Simtropolis 1000

[MINIggy03 227]

EDIT: I went ahead and posted my idea at the new forum under ideas with the label "1701 A.D."

Essentially the idea is to take the base work of how 1701 AD works, and create a suburban/city builder game out of it. 

[gabetx 1]

i am willing to help with this game

[Nerd_Guy 4]

I am not very vocal or skilled in the modding and BATting sections, but I am willing to do whatever I can to help. I would like to offer my people skills to this project. If anyone has a place where I can be used, PM me. Thank you

[TheSixCents 0]

Deaming Is Allowed...

[veeps 0]

I just wanted to add my two cents about the grid.  Couldn't you make it where it is actually 3 grids on top of each other?  For example, if you were looking at the city from directly overhead, there would be a north-south grid, a NW-SE grid, and a NE-SW grid.  This way, when you put in a road, rail, or zone, the game engine just follows one of the three grid patterns, allowing itself to change from one grid pattern to another as you go.  I don't know if I am explaining myself correctly, but hopefully someone here knows what I'm trying to say and can explain it better.

[brijones 0]

Having been a Sim City fan for a very long time, there are many things that keep me from playing the game. These certain things are enough to keep me away. I will list them in fine detail.

The reason Sim City doesn't work, or to put it better in perspective, the reason you cannot find yourself lost in it, is as following. Go and look at every city that you'd love to create in Sim City. A city evolves over time, it isn't just plopped in like a game. To make a realistic simulation, you'd need a game that evolves over time. So, you'd need to start the game in an old time and era. When you start the game, you'd only have the technologies available at the time. You know, perhaps horse and cart? The time and age the game is set in defines how you create it.

Now, as time moves on, we find new technologies, or urban planning idea's, and very quickly we realise that the small town we have created will need major changes in order to evolve. I live in Melbourne, Australia, and here, you can see how old urban planning ideas become a road block to the future. Such as, the inner city is practically full of the worst road designs ever, ones that have forced expansion to move out of the city. In Melbourne, the population expanded East so much, and urban planners had hit a gold mine. No longer were they constricted to tight high density area's. In the East we have major roads galour, 3 lane roads at 80km/h with service lanes. Or even better, we have a 4 lane road, with a light rail service down the middle, and then service lanes.

The East is a haven for car lovers, and Melbourne has become to heavily obsessed with the car, more then any other state.

But, the issue is, I cannot recreate Melbourne in Sim City, because I would start off knowing that the city has some serious issues, and I would attempt to solve them in the game, and I would end up with something that wasn't Melbourne. The thing you need to add to a game, is restrictions on what you can do. Feasibility studies. You need a game that turns the player into an urban planning expert.

Next on the agendar is roads. You need a game that makes roads freeform. A game that forces you to put curves into your roads that conform to certain road restrictions. In major cities, in order to make a road 80, or 100, it needs to conform to set safety restrictions. Such as: For a freeway, it's curve mustn't hit a set threshold, or else there is danger of an accident occuring. The same applies to smaller roads. But, it goes beyond this, we need cities that are completely freeform. We need zones that aren't square. Basically we make the zones complex, and able to follow the contours of the roads that divide them.

As for this filler idea, why not take it one step up? Why not make the buildings complex? Instead of filling the tiles, how about let the city design the building from the ground up? It could design the dimensions of the building using prefabed models. But, what is really required, is that the building going up is feasible. Perhaps you could make the game so that a building permit is required, such as the game places an email in your virtual inbox, that has details of the planned building. You get to say ya or nay to the proposals. And, we need to get rid of this bulldozing buildings every year for a new building. It doesn't work, and it adds to the unrealism of the city. Buildings need to stay until it becomes heavily feasible to pull them down and place a bigger one instead.

We have to get rid of the grids. Lets make the game so it's impossible to work out grid patterns, give the player some surveyer gear, let them do the work. We need more real cities. I want a game where I decide how to build it, not the AI restricting me to preconcieved methods. Introduce urban planning, and only allow ideas to be used that were available at the time you are actually playing the game. If you are playing 100 years ago, then, we should perhaps think about not allowing freeways.

[srsedate 118]

Heck yes! I too also have a great game idea. You should check it out:

https://www.simtropolis.com/forum/messageview.cfm?catid=25&threadid=90281&enterthread=y

It goes on with what you are explaining.

[Ntq€310 1]

wow, so many great ideas, just to say join http://urbsurbis.com/ , to have your say in things, we need more members to know what the community really wants!!

[jip2 0]

Nice! I like the idea! If you need modellers I have some experience of unsing Blender 3D and texturing with CS2.

[bknitram 0]

I didn't read the whole thing, so forgive me if its already mentioned. Lots of people are asking about mac compatability. There is a way to do it. The core of the game (everything not platform specific) has to abstracted and a plugin system needs to be built that allows for everything platform specific to be implemented.

[KCookies 0]

If there is a new game, I'd love to see it stray away from suburbia. People could still make suburbs, but the new game should instead focus on cities, urban areas, as well as rural areas. It'd be cool to see curved streets, but really, there are few urban areas with curved streets, most are in the suburbs, which are designed for cars, not people.

[JanYpe 17]

there are few urban areas with curved streets,quote>

...Have you heard of this thing called Europe?

[JohnEZ 0]

Originally posted by: JanYpe

there are few urban areas with curved streets,quote>

...Have you heard of this thing called Europe?quote>

ROFLMAO! Too true!

[patriots_1228 51]

have you ever heard of a thing called "everywhere besides western america?"

[crusaderpat 0]

(PS we need a sexy logo too)quote>

A sexy logo you want, a sexy logo you'll get.  I've got a photoshop, and i promise it'll be great.  Ill post it with a picture when its ready. 

[crusaderpat 0]

TRANSPORTATION ADJUSTMENT:

 

I think that an easy to use road system would be ideal in "Simtropolis 1000" .  I think the best way to achieve a new "flexible" road system, would be to use the same type of roadway design as in "Black and White 2".  If you've ever played it you'll know that you can build the roads as curvey and crooked as you want  AND the buildings connect right to them with no problem.  I think to solve the RoadWay issue, the designers should turn to the design of  "LionHead Studio's" "Black and White 2" 

(Please don't think I'm crazy)

[zzsim 3]

Well I really hate to sound negative, as the ideas for this project are great, but, while this has been brought up many times, I still have to wonder just how feasible this project is?  I mean, SC4 was in developement for 3-4 years with a whole team of professional programers/artists, and it still released with a severe lack of building variaty (corrected through Rush Hour, and custom content), transportation options, plenty of bugs, and a grid based system.  Basically, the game we play now, with all of its custom content is the sum of about 7 years worth of work (by the developers and the communtiy) with countless hours of that coming from the tons of custom content creators on these forums.  Honestly, with this projects lofty goals of a fully 3d game world, and breaking away from the grid, all while creating a stable game that actually runs, I've got to wonder; do we the communtiy have what it takes, and can we do better than even the professionals over at Maxis?

But hey, just because something is improbable dosen't mean that it is impossible.  Counterstrke started out as a mod for Half Life, and look how successful that turned out; it is currently one of the most popular PC online shooters.  So again, while I do believe that this project may be too large for the community to handle, it certainly is possible, given the right amount of dedication and experience (namely programming).  I think the most important step in getting the project organized has been taken with the launch of that website, and with the looks of it (I just registered), the planning stage seems to being going along well.  Good luck, I would love to see all of you guys prove the doubters (including myself) wrong!

PS I am currently trying to learn the BAT and modeling (I would like to become an architect so learning the BAT would be a good first step before taking on CAD), so if this project gets to the stage where you need people to create the game's building models, I hopefully will be able to help.

[Robstersfive 0]

as long as it supports linux open source city builder would be very cool. 

What would be funny is if spores does badly and simcity will probably die EA and Will Wright crying about it meanwhile you guys made open source city builder

its matter time before open source games i think same happened with MS back the day they had such a monopoly and being arrogant, I hate EA far more than MS now and so do many others because they are just distorying so many great titles to cater for the adverage user now has a computer and all the kids have computers to.

[Nesnej 0]

There are already a number of open source city simulator projects. I think the most promising right now is Opencity (www.opencity.info) but it is also at the moment at SC2000-level at best. I don't think neoneurone (the guy behind opencity) is quite ready to implement all those features mentioned already, but I'm rather sure he'd appreciate any kind of contribution.

[XAVERIOS 11]

We are two guys from San Juan, Puerto Rico that have a full devotion to SimCity Rush Hour. I introduced my friend to it, and currently we both play the game basically on everyday basis. I've also read and seen screenshot of the new version of SimCity CS that we both dislike at all, even without playing it. It doesn't have what we were expecting from the manufacturer, EA. We both would like to keep on playing with, with new features, something EA have forgotten even when they have seen how the game as become with all those plugins added. We basically, are end gamers that download thing other smarter guys have been uploaded, great things, over the past few years. We both are looking and longing for Simtropolis 1000, our game. Last thing, we want to join to our game and join to the effort on keeping it alive.

[Jazzmaster 716]

Wow, a game created by us fans from scratch. You could establish your own video-game company! Take that EA!

[Robstersfive 0]

fact that guy made open city which is clever but doesn't even come close to simcity classic I really can't see this happening and getting fed up with simtroplis think they know everything.

Simcity is one of my all time favourite games but it was getting stale it needs new direction, ok this might not sound good but it certainly interesting and is first simcity to be 3D to do 3D version of sc4 with all them features would be impossible, and to do another version like it just be a clone of sc4.

Simcity 4 a great game and love all custom content but its exactly why there no need to try make a simcity to top just of iyet! Because to do so would be pointless as it be same game, plus you lot will have to face the facts that simcity has only core fan base and been a player since early days simcity fan base seems to feel smaller and smaller these days, less and less fan sites to it and only real deadicated players are left.

I sure hope this new simcity does well we need new fans and a breath of fresh air and new fan sites devoted to simcity again not simtroplis and there monopoly fan site, as a simcity player i miss days of simcity 2000 and 3000 far more i feel simcity 4 was game started this series decline because it certainly wasn't user friendly to new players and thats a fact.

[Bandero 5]

Very interesting idea/concept going on, I will definitely follow this. About the Open Source... I just bought the August Issue of MaximumPC Magazine and on the Disc, they included Lincity NG, it's a city simulator that's been around for Linux and it's finally been released on the Windows Platform. Do not get too excited about it, it will not replace SC4, heck, not even SC2000, think of Simcity Classic with better graphics.

Well, why not start with that as a base? you know, to get the basics going and then build from that. Think about it, like an experiment, to see where and how far this can go.

For those people outside the US/Canada who might not get that magazine, you can download the game and source code here: http://lincity-ng.berlios.de/wiki/index.php/Main_Page

One last thing, for all the people who thinks that asking EA for the source code for SC4. I mean, you guys are trying to build something that in paper it could be better than SCS. Do you think that EA will give you the means to defeat them? it's like Pepsi asking Coca Cola for their secret recipe. This is not an attack or flame on anyone, it just common sense.

[Ondes 0]

Great, awesome ideas. This could be everything that SimCity lacked, and everything it seems SCS will not be. I am by no means a devlopper, but played SimCity for quite some time now and just found this great forum, and I am willing to offer help in other ways. Let's see what we have in terms of a developpment team, and perhaps get this thing rolling.

[Daryn07 0]

Hey everyone,

I'm over at UrbsUrbis now with a great additional application for the game they're begining to brainstorm about. This application would be a great asset to their game... its called a "Custom Network Designing tool" or "C.N.D.T." I am looking for great application builders. People who have an understanding of user interface and would work with the game's programmers to enable easy introgration with the game and it's contents. You'll have to create a free account... but the resources are unlimited. Here is the link

[Walton 0]

Firstly, these ideas all sound wonderful. I have yet to read something that I didn't agree with. Although I haven't read the whole thread, so please tell me if I say/ask about something that's already been addressed.

I just joined Simtropolis (and I mean just... As in, like... yesterday.) but I have been play SC my whole life, and I would love to help out in some way.

My skills in BAT'ing and any kind of programming are virtually non-existant, but I do draw buildings quite a bit, and I thought perhaps that my skills in concept designs for the new content might be useful.

Also, if we are to approach this project seriously, we are going to need at least a few people who will advertise for the game. I agree it would be best not to charge people, but we need a group of people who will contact people about the project. For instance, about getting the source code from EA (this might've already been discussed, I'm not sure), it would be nice to have some people who could communicate with the folks at EA on behalf of this project. Also they could help with the idea I read about earlier, about selling companies advertising for the game (like on billboards and on the sides of buildings and such in the game). This small team of people could help with that, too.

We would also need to spread the word about this. We are definitely going to need donations. I and others could go to various sites and contact them about putting up advertisements and such for the game, and ask for donations as well.

Whatever whoever is in charge here decides, my skills are at your disposal. I do have some experience in advertising, albeit in a totally different field. And I also would gladly submit my building designs for the BAT team.

Please someone let me know if any of this sounds useful. Also please contact me if you would like to take a look at my drawings. I want to help very badly, but sadly I don't have any of the programming/technical skills that you really need to get this project off the ground. I do however believe I can help in some way. Just point me in the right direction. I'm only a PM away!

[Walton 0]

Originally posted by: crusaderpat TRANSPORTATION ADJUSTMENT:

 

I think that an easy to use road system would be ideal in "Simtropolis 1000" .  I think the best way to achieve a new "flexible" road system, would be to use the same type of roadway design as in "Black and White 2".  If you've ever played it you'll know that you can build the roads as curvey and crooked as you want  AND the buildings connect right to them with no problem.  I think to solve the RoadWay issue, the designers should turn to the design of  "LionHead Studio's" "Black and White 2" 

(Please don't think I'm crazy)quote>

You are absolutely not crazy. I know exactly what you mean, the way the buildings sort of rotate themselves and stick on to any kind of road, straight, curved, or whatever. wonderful idea never thought of that. that is most definitely what we need to try to do.

[Robstersfive 0]

you lot are crazy if you think EA give you the source code for a game! they never do it because just look bad for staters plus they want next simcity to do well not you lot to boycot it!

anyway new one comes with full modding tools!! you could make own simcity with that as you can even change the game rules! that amazing and I really hope we see some great mods for SCS.

a true fan of the series wouldn't leave the new simcity going to be good and sounds like open to more change than ever before

[PerrierBaroudeur 0]

I don't view this project as flying in the face of SCS. It seems to me that SCS and this project are moving in far different directions; they'll be very different in terms of how they're played. SCS (unfortunately) is beginning to cater to a different group of people, while this game is going to appeal to old Sim City fans. I am a hardcore SimCity fan and I was planning on avoiding SCS even before I knew about this project. I doubt it will detract much from SCS' sales...

I am a true fan of the series and I would never leave Sim City sequel unbought; it's SCS that's moving away from this community, alienating the game's strongest fans, which is why I don't really even think of it as a member of the SimCity series.

I'd love to help on this project, but I'm no tech whizz and I don't know if I could do anything of use... is there anywhere I can donate money? That's pretty much all I'm good for.

[JCarter 0]

Where is the link to the new forum? I think I lost it...thanks