The New Official Next Generation Sim City Wish List

[SpecialEddie 3]

I can hardly read all these. What makes you think they can?

My only wish list is if they want to make Simcity simple, yet with improved graphics, they should just make SC3000 3-D. Now everyone can have cities that look like the SC3K intro and be happy.

[CocaTertoka 7]

To tell you truth, i dont really care for the 3-D graphix idea. It has the potential to slow your computer down alot. And most of the time it sacrifices the graphics.

I would rather have them just like they are, but with much imrovement on the gameplay. They are allready pretty realistic as it is. And if a custom BATer really puts time and effort into it, it looks practically real...

Few suggestions...probably reapeating what other people have said

-Better transit -- avoid the grid. curved roads would be nice. But im not sure how that will ever happen... possibly just more angles when drawing the roads. not just vertically, Horozontally, and at a 45 degree angle, but afew other angles inbetween. (Im no good at math and stuff, but you get my point) : \

-Following diagonal roads -- I have no clue how they will figure this one out. but if they do, id love it....

-Weather -- Only if it doesnt sacrafice the speed, its not really a top request of mine...

-Building on hills -- no more dumb retaining wall things, they look horribly unrealistic

-Sandbox mode? -- Its actaully some other guys idea, but i like it. Unlimited money basically. As for the zonning and building, im not sure how you would figure that out...they just instantly grow where you zone? eh...who knows....

-Get rid or You drive it, and the dumb sim people -- not like it really effects me (because i never use them) it just seems like a waste of space to have them. and im sure there are some people out there that like em', but thats what 'the sims' are for. Simcity is a city building game, and any other stuff just takes away from what they could be putting on it.

-Sliders on the build options -- Im tired of sitting on my computer and holding down the mouse to get to the bottom of my seemingly list of BATs. And it would be wonderful if they had a slider bar (like on the side of your internet browser) That could make it fast & easy get to the bottom of my endless lists.

more later probably....

peace.

[nafadx 0]

OK heres my list of stuff...... and please read it all. I hope the developers of this new Simcity game will be actually reading everyones suggestions on the different sites and not just saying they are. So far, in the screenshots ive seen, ive only seen a 2-lane each way avenue. What about everything else!?!? Ex. highway, 1-way, street, regular road, train, subway, tunnels, docks, monorail and whatever else i forgot. Enviorments. Will it have snow, rain, sleet, frost, highwinds, cloudy days, thunderstorms, hail, tornados*, water spouts, hurricanes or tropical disturbances?? There should be a new advisor, the NOAA or National Weather Service advisor to warn you of bad weather. I heard somewhere that they are dropping the whole advisor system. I say please don't. They piss me off sometimes, but thats what makes Simcity what it has become. Will there be high altitude snow? rivers running from mountian to sea? there better be. that would be nice. or even deserts like Moab, Utah with the arches and stuff. I know some of thoes are on the disaster list, but they come with some thunderstorms. i got a better idea. there should be a setting that you can choose to have random disasters. each one should have their own option, so a volcano cant come out in your city when the only you want is a tornado. Will they ever get rid of thoes appearing and disappearing cars? They should come out of the drive-ways or parking lots. Why do the roads and streets not have on street parking? That would make it more realistic. That happens in the real world. Can the people making SCS make the 1-way 1-way interscetions work properly. they dont work good in SC4. One idea that i just thought up.... the u-drive-it thing. you should be able to have an in car camera, as if you were actually driving. and that goes for everything: car, plane, boat. and they should make the all planes from the large and municple arpts, and i mean all the planes, flyable. i really want to fly the 747 Another idea is you can go inside the buildings. that would be cool. like you can do stuff in the mayors house and drive around giving speeches and now my ideas are getting stupid.....some of this might not make sense because i did not really proofread all this so i mite have spelled things rong or whatnot.... If anyone of you people making this game just happen to be reading my post, take my ideas seriouslly,and everyone elses too, because we would like to have a satisfying product and so do many other Simcity players/fans. I understand the people making this game want money, right? The way to do it is to appeal to the potental customers (the fans) and give them what they want. Advertise by showing screenshot of actual suggestions (like mine!!), and that may get people supportive and more excited of the new game. The ones i have seen, it makes me disapointed, because, first of all, the graphis were fine, it seems to lack transportation options and it just looks like a step backwards in a wonderful and nice game. ...I could go on forever!!!(ahhh, maybe not... yawn..) -ME

[diva613 0]

In addition, I would Really like to see a couple of Regional Options, wherein you can build a highway throughout your whole region. Than when you select a city to play, you can customize the highway...

Also another thing i would like to see is a Canal Option, that is dragable... and fully funtional.

[deadwoods 542]

Guys, if you're hoping for people to read your suggestions, can you atleast use a bit of paragraph structure and whitespace? The posts above are one big mess of words, and my first thoughts are "I can't be bothered trying to understand this".

[fastica 0]

I agree with 99% of the features proposed here, but also want to add an interested one (I think)>

Printable city maps.

It could be a button to let you export the city map as a graphic so you can print it. It could also let you put names to the streets, avenues, etc. Just imagine the possibilities to have a printed map to do some planning for the city expansion. I think it would be great to have this.

----

[nafadx 0]

i did make it paragraphs. i just came out that way and i dont know why. ill try to fix it

[diva613 0]

nafadx when you are typing just make sure that you are not pressing shift and enter at the same time what that is is a code that automatically imprints the word wrap funtion.

[Jazzmaster 716]

One thing I like about SC is that the jazzy music transcends the somewhat annoying music you find in some games. It helps generate the feel of a real city;especially at night. I really hope the music stays the same!

[cammo2003 20]

Originally posted by: fastica I agree with 99% of the features proposed here, but also want to add an interested one (I think)>

Printable city maps.

It could be a button to let you export the city map as a graphic so you can print it. It could also let you put names to the streets, avenues, etc. Just imagine the possibilities to have a printed map to do some planning for the city expansion. I think it would be great to have this.

----quote>

I really like this idea.

It'd be good to have a street name generator within the game as well - and an easily moddable one (it could perhaps be read from a .ini file), so that one doesn't have to name EVERY street. Perhaps roads, avenues, and motorways should be excluded from the naming process and done manually, though.

[CocaTertoka 7]

yea, i didn't mean to not have paragraphs

test. well its working now......

[LivingInThePast 364]

29) Ploppable street signs that have an effect.

30) Realistic water towers (usually having city's name)

31) Weeds in park if poor maintenance.

32) Roads should naturally gray, repaving depends on traffic.

33) Ploppable street lamps.

34) Power lines, both low and high voltage.

35) Customizable stoplights.

36) Selling plots to residential developers (instead of you)

37) Runways crossing roads (it happens)

38) REALISTIC PARKING LOTS.

39) Realistic newspapers, replacing newsticker.

40) Graffiti on street signs

41) Realistic navy/air/army bases. They are no longer evil and will help a city a lot.

42) Strategically placed buildings (fast food and malls on the highway, homes in the suburbs)

[crazyarchitect 7]

All of these are good ideas, also on airports and seaports, we should be able to shape them how we want.

Like zoning in SC3000, but actually look like an air or seaport and not a bunch of buildings blocked together to look like one

and definitely keep the music

[FieryMtns 2]

In addition to things already mentioned, here's my input:

1. Regions with adjustable city limits (because in reality there aren't too many square cities with imaginary edges). City limits should end on the edges of rivers, creeks, roads, etc. This should also include the option to annex neighboring areas. There should also be unincorporated towns.

2. Real rivers, creeks, lakes, and all other forms of running water above sea level that empties into the sea. This was one of my most favorite things about SC2K, and I miss it terribly.

3. Stages for cities, i.e. there should be a difference between a village, a town, an incorporated city, and megapolis. It would be nice if the city grew in stages so the city would look and feel its true size.

4. Fully dimensional road networks with zoning that connects to the edges of the roads you draw. The 45-degree increments severely limits the creativity in designing cities. Plus I would like to see low-density housing further away from the road. Rural areas shouldn't have urban-looking streets lined with houses.

5. I would also like to see the option to have less control over things in the game as I see fit, as Spinmaster already mentioned. I'd like to go further and have automated neighboring cities. I really liked the competition that SC2K had and the collaboration that SC3K had. With SimCity 4, I have to spend my time on several regions at once when instead I'd like to be the mayor of just one city. It'd be nice if the bedroom community next door was ran by an AI mayor.

5b. In addition to AI cities, I would like more prefabricated cities to start with. SC4 was more difficult to jump into, because there was relatively few examples to play with compared to SC2K which predated it be nearly 10 years.

6. Easier region terrain editor. SC2K was effortless, especially because of its great random terrain generator. SimCity 4 requires as much time editing the region than it does the city.

--

Most of these have already been helped greatly by the wonderful community that surrounds SimCity 4, but it'd be nice if the next generation of SimCity had these things (which I deem a necessity) on release.

[nafadx 0]

Originally posted by: diva613 nafadx when you are typing just make sure that you are not pressing shift and enter at the same time what that is is a code that automatically imprints the word wrap funtion. quote>

Just how do you undo this wrap around function?

[matt_sbs 2]

I will be happy if roads were not 45/90 but instead 30/60/90, that would be enough for me to be happy.

[Braxton 0]

There's a lot of great ideas here and people say "What can they do to improve this game?" I think we've given ideas on how to improve it in this thread.

One thing that REALLY needs to be addressed is the interface. Like it or not, this is the most important aspect of the game since it is the place where we do select and look at everything of importance. It needs to be streamlined, a lot. The buttons and scrolling in SC4 have to go and something new needs to be implemented so it is easier to move around and is easier for new comers. You can add more to the game and still make the game easy for new players and this is where it all begins. Most gamers probably have a 17"-19" monitor or even larger and it should be design so it stretches to fit the screen and to take advantage of that extra real estate, including the use of widescreen monitors.

[The_Dalai_Llama 15]

I don't think it's been mentioned, but I think the next SimCity should feature more naming options. We can name buildings and streets, but I suggest expanding on that and creating a complex street/highway naming system complete with county/state/federal designations, signage, and a numerical address system. It could be used to create street maps for your city, finding locations easier, and potentially influencing traffic in your city.

You can also click on a street or highway, not just a single tile, but the entire road, and access traffic stats, a database of buildings located on that street or highway, and other vital stats.

Of course, this could be optional and there can be automatic street naming for novices.

[LivingInThePast 364]

Things Recently Added:

44) It would be terribly complex, but I want to design the subway/elrail/GLR system to have different stop times, different station types, and routes.

45. Underground tunnels or skywalks linking buildings or going under/over roads.

46. The ability to add sidewalks to roads without sidewalk, to increase bike and ped usage.

47. A streamlined interface, preferably not EA like, it should be designed for different users. For example, one would be OSX like and the other Vista like.

[waway625 72]

nad if all these suggestions are too hard for EA (and whoever is developing it) at least just ..

1.Modify the game engine to support an extra large city (around 3 times longer and wider than the present large city tile) or even better, modify the game engine so well have the option to play the entire region as one city..this is 2007 and the Core2Duos/Athlon X2s can handle it anyway

2. Add more zoning options say (to the existing High, medium and low density)

a. for Commercial, add CO$$$, CO$$, CO$, CS$$$, CS$$, CS$

b. for residential add R$$$, R$$, R$

such that i can zone a high end village or district and not worry for a high rise tenement to rise suddenly (how unrealistic is that?)

at least do this EA, and let the real modelling and modding to the STEX guys, theyre much better than you anyway...

or better yet, release the code and let the modders DO THE JOB YOU ARE SUPPOSED TO DO..like i said, the modders here are better than your designers/devs anyway

[Cob92 360]

Number 1 thing for me: Instead of being forced to develop numerous tiles to make one metropolis, I would like the ability to either start on a larger tile or be able to annex land to expand the city as much as I wish (provided that the computer can handle it)

Also, I want first-person UDI. Airports and seaports should also become zones again, but instead of being a pile of random buildings like in SC3K, the zones should grow realistically. Also, I want my airports to provide regional service instead of being limited to one measly tile.

[bw87a 0]

i would like to see more of a regionalism effect. i think it would be cool to choose whether or not you want to make a whole 'state', a metropolitan area, or one large city with spaces for suburbs. also, get rid of the strict squares. you should be able to drag out city boundaries, therefore, making the boundaries of a river city more realistic.

~There's an official wish list thread pinned to the top of the first page. No need to revive an old one. ~

[JanYpe 17]

This list of ideas was taken from mrboo001's old wish list thread. Consider it quoted for posterity.

Originally posted by: mrboo001

As many of us know, there is a new a Sim City game coming out. Where or not its too late to do anything about it, I guess we'll find out... but its better to late than to never try to help the new developers Tilled Mills make a better game?

The Format:

What your wishing for (i.e. different types of highway interchanges, more types of schools, ability to plot RCI in game, maybe ask for the NAM group for some advice?)

    - The details of what your wishing for.. Could be as short or long as you want.

As of right now, this isn't the "official" list for the SimTropolis site, so if the mods want to close it, go ahead.

The List:

Better Transport Engine - Let's face it SC4's was the worst in the series.

1-Realistic transit capacities. Determine a realistic traffic load for mass transit. For instance just a little math, bus stop capactiy based on one 60 person bus (shool bus size) 4 times an hour. 60x4=240(ANS) and ANSx24=5760. Now if they let us set bus stop frequencies the capacity can be adjusted simply changing that first problem. Do this for all transit systems.

2-Better pathfinding. What in the world are the sims on that makes them drive around town to get to their jobs? Thank you NAM. - crushedcar

More building variety- Self explanatory. - crushedcar

Better Development Engine - SC4's was good, but it could have been better.

1-Make it more difficult for high wealth buildings to overtake low wealth ones. In reality this happens very rarely because of the cost. It's cheaper to build outside existing development than in place of it.

2-Make it possible for multiple occupant groups to inhabit the same building, especially residential high rises. - crushedcar

always thought it would be cool if onelane of traffic=one tile on the game, then your one way roads could be just one lane and three lane roads (one each way wih a turn lane in the middle) would simply occupy 3 tiles. Avenues would be five tiles (@ each way with one-tile median) and MT stops would be 1x1 so that they could still be placed in the median. Highways would be 7 tiles and GLR/Elrail can go in the median. - rodent1989

instead of having only "Orthogonal" and "Diagonal: it would be cool to have 8-10 different grids. You would press a button at the bottom and the grid would cycle from orthogonal to just slightly sloped, then slightly more sloped...all the way until its orthogonal again. Then, whatever grid you have selected is the grid you would use for laying roads/zones etc. If anyone understands what I said, they would see that this would be an awesome way to create cities with 4-5 opposed grid layouts, more like a real city. - rodent1989

I'd also like to see electricity/water/garbage deals done in the region view

to make them less confusing. - rodent1989

Lay down highways in the region view too. - rodent1989

Make the region view transition seamlessly into the city view simply by zooming in instead of having the load screen. - rodent1989

School districting, instead of circular coverages (which are impossible to make 100% efficient)  when you querey a school you simply outline the outside border of coverage by click-dragging between intersections. You could create bizarre, but efficient coverage zones for all the schools. - rodent1989

Make hospitals bigger and clinics smaller for realism. You dont have 5 hospitals in a city, there's maybe two, but there may be dozens of clinics - rodent1989

Make elrail over road a draggable network. Elrail doesnt save any space when there's nothing underneath it. - rodent1989

A 3D Object Editor

To me, its not all lost if we can modd this thing to our liking. First and most importantly, we need a way to make new buildings. This way could be anything, but from a realistic standpoint asking for a  simple converter will do

Features it should have:

1. Import/Export into mainstream 3d formats(3ds, Blender)

2. Some basic modding features to allow us to specify the use of the new model in the game

3. Some support for animation, if present in this game – hamsterTK

They want a new breed of players who need it kinder and gentler to play? Ok, make the advisors "directors" instead, with the option to not only say "you need a new rail system" but to actually propose where to build it, cost, etc... and let the mayor simply say yes/no to it. Similar things for all other advisors, taxes, civic funding, etc.... But also, the option to fire or "shut up" a director, and let the mayor still have 100% creative control, as we do now with SC4. This would satisfy the "it's too hard" newcomers, without abandoning those who kept the franchise alive for 20 years. - Spinmaster

They want to give it more appeal to "The Sims" fans? Ok, I could see better integration between the two games. As-is I've had zero desire to even look at The Sims. I'm not interested in it by itself. Shall I buy it just to import one and watch him swear at me in some babbling language? Uhh... no, no, and NO. But true integration might work - your Sim can live in your city, his/her thoughts are influenced by personal experiences and character development in The Sims, and his/her experience in your city likewise affects the character back in The Sims. A SimCity fan might be interested to see "actual people" (not really, but The Sims' flavor thereof at least) living in their paradise... or ghetto. A "The Sims" fan might like the idea of building the whole city their little buddy lives in. Ahh, now this might be worthy of trying both titles - Spinmaster

- Region Mode

- Customization tool

* Primarily for buildings, but I think props, streets and especially flora would be great

- Plug-in folder, or the like, for us to share with one another our custom materials

- This would normally go without saying, but with this game you can't be too sure, we need management options like financing/budgets, ordinances, commute times, etc..

- Roads, Streets, four-lane roads/avenues (at least the screen shot proved we have that), highways, trains, subways – Poetic

1. Highways!

Being able to chose how many lanes are in the highway would great too!

More interchanges, or the ability to make custom interchanges!

2. LOTS OF TRAFFIC LOL! Simcity 4 only had commuters... This game needs to incorporate other trips and tourist traffic, as well as bypassing traffic going from city to city. - haljackey

1. A BAT, LE, Ilive tool etc

2. Better and more transportation networks -MarcosMX

1. Zones, not plots.

2. Calculation first and stuff moving around later. Not based on walkers moving around first to drive the game mechanics. - ssfsx17

1. A Realistic Urban Simulator

2. Running Water

3. A full 3D BAT, prefferably one that lets us use .gmax files.

4. More transportation options, maily highways ect... this is the life blood of a SimCity, beyond being realistic.

5. Possiblity to have a complex tax structure, but also scale it back a little for the newbies

6. Better pathfinding, well no disapearing cars

7. Weather - BarbulaM1

1) Tourist present in the game, giving rise to seasonal tourist crowd and tourist cash

2) Landmarks that actually attract tourist and generate money

3) 4 Seasons

4) Mayor have the ability to organise city wide events - ie. Madi Gras

5) Besides zoning RCI, have the ability to specify which are the Central Business District zone, Nightclub area, chinatown etc. Specified zone will have the appropriate type of building appear there instead of random Commerce building appearing.

6) Bring back the "newspaper" from sc2000 and have it as an option whether mayors wanna read about some of the groundbreaking stories occuring in town. - AngKh1982

I demand lighting as good as I can do in 3ds max or I'll stick to my own creations for free. Also I want the models to look as good as some of our Custom BATs which are made by amatures (most of the time). - Scipio

quote>

[Goldfish4209 9]

1. Scalable complexity so both vets and *****s can get what they want.

2. Some form of backwards compatability with SC4 custom content, wether it be integration into the game or some conversion app.

3. Something better than a grid, I don't care what it is.

4. More realistic transportation.

~Taken from the old wish list thread.~

[Wilfried Webber 22]

Basically, five things:

1. Any of the bugs in SC4 fixed. Oh, and no new bugs, of course

2. Any of the transport options of Rush Hour plus the contents of community developments like NAM, ie. roundabouts, two-lane highways, high-speed railways, different road markings like Euro...

Actually, a few basic networks which however could be all the way adjusted (think of number and type of lanes on roads, bus lines, intersection design etc.) would cover most of our needs, I suppose.

3. True 3D engine without grid. That's essential, and I don't think it would slow down the game too much. Honestly, Maxis really could do better in this field anyway, so why not getting away with better graphics?

4. Mixed-use zones. Oh yes, such things exist outside of American suburbia.

5. Finally, the fun of SC 2000 we then will have been missing for about a decade!

It's not really much I'm missing. It's just about a few extensions and improvements. In fact, only the 3D engine (and perhaps the mixed-use zones) would require writing a completely new game, anything else could be actually covered by just another addon...

~Ditto.~

[john.keig 0]

this will sound silly and trivial, but i would really like a city that isn't necessarily square. it'd be good if annexing and so forth were part of the game.

but onto less trivial things, i would really like there to be diagonal roads in 4-8 different angles (as was mentioned above) and zones corresponding to diagonal orientations. i can't stand the way regular buildings look on diagonal streets in SC4, leaving me building overly gridded cities.

more variation in zone density. i know many people would like to build neighborhoods of townhomes and walk up apartments that are the default in most major cities. without spending a ridiculous amount of time zoning alternating high and medium density, it's hard to do that. maybe a fourth density would be appropriate.

i think that more building variation and more stylistic variations would be great. i really think that an option for starting your cities in various times in history and having styles correspond to those periods would be very nice. that way, there could be obsolescence of industries and buildings, and therefore a realistic economy (no city continues on exponential grow, no matter how well run). of course, there should be an option similar to how SC4 works now, where you can have cities independent of the historical timeline.

parks should be reformed so that you can zone an area with grass textures or paved/brick/stone textures, and then all the amenities (fountains, tennis courts, baseball fields, etc.) can be added on to the base park zone.

buildings need to look better on hills. i avoid hills, because i don't like the way houses and buildings insist on being on flat land, creating those awful looking cliffs from house to house.

diversity in buildings and realism in buildings (i got to make a plug for the American Four Square house, because it looks 1000x more realistic than any of the Maxis houses)

better looking industry, more jobs in industrial areas. a huge factory can employ hundreds if not more people.

terrain generator (like in SC2000)

options on how many lanes are on streets, highways, etc.

~Idem.~

[trainmanr5 0]

What I would love to see in the game is more camera options.

It would be cool to be able to pan down and see the city's skyline better.

I LIKE U-Drive-it

it's so cool to drive around in the city you made, except I wish the traffic lights and stuff worked better

~Please use the edit button if you find you have more to add after a few minutes. ~

[Barker 0]

Make SC4, all the same aspects, but better; in the sense of improving the game, many aspects have already been discussed...no need for a new thread, we did this already, tired....

Why will anyone listen this time if they didn't on all the other threads>not just st, but many, many other sc4 sites, sorry, I'm getting pessimistic about money hungry gaming corporations....

my too scents

[Wildgamer_95 0]

I want to see more disasters in Simcity Societies, for example: floods, hurricanes, more powerfull earthquakes, air crashes, bulding crashes (if building standing abandoned for years, it will crash one day), avalanches (in mountain areas) and some exotic disasters (terrorist attacks at high crime level) And don't forget about SC4 unique disasters (volcanoes and lightnings)!

[rctshack 182]

It would be nice if the city could rent out office space in commercial buildings. If you go into a large city such as New York, you will notice that half a block is not a clinic or police station, the city uses rented space in the bottom floor of an office building many times to utilize for public works. Why can't we chose clinic from the menu and incorperate it into an office in a building already built? No need to take up 2 whole squares for one small clinic. Same with other options in the game.