
> There are mods to unlock all milestone capabilities from the beginning.
Yeah, but that disables achievements unless you use another mod to disable disabling achievements and really I’d just like the game to make sense 😛
I’m not opposed to mods, mind you. I just usually play it ‘clean’ for a while before tinkering. Plus, I don’t mind milestones in general terms – gives you something to work towards. I just don’t think that agriculture should have been locked.
> [@BrianJ](#):
>
> I didn’t know that was intentional, thanks!
Yeah, I assume that the intent is to avoid a “model railroad” sort of look when you zoom too far in. The models may not hold up well to tight scrutiny (nor should they, if it means slowing down the game so all the tiny cars can have more details).
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### Author:  [@fachverwirrt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fachverwirrt)
#### Post date: [March 17, 2015, 11:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sim-city-no-thanks-give-me-cities-skyline-new-city-building-sim-from-paradox/714129/174 "2015-03-17T23:45:54Z")
> [@SenorBeef](#):
>
> There are mods to unlock all milestone capabilities from the beginning.
>
> Speaking of which, I just hit 75000, a metropolis, which unlocks the final tier of milestones I think.
>
> I ended up deciding to record a [tour of my city](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IpfECeIePeg). I was aiming for like 8 minutes but somehow ended up with 22 talking about districts and traffic and various things, so just skip around a bit if you want to see my city.
The final tier is “Megalopolis”. My city got there at 65,000. I think each map has different milestone requirements, based on the amount of buildable space.
I’m pretty pleased with my city, despite my ineptness at roads. I’ve managed to keep traffic flowing with a minimum of highway mucking. Only one big traffic jam going into my (constantly troubled) industrial park. My highway ramps are hideous, but they work.
I have no idea how to make a video of my city, or even a screenshot.
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### Author:  [@Jophiel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jophiel)
#### Post date: [March 18, 2015, 12:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sim-city-no-thanks-give-me-cities-skyline-new-city-building-sim-from-paradox/714129/175 "2015-03-18T00:01:14Z")
F12 is the default screenshot button when playing a game through Steam.
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### Author:  [@SenorBeef](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SenorBeef)
#### Post date: [March 18, 2015, 12:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sim-city-no-thanks-give-me-cities-skyline-new-city-building-sim-from-paradox/714129/176 "2015-03-18T00:02:06Z")
You’ll want a seperate way for traffic to get from the main freeway (the one that brings in the outside traffic) to your industrial zone than for the rest of all the traffic. A one way road split off from the incoming freeway directly to the industrial zone, for example. And then a separate on ramp back onto the main highway without having to go through town again.
I forget what tier you get cargo trains, but it’s fairly well into the game - but if you have an outside rail connection it really helps to offset some of that traffic.
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### Author:  [@F.Pu-du-he-pa-as](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/F.Pu-du-he-pa-as)
#### Post date: [March 18, 2015, 1:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sim-city-no-thanks-give-me-cities-skyline-new-city-building-sim-from-paradox/714129/177 "2015-03-18T01:14:30Z")
My crematorium burned down.
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### Author:  [@fachverwirrt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fachverwirrt)
#### Post date: [March 18, 2015, 3:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sim-city-no-thanks-give-me-cities-skyline-new-city-building-sim-from-paradox/714129/178 "2015-03-18T03:20:07Z")
All my industrial zones have dedicated freeway exchanges. It’s just that the one with the cargo station generates _a lot_ of truck traffic. I probably need to rework the traffic flow through the zone itself.
> [@Jophiel](#):
>
> F12 is the default screenshot button when playing a game through Steam.
Steam overlay is currently broken on OS X, so I’ll have to wait for a patch.
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### Author:  [@SenorBeef](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SenorBeef)
#### Post date: [March 18, 2015, 3:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sim-city-no-thanks-give-me-cities-skyline-new-city-building-sim-from-paradox/714129/179 "2015-03-18T03:31:59Z")
There’s a bug where placing a lot of parks will satisfy commercial demand, so if you build a lot of parks you could potentially have no commercial demand for a long time, as the game is interpreting your city to already have sufficient commercial space.
[There’s a fix](http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=409068574&searchtext=) and they’re going to patch to fix it soon. But you can use that mod to reduce the commercial-satisfying effect of parks in the meantime.
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### Author:  [@F.Pu-du-he-pa-as](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/F.Pu-du-he-pa-as)
#### Post date: [March 18, 2015, 5:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sim-city-no-thanks-give-me-cities-skyline-new-city-building-sim-from-paradox/714129/180 "2015-03-18T17:21:46Z")
> [@fachverwirrt](#):
>
> I haven’t had any problems with _building_ industry. Just with getting workers. Even leveling up with services isn’t helping; the buildings won’t level up as long as there are “problems”. So they complain about workers, get abandoned, I bulldoze, another one pops into place and complains about workers. Rinse, reuse, recycle.
I have this problem, too. Does anyone have a solution?
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