Cities Unlimited

[Tropod 144]

hey Philippe,

Thank you for your involvement with the community thus far. It's nice to have a game developer out there who is trying to listen to its (potential) customers.

I would just like to elaborate & give some feedback on the whole zoning & regional play thing, an apparent contentious issue for many;

1st Zoning: Personally, having to plop every single building there is to create a city is distasteful & very offputting for me in a city simulator. I like to just zone the land, or lay the ground work for where certain types of buildings can build, & let the city take a life of its own through building whatever it decides to build. This is what has made all the SC to date so popular; they do not require or force the player into creating a (pre-)defined (mental) vision of a city based on having to plop every building; which I imagine for some players like myself, have a hard time with.

Or if I could put it another way; a zoning mechanism allows a player to be creative without having to be creative. I would & do struggle with the thought of having to make a creative city if I had to plop every building.

2nd, Regional Play; with SC4 this brought a whole new ellement of play; being able to build sprawling cities beyond the limitations of what might normally be accomplished with software/programming (of the day). Something a lot of players, like myself, have a deep fascination with; connectedness. For example; What's the point of having a highway system if it's self-contained within & doesn't have a life beyond its own city? It's pointless. And the same can be said about a whole city itself. SC3K had neighbour interactions, but it was quite meaningless as they were completely game controlled; which is why the region aspect in SC4 is so great, because we're able to continue creating/controlling a city beyond its own conventional borders & there's really no limit to how far & wide one can build (the only limitation being a persons computer resources). Which for a city simulator, a game that has no definitive end, is important. What's the point of a game with no definitive end, to have a limitation of only being able to create in/on 1 set tile city of a pre-determined & unchangable size; it defeats the whole point of having a game with no end.

I would not for a minute expect SCU to undertake the same aspects of SC. I just wanted to give you guys some feedback on perhaps 2 aspects that a lot of players find of great significance in city simulator.

Cheers!

[Superchan 23]

ill have to wait and see if the gameplay turns out to be good, i tried city life but didnt like the cultures idea, it complicated gameplay, if this game is more like sc4 with zoning, and no cultures, then i might buy it.

[shpangler 19]

despite how many posts I have written, I have been a member of Simtropolis for over 2 years now (which is still new to some of you 'oldies'!) Anyways, like everyone else here, I think we are all extremely impressed at how the development team for Cities Unlimited is involving themeselves toward this community. Even though it's a smart move on their behalf, it's also a great way for us to potentially shape the next great city simulation game.

As for input? I don't have much, except that I love transportation networks, and I say: "The more transportation options, the better!" After all, a city is barely a city without a network of roads, trains, highways...all of that good stuff. Other things like zoning and the ability to terraform I think are other important parts of any city game. From some of the screenshots, I can tell that weather will be an issue in City Unlimited. I think this is a great idea as it is very realistic (Some cities are defined by their weather patterns.) Custom content is another HUGE thing: Custom buildings, landmarks, and maps are a huge reason why Sim City 4 is still popular and fun (even after all these years) I won't expect Cities Unlimited to support custom content at such an early stage, however it would be a really nice feature somewhere down the line. Just from the pictures of the game, I really like the direction it is going in, even if there is much more work to be done.

Anyways, I just wanted to put my two cents in. I wasn't going to post, but after seeing the developement team actually looking at our 'rambles' I thought I might as well lend my opinion. On a final note, thanks again to the staff at Cities Unlimited, and lets hope that the final product will keep us interested in the city simulation genre!

[MayorTim 16]

Edited, seems I was wrong. Sorry Tropod! XD

[+Guest]

MayorTim how do you know that? Know the information in regards to the zoning? That information hasn't been released by Phil yet has it?

[thatmonkeysim 8]

If you put both bixel and tropod's post together you have something special!

Now when you have the zones we want to micro manage that too... instead of 10 different zones why not... say 50? lol or have it to where you can customize the zone that you put down...

what i mean is where you can control how many people live in that zone or what kinds of buildings can be built there or how tall the buildings are etc... It really would give some customization for each section of town.

Then that can work in with the developers and they can propose to change the zoning to build a condo building instead of a single family home... then you can have the city's populous have an opinion on it. Like when the proposal comes up you can have a little blurb at the bottom saying how the city feels about the proposal and how it will effect your city's population, economy, etc...

Now with all of the things we are suggesting we might be leaving the casual gamers behind with the complexity...

One thing that you can do is create levels of skill... kind of like in SC4 but different, of course

You could set it to a Low, Medium, and High Difficulty... Not only for how fast the city grows and how much money you start off with but also for the micromanaging ... that would help out the difficulty for the game... so if they just want to build a city without having to scrutinize over the tenth of percentage on taxes or how one proposal is better for the city than the other than they can choose a Lower Difficulty... while if you want all those things choose a High Difficulty...

Also another thing that is on my mind is about the transportation... one thing that was really restricting in any simulator ive played was the inability to make multilevel interchanges with highways... or anything for that matter... that is something i would like to see.... and i havent played CL to know but.. when ever you make an intersection on the side of a hill it shouldnt level out about half of the surrounding areas... that was extremely annoying...

There has been alot of stuff that I think that should be considered in making the game... but its too late for me to remember them lol...

Oh yea... if you havent noticed... most people on here want realistic Transportation Systems... so i hope you guys have a large team dedicated to it

Thanks for listening

Tyler

[+Guest]

Phil, would this game be sold in Australia and other places outside of the US/Canada region?

I love the idea of various difficulties. I want this game to be rich and complex but at the same time it can't alienate the newbies. So why not have a system where those new to the game can still build wonderful cities? As the game goes along, tutorials, and various other implements can build up the newcomers abilities, turning them into great city planners. People with more experience can still get so much from the game as they can play in a more difficult mode. And I don't mean that the the higher level players will have less money to work with (like previous SC games) I'm talking about transportation and networking, city structure, zoning and reginal play being quite realistically diffcult. These concepts can be as hard as SC4 for the oldies, but the newbies will need more help. So by having the game teach them as they go along, they can build up their skills and have a blast with their cities. I guess making the simulator look as realistic as possible helps people marvel at their own work and enjoy the game more.

[scotty222 549]

mpol-should be, city life was

[Sap59 3]

Heres a few ideas some which i'm sure have been mentioned already.

* Zoning and transportation layout options is a must.

* The culture thing is fine in SC:S and CL but it shouldn't be a major factor in this type of game, imho.

* Some ploppable buildings is fine but i prefer the AI to do the majority.

* A terrain editer would be great.

* Some sort of easements on roads so when you upgrade from say a 2 lane to a 4 lane you don't have to wipe out a whole row of buildings like what was done in SC4.

* Regional play and some sort of limited multiplay, small groups perhaps.

* Disasters would be ok but maybe as an option.

* A SandBox mode would be a nice feature too.

[MedoPu 0]

Originally posted by: Sap59

Heres a few ideas some which i'm sure have been mentioned already.

* Zoning and transportation layout options is a must.

* The culture thing is fine in SC:S and CL but it shouldn't be a major factor in this type of game, imho.

* Some ploppable buildings is fine but i prefer the AI to do the majority.

* A terrain editer would be great.

* Some sort of easements on roads so when you upgrade from say a 2 lane to a 4 lane you don't have to wipe out a whole row of buildings like what was done in SC4.

* Regional play and some sort of limited multiplay, small groups perhaps.

* Disasters would be ok but maybe as an option.

* A SandBox mode would be a nice feature too.quote>

Thats exactly what I want too!

Moderator Edit: MedoPu, sorry I barged in on your post... I clicked 'edit' instead of quote and didn't realize it until I overwrote your post I know the above isn't exactly what you said, but I think its pretty close. Feel free to re-edit this, and sorry again

--Cheese89

[Sandis_van_Great 346]

this game gona be soooooo coooolll

[Kevin 101]

Originally posted by: Sap59

* Some sort of easements on roads so when you upgrade from say a 2 lane to a 4 lane you don't have to wipe out a whole row of buildings like what was done in SC4.quote>

In real life terms, it is realistic for buildings to have to be moved or demolished in order to make way for road expansion. One of my biggest problems with City Life was that all of the roads, whether they were 2, 4, or 6 lanes, have the same width. Two-lane roads have massive sidewalks to compensate for this... and it just looks ugly.

While its nice not having to demolish your buildings when you upgrade your road, I'd rather have to knock a few structures down if it means a more realistic game.

[cowcorn 11]

One thing with zoning that I think hasn't been mentionned yet here is mutli-use zones. What I mean is zones that would develop small shops at street level and appartments in the upper floor on medium density, this could also be done with high density with towers that have a mall in the first floors. That's something you see every where in real cities and has been asked many times for SC4. I've said this pretty much in SC4 terms but I think the general concept would be a very welcomed addition to Cities Unlimited.

[dasilva 3]

Hi guys,

Wow! I'm working so hard to get you all with the official website as soon as possible that by just not connecting for a day and lot of questions are raised here

I hope I won't miss any... At your mark, go!

As a general answer regarding transports, when we tell you we are really looking to provide you with an upgrade from what you've seen so far, believe me: it's huge!

I really cannot tell you much right now, but what I've heard and seen so far is... how could I say that?... so configurable?... We'll have a dedicated article and discussion together about it in the official website.

Zoning is also a point that comes again and again... I cannot answer this point right now but be sure we already have discussed it internally and you should get some answers from us as soon as we have something to show you about it. The sames goes for Cultures...

The landscape on which you build your cities is just your primary resource and we do understand that you need variety. We are putting a lot of efforts on the graphics side but also on the game play...

it's great to see you back Tropod, but I believe you are mistaken. Cities Unlimited does have zoning, and in fact the zones can be at any angle. It also has regions, and in fact they are currently toying with the idea of allowing you to build on an entire world (more of that is in the interview).quote>

I'm sorry MayorTim but I never said officially there will be zoning in CU neither regions. I wonder where you got that?

To thatmonkeysim: Your point of view on difficulty is quite interesting, I would love to see some more discussions about it. I think I may add a thread on the official forum just for that

To mpol: We would like the game to be distributed all over the world but I cannot give you now where you'll find it neither when... I'll keep a note on my desk to promote Australia distribution

To Cheese89: We are looking at an answer to your point on the lanes and it seems that you should find it interesting...

To cowcorn: I agree, I've always wanted to get this in my cities too. Good point, I'll drop a word about it to the game design team

And to all, a real thanks for the clever comments, suggestions and ideas you are posting down here. It's great for us to find such enthusiasm and see how our game design expectations fit with yours.

I now have to leave you for the sake of having the official website ready asap.

CU soon

[+Guest]

Hee thanks for addressing me mate. If this game is as good as it looks, I can assure you there will be quite a few Ozzies scrambling to play it.

I can not wait to see this official sight. I'm guessing that will be our main source of communication once it is done?

I do hope there are zones. Trying to make a big city and having to plop ALL those buildings would take up SO much time.

[meowza 230]

I like the idea of a semi-multiplayer online game. I'm not exactly sure how it will work, but it sounds good.

If CU shall include cultures or societies (as SCS), hopefully it'd be aesthetically synchronized with the micromanagement aspect of the game... If not, I suggest that MC scraps the culture section entirely.

[dasilva 3]

Hi meowza,

Could you elaborate more about your idea on "synchronizing" Cultures with the micromanagement aspect of the game?

[rctshack 182]

Originally posted by: Cheese89

Originally posted by: Sap59

* Some sort of easements on roads so when you upgrade from say a 2 lane to a 4 lane you don't have to wipe out a whole row of buildings like what was done in SC4.quote>

In real life terms, it is realistic for buildings to have to be moved or demolished in order to make way for road expansion. One of my biggest problems with City Life was that all of the roads, whether they were 2, 4, or 6 lanes, have the same width. Two-lane roads have massive sidewalks to compensate for this... and it just looks ugly.

While its nice not having to demolish your buildings when you upgrade your road, I'd rather have to knock a few structures down if it means a more realistic game.quote>

I think I have a solution!!! Growing up in Texas, we have a lot of interesting things because we have so much land that they can experiment a lot. First off, The City Life roads made me mad because 2 lands was the same width as 4 lanes... not cool. My idea is that all roads are as thick as the actual road+sidewalk really are... unless specified by the user. For instance if I am building a neighborhood... i kow the road will never need to be more than 2 lanes... so it is set to that width... whereas If i am building main street in a small town, but I know in 100 years that this city will hopefully be a lot larger, you could set that road to have the width of what a 6 lane road would be, but only have 2 lanes, and it would only cost as much as a 2 lane road until 100 years down the road when you upgrade the road.

In my hometown, about 40 years ago they build this state highway, but they knew in the future it would be expanded into a massive freeway as dallas expanded towards our town, so they left a lot of grassland free on either side and the buisinesses all had to be about 100 feed from the edge of the road, and 5 years ago they epanded it into a freeway without destroying any of the structures in our town. The same with one of our roads, lawns went up to the edge of the road, but the city owned the first 10 feet on each side, so when they expanded the road, they only had to move the mailboxes.

The whole point I am bringing up is that cities get to decide when first building a road if they think it will ever be expanded and can plan that way leaving easement rights (easement right??? right?) on either side for future expansion. If they feel confident that the road will stay the same, they can sell the land and have the buisinesses and houses join the roadfront and if they ever need to expand that road in the future... then those buisinesses need to be demolished or moved. That's the way it reall works.

Obviously there would be reasons for each side... like in downtown you don't want all this extra space everywhere because you are loosing out on needed commercial tax money for that land, which downtown the tax money on skyscrapers is a lot. Anyways, I like the idea of having to plan ahead and dealing with my own mistakes later on. Also having the ability to micromanage the roads and their width is nice.

[rctshack 182]

Originally posted by: dasilva Hi meowza,

Could you elaborate more about your idea on "synchronizing" Cultures with the micromanagement aspect of the game?quote>

This is what I got out of his comment.

In sim city societies the basis of the game is based around making the societies work. Everything you build influences these but you build BECAUSE of these... whereas a city builder to me should do the opposite. Culture should be there already, and be dependant on past history and current population... not on transportation and buildings. If me adding buildings to a city changes the culture completely... then it's not real. What city in the world added a few buildings and they turned from communist to greenpeace? Having culture is nice and I think it's a great addition to a city, but I believe it shouldn't be a major focus and most of the energy of the game should be focused on building realistic and functioning cities. And yes cities have culture, which could influence certain aspecs, but cultures are there from the getgo and are just the background history of the population. This is confusing me now.

Ok... no clown factories... there we go.

[Sap59 3]

Originally posted by: Cheese89

Originally posted by: Sap59

* Some sort of easements on roads so when you upgrade from say a 2 lane to a 4 lane you don't have to wipe out a whole row of buildings like what was done in SC4.quote>

In real life terms, it is realistic for buildings to have to be moved or demolished in order to make way for road expansion. One of my biggest problems with City Life was that all of the roads, whether they were 2, 4, or 6 lanes, have the same width. Two-lane roads have massive sidewalks to compensate for this... and it just looks ugly.

While its nice not having to demolish your buildings when you upgrade your road, I'd rather have to knock a few structures down if it means a more realistic game.quote>

 

I should clearify i am mostly talking about commercial lots not residential.

It is true that in general, older structures in older towns (pre-zoning days) most likely will have to be razed in order to make room for wider roadways which is fine if my starting date was an earlier period and also even in modern days some structures will also have to be razed as the population grows.

But I would prefer a "land use planning" strategy of my towns/cities to avoid excessive razing, my idea of the game is not so much how big i can make the city and population but more of an urban planning design layout and also trying out new ideas.

This game if done right can not only just be a game but an actual learning tool that even schools can use to teach land planning.

[dasilva 3]

rctshack, you shouldn't misunderstand what we considered cultures in City Life, they are a mix of social classes and common behavior. It is used the same way the Simcity $, $$ and $$$ but with 6 levels instead of 3 and some common behaviors.

They didn't represent some sort of ideology or historical society such as Greenpeace or Communists...

I don't know if I'm clear, let me know if you see what I mean or not...

[rctshack 182]

Originally posted by: dasilva rctshack, you shouldn't misunderstand what we considered cultures in City Life, they are a mix of social classes and common behavior. It is used the same way the Simcity $, $$ and $$$ but with 6 levels instead of 3 and some common behaviors.

They didn't represent some sort of ideology or historical society such as Greenpeace or Communists...

I don't know if I'm clear, let me know if you see what I mean or not...quote>

Yah, I had no idea how it worked in city life, i was pulling all this from societies. I guess culture could include income... but I hace never thought to put those together, I always think of cullture as history mixed with behavior. When it comes to money... I always think of class.

[Nevets13 27]

I wouldn't mind a small social aspect in the game. I liked following the lives of certain people, like in SIm City 4. It isn't something I would absolutely need in the game tho Maybe an expansion.

[Androv 6]

I liked the cultures idea :-) It made it easy to give a part of a city a certain feel although it got annoying when my rich folks kept torching the neighbouring slums... It definitely gave each part of the city a certain 'vibe', although with the limited buildings it did get a little repetitive.

[gabry85 2]

Hi, Philippe!

I enjoyed the idea of social classes in City Life, but there were some problems.

I'll take an example. Since I like to build huge suburbs, Blue Collars were all things considered OK (there were no classical middle class one-family houses though). I was interested to build a small Fringe neighborhood nearby (some sort of Venice or Greenwich Village) but it literally eaten the Blue Collars and burn it to the ground!

In SimCity I never seen conflicts with classes. I can choose what kind of neighborhood I will build with wealth taxation. If CU will have classes, I would like to make them live in harmony at their boundaries.

These are just my 2 cents. I can't wait to express my ideas in the coming website and I thank you for the feedback you give us!

[yoshikoroyimara 5]

Culture does bring life to cities, I have to agree, but sometimes overwhelming amounts, such as gabry's example, can be pestering to the point where I cannot stand. The closest major city where I live, San Francisco, has a multitude of culture, from ethnicity (like Chinatown, Little Italy, Russian Hill) to movements (homosexuality, hippie, hyphy...don't know what the last one is...crazy generation we have here). However, SF doesn't have clown factories or sorts. That is why I tried CL but didn't buy it. It seems too unrealistic. I think you should look at major cities, mostly in the US (the melting pot of the world), and consider the different cultures that reside there. I bet you can find a lot from New York City, to Los Angeles, and even Salt Lake City!

[rctshack 182]

True... i think that cities can include culture, but the culture shouldn't change the fundamentals of how cities work. The basics are still the same for Savannah Georgia as they are for Alexandria Egypt... cities function the same.

[+Guest]

Thankyou. I totally agree there rctshack. If these societies are going to be apart of this game, make it something that doesn't disable any of the game play we love.

I love somone's idea up thread of having very influential people coming into our cities and have profound effects upon it. THAT is something I do like. It's not going to change the way we play the game too much and adds this other awesome dimension that allows each city to be it's entity.

[meowza 230]

Originally posted by: dasilva Hi meowza,

Could you elaborate more about your idea on "synchronizing" Cultures with the micromanagement aspect of the game?quote>

 

If MC were to include a culture or a societal aspect in CU that does not perfectly fit the micromanagement game play, this might ruin the game in some way or another.  Actually I'm not sure on how MC will pull the synchronization of the two aspects together, since I have yet to see a perfect city simulator that could simulate a true "living" city; and not a robotic, fully user-controlled sandbox.

Think of it as having a single sophisticated independent AI for every in-game citizen; which is affected by his social, emotional, cultural, psychological, behavioral, economic environment, and all the other factors that influence the growth of a real human being.  So for example, if you have 1 million citizens in your city, you have 1 million individual AIs interacting with each other and their urban environment from scratch.  --All these without sacrificing a great city micromanagement game play...

This notion seems almost impossible, but it is my dream of an ideal city simulator.  (Kinda like the Matrix eh? )  But I honestly doubt if the current CU is ready for this endeavor.  Maybe we may see such simulator in the next franchises of MC's city management games.  But who knows, maybe the time has come...

I hope that cleared up some ideas I wish to convey.  If it didn’t, then I don't know any other way on how to elaborate it.  Some help would be nice.

[Mulefisk 15]

I just thought of another point. One of the things that bothers me about Sim City 4 is the fact that buildings can't change classes upwards. What I mean is that, while a r$$$ building can dilapitate and be taken over by r$ citizens, it is impossible to gentrificate a neighborhood of r$ buildings (Unless they originally were r$$ or r$$$). Another problem is that they can't change their function. In the real world, there are a lot of examples of old industrial buildings getting a rennaisance by allowing commerce to move in. This is also impossible in sc4, unless you make your own lots. These two problems go together, because they make it impossible to revitalize and change the use of old neighborhoods without replacing old structures with new ones. My point is basically that i'm hoping the system you have devised for the classes and uses of buildings will be flexible. This will also add a whole new world to the city-planning and simulation. For example, you could take an old industrial area and turn it into a hip student-town. You could change a working-class area into an artsy r$$$ place full of wine bars and art galleries. Without demolishing a single building. I realize that implementing something like this (unless you've already thought of it) would result in a whole lot of work on your part. Each lot would have to get a different version for every class and function. However, I still think that it would make the final game a lot more realistic, especially if classes and societies are a large part of the simulation.