The New Official Next Generation Sim City Wish List

[Deathcat001 8]

Most of these things are available now with BATS.

Only if Cities XL incorperates the creation of money genartor..

 

[LivingInThePast 364]

Originally posted by: Evillions

I highly doubt there will NOT be another Simcity.quote>

That means you expect it, but you then contradict it in the next sentence.

[Solidseal 0]

1.> Curved roades, Curved Bridges and curved tunnels ( bla bla addons)

2.> The abillity to make a picture of the skyline and/or some kind of 360

[BurroDiablo 222]

>3D

>Gridless

>Freeform and snappable Transport networks

>Lot system like SC4

>Moddable to the nines

>Stable with large amount of mods

>Totally sandbox

>Massive expansive region

>Region terraforming

>Adjustable City borders

>More than 1 kind of tree in God mode

>Weather, Seasons, Climates

>Realistic Disasters with realistic consequences

>Water at different heights

>Resources (Oil, Coal, Metal, Gems, Uranium etc)

>Upgradable buildings (Powerplants, Police Stations etc)

>Dozens of new transport options (Similar to NAM)

Probably a few others I'll add later

[Evillions 552]

Originally posted by: LivingInThePast

Originally posted by: Evillions

I highly doubt there will NOT be another Simcity.quote>

That means you expect it, but you then contradict it in the next sentence.

quote>

Sorry I had a typo while commenting. Anyways, I really don't see that there will be another Simcity. Considering EA pretty much owns Simcity. (Not so sure, many belivefs on such rumors.) SO I guess there is another Simcity. Only "The Sims" and "Spore" = (Possibley.)

[LivingInThePast 364]

I haven't updated my original post in almost two years, but I'm going to edit it now, starting with

56) An updated traffic system. Rather than have trips "fail" (which in reality, they never do), it builds up stress levels (again, like SimTower) especially if they don't have a decent-paying job.

[h.brett 0]

Good points-I could not have summed up my feelings any better! The game was very interesting for the first 3 weeks. Then it seemed I ran out of ideas. Yes, it would good for the region to have different areas of specialty. Perhaps this could be "governor" mode. After using god mode on a region, you could use something similar to a satellite view over the region to zone, for lack of better words, the special areas/cities. (a tool bar showing various areas that must be mapped out before you can play the region. Example: "Place your region's capitol." There could also be a few buildings -that once used become unavailible again unless bulldozed- to increase desirability for a city. (the college, tourist, or government town)

Another point...

Sim city is about being mayor, not the government in its entirety. However, perhaps a link between mayor mode and the "governor mode" could allow much more diversity for every city. This would allow for a mayor to make appeals to the governor for certain works, and he could present you with special rewards on a state basis, like your city hosting a state college, maybe when your region reaches a certain point of growth.  (you could think of the governor as an advisor you must listen to in some instances) You see, your city can influence the entire region, but keep in mind, you have to balance the needs of your city against the overall needs of the region. This means you may run into constraints enforced by the governor, making the game more challenging and making Sim City even more a city building simulator. Keep in mind that as long as this setup is as simple as it is now, the added challenge will not take away from the enjoyment you get now.

***In response to killing your computer, I'm no expert, but I should think that the added scenarios would demand more RAM and perhaps a higher speed processor. I feel though, that this would very minimal, as you would be in governor mode, god mode, and mayor mode separately and at different times.

Allowing current plugins and lots from the sim fan websites to be used in the new game will make the best, in my opinion, use of the Sim City fan base and keeping the same style make the creation of the 5 Sim City easier and faster.

Good points!

[h.brett 0]

I see your point, but understand the grid makes for faster placement of items and makes zoning faster. Looks vs. Gameplay. I'd hate to make the decision if I could not have both!

[KohmmonKoh 0]

My wishlist:

1. We need a breakthrough. We don't need the grid. I know it's harped on but yea no grid

2. I'm eager to see what the acrologies would look in in Simcity 5

3. I know this may sound kinda stupid but what if we got some sort of futuristic city on our hands? Hey, teleportation comes useful when you need it (Though costly )

4. Seasons. Snow in Singapore

5. Full 3D

6. Advisors that you can pick. Not a game function but rather more like a eye-candy.

7. Region terraforming.

Yea that's about it.

[dave1909 0]

The 2 most important things that should be different to SC4 are Commuting and zones.  The grid should be changed too cause i play so much i can see it a grid for half hour after i stop playing.

Commuting

where to start ? I dont like that buildings are abandoned to commute time.  the commuting was all wrong on SC4, since when did it take 30 minutes to walk 100 yards let alone going in a car or a 'High Speed' monorail.  Maybe if commute time is too long they should have people losing their jobs or having an effect on crime rate.  I think we should have more ordinances to encourage particular means of transport.

Zones

I have briefly looked through this thread and i definitely think RCI needs to be more elaborate.  more degrees of density are a must, we should have more super skyscrapers, SC4 was badly limited to buildings of around 2,000 people because whenever you built up a strong enough zone, the commute times were so long.  there should be the options to build council offices, larger police stations, fire stations etc.  maybe these could be zoned too with a zone for government buildings and use TAB to change the type.  What i think would be awesome as somebody has already suggested is national parks.  I think Green belt zones are a must and maybe have some zones that expand on their own as demand grows with options to limit this.

i could think of plenty of other changes but those are the main ones

[LivingInThePast 364]

Why is this stickied yet sinking as the other posts get ahead of it?

[LivingInThePast 364]

Man, I started two years ago with 16 ideas for the next city sim, and now I'm up to 88! Yay!

[nathanthemayor 1,263]

Okay, here's 30 things I want there to be in a simcity 5:

1.Freecamera, just like in societies, and all 3D

2. U-Drive it

3.No more grid, except for police, fire,etc.

4.Supported by all drives-Vista,7,XP,etc, and no crashing.

5.Cities develop depending on building type selected(E.G:Japan,England,Germany, USA,etc.)

6. Zoneable custom airports WITH jetways and more aircraft then 707's

7.Ploppable HD highway signs, depending on #5

8.Highways be replaced with RHW(E.G:Multiple lane to 1-lane highways)

9.Custom terrian that could be edited

10.Underground highways, roads,etc, with on/off ramps for underground highways.

11.Underground walkways, shopping malls

12.More disasters, such as tsunamis, supervolcanic eruptions, and floods, and weather plugin

13.Passenger/frieght trains,depending on #5, and monorail, subway,GLR,and elevated rail.

14.Rail overpass and underpasses

15.Lot Editor

16. Diagonal bridges/road/rail/highway under bridges.

17.War, peace, etc

18.High-speed rail

19.Life-after-people scene(e.g:in case all power goes out)

20.Economic depressions,etc

21.Canals, both eyecandy and functinal

22.One-way roads and highways

23.Everything from the NAM

24.Installment of tourism(E.g:resort hotels, resort casinos, theme parks,etc)

25.Zones

26.GLR/Rail-in highway

27.Rail yards

28.Seaports with modern day crates,cranes, and ships

29.Language changes on buildings,etc depending on #5

30.Billboards

31.BAT compatable with google sketch-up, all rendering in HD,

32.Landmarks from real life

33.Easier way to transit-enable lots

34.Bridges over certain buidlings

35.Parks, and ponds, lakes, rivers, etc.

[Jeffmaster223 24]

maybe a mod that makes it easier to make a builing?

the ability to make a bridge at any angle

better road options

larger variety of cars

better highway intersections

more various trees

a bigger variety of buildings

row houses

more landmarks

actual NYC/LA/other real buildings

BAT's that take up less room. (it nearly crashed my computer)

bridges with two kinds of transportation

roads under bridges

bridges under bridges

higher capacity of roads

curvy roads

ports

canals

online game and you don't have to pay

money tree (optional)

SPCA,Humane scociety buildings

Fast food buildings (mcdonalds)

traffic lights

better stadiums

parks

snow

lakes on mountains

alpine trees

realistic water

land below sea level

army bases

fission power plants

nucular boms

wars

airports

different kinds of streets

That would be my SC5.

[nukeu123 307]

my list

1) easy out side game edit tools(such as bat or lot editor)

2) grid on or off sitch i dont care really

3) free 3D camera much like scs view the skyline or from a helicopter view

4) i like ploping over zoned/developed land

5) KEEP THE ZONING SYSTEM HOW IT IS except the auto streets

6) like said above abandoned rail/roads

7) i like that thyme idea aka usa or Europe style

weather, too much rain = erosion not enough = drought

9) seasons

10) regions relationship ALL OUT NUCLEAR WAR!!!!!

11) realism is key!

12) time/tech prgretion 1800= horse trailers 2300= high speed hover jets

13) better difficulty button easy could be for kids/noobies hard for hardcore/realistic for sc veterans

14) i love the sc3k news ticker

15) improve sim mode not just move in but third person walk/drive through the city

16) better crime system

17) more power plants

18) all civic plops don't look quite the same

19) city/region deffence (as i said rigion relationship)

20) maxis brakes free from ea's prison

21) copatiblaty data transfer for/from other maxis games ie, play a sc4 region in sc5

likly or not ea is corrupt this will unlikly happen I HATE EA

  Edited July 22, 2011 by nukeu123  

[stevoh 2]

If sim city 5 ever comes out these are the 11 things i want in it.

1 ) No more cummute time, that was such a pain in SC4. Replace it with something that's balanced but stil a challenge.

2 ) Massivly Multiplayer Online world, Ok I know this is copying cities xl, but it was a really cool idea. I think Monte Cristo got greedy with the subscriber thing, I wud've bought cities Xl if the made it say 5 OR 10 Euros more expensive, (I presume 50 was the standered price) instead of forcing people to pay 9euros per month. This pay for subscription service broke the game.

3 ) Have several ways of building cities combining elements from the cities xl series and previous SC games. For instance you have an option (in single player mode) to either play a world (single player version of point number 2), a region, or a map of your choosing. You can also have the choice of how big or small these maps would be (Depending on your comp specs).

4 )Bring in expressways for roads/rails/mass transit.

5 )Have the bus system from Cities Xl applied in SC5, same for subways and other mass transit.

6 )Scenarios, they were fun in SC2.

7 )Allow you to import your cities from previous versions.

8 )Access to the modding servers at Simtropolis and Access to the ST Exchange.

9 )The ability to terraform and custimize everything in the game from the maps to the cars and trains on the street.

10 ) radius Service system from SC4.

11 )And SC2'S Diasters! They were the best!

  Edited July 28, 2011 by stevoh  

[Harbin91 37]

Since there are rumours that a Sim City 5 may be in development, I think it's appropriate to bump this thread.

I would like to see, alongiside some of the suggestions above:

• Difference terrain styles and water levels in the game, as opposed to requiring a plugin to get it.
  
• More realistic road and path (sidewalk) styles. Not everywhere has gray roads. I live in the UK, where just about every road is made of black tarmac, and this is now starting to apply to the paths at the side, and in town/city centers, most of them have a variety of paving, ranging from concrete paving slabs to more lovely looking sandstone, or brick.
  
• Gridless zoning and roads. I want to see buildings that are not typically square, but have a varying degree of angles.
  
• Different architectural styles. Three of the building styles are American, and one is modern European. I want to be able to build older areas, using grander looking buildings.
  
• The ability to plop buildings, or residentials. To avoid this being abused completely, I would like to have a greater control on what gets built where. I want to be able to build terraced housing without it becoming abanoned (a problem with the ploppable thing), or without having to wait until the game decides to put it there.
  
• Ability to have more transportation options, without the need for a mod. Such options would perhaps include one-lane one-way systems, or perhaps draggable light-way/tram systems and pedestrianised areas.
  

[LivingInThePast 364]

I originally wrote my first list back in 2007 and continually edited it for the next two years. But now I think I should write a new list entirely.

1. A good query system, ala SimTower. You can check source/destination/stress of people. Could be designated as right-click.

2. Single track railroads as the default!

3. Any time you abandon a road or railroad, it leaves a scar on the ground.

4. Abandoned railroads! This is what happens when they are disconnected (or abandoned), or simply haven't been used in a while. Abandoned railroads breed crime (in big-city areas) and lower land value.

5. Cool and realistic railroad crossings.

6. One main police station and a couple of smaller branches (instead of tons and tons)

7. Realistic school systems.

8. An easy way to make your own malls. This is best as a third-party opportunity, as video game corporations typically do not have the right to make malls with Dillard's and Sears, for instance.

9. Car dealerships, but it also suffers from the problems of above.

10. Realistic looking roads. Yellow stripe in the middle for North America. Cities XL has failed in this respect. See #32 for more.

11. Compatible with Mac and Windows out of the gate. License out a Linux version to be ported.

12. Sunsets and sunrises.

13. Mixed-use buildings.

14. MAYBE something like Planet Offer. You can't see the whole region (only a small part). If a car zooms off, it can go into someone else's city, which might be thousands of miles away in RL. Likewise, if you build a farm town, you won't be able to grow terribly much because the megalopolis next door is sucking up your city's life. Of course, there will be some way to make it all fair and fun... (I originally wrote this LONG before Planet Offer).

15. Disasters and U-Drive-It where people are allowed to get somewhat hurt. I don't want to run into someone, and they move off a bit, then either disappear or keep moving. When I hit them, the cars will get totaled as the fleeing driver jumps onto the sidewalk.

16. A fun U-Drive-It replacement, or none at all. U-D-I just wasn't fun. The car crash limits, the horrible control system, the isometric view, it was just so slow...

17. A real university system. Lots of buildings named after various professors and/or donors, a separate police station, absorb more and more city area, bars and nightclubs, frat houses, crazy student drivers, and lots of traffic for the big game! Living near Texas A&M University is like that. When you add a university, the traffic and crime spiral up, but there is also jobs and income.

18. The end of dirty industry constantly. Dirty industry will only happen if there's heavy industry early in the game.

19. Light industrial again.

20. Now here's somethin' retro: you can choose which industries you want in your city (food, construction, tourism, petrochemicals, etc.) and set the tax rates accordingly (a la SimCity 2000).

21. Realistic cars. Actual models.

22. Everything is in the language where it is made. I want to see American English on most of my stuff, and other languages if its a foreign BAT or something. As in...no Simlish!

23. Real religion churches (I want to see the churches, mosques, and synagogues...no "House of Worship")

24. All the cemetaries I've seen have narrow roads running through them (except the small ones)

25. Make the BAT plugins smaller. Seems like the SC4 ones were too bloated.

26. More farm variety. You should see the crop grow and possibly get rotated out. And big irrigation things.

27. I want feel. Give me the sunny countryside. The crowded highway at rush hour. The "bad part of town" at night. Specifically, this applies to the "feel" of various neighborhoods. It may even involve signage change (Houston, again)

28. Rather turning dark, I want to see poorly-maintained buildings see stuff like paint chipping. Likewise, abandoned buildings will not be nearly as common.

29) Ploppable street signs that have an effect, like "There's an accident on Logan Street!"

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. Some places have naturally red gravel or other types.

33) Ploppable street lamps, in certain cases.

34) Power lines, both low and high voltage. 

35) Customizable stoplights and stoplight behavior.

36) Selling plots to residential developers (instead of you). This would mean they plan the streets, too.

37) REALISTIC PARKING LOTS.

38) Realistic newspapers, replacing the newsticker. I'm sick of advisors annoying me and lame one-liners.

39) Graffiti on street signs (in really crime-ridden areas).

40) Realistic navy/air/army bases. They are no longer evil and will help a city a lot. They resemble Fort Hood rather than a WWII training camp, for starters (if you were using the American-based set, that is)

41) Definitely put in upgradeable institutions, a feature that SC4 left incomplete. You can even rebuild outdated buildings!

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

43) Demographics. Demographics would be more than just some random statistic, it can affect crime, buildings built, and people walking around. Care should be taken not to make it racist (but in many cases, that's just how things appear, sadly).

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. They have commercial uses (the tunnels in downtown Houston, for example).

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

47. The interface should allow me to switch positions of things. Take examples from the iPhone.

48. I want my cities to be gritty and/or realistic. Not the dumbed-down, politically correct, sterilized, perfect Sims world where people speak gibberish.

49. Fires happen constantly in cities. One small blaze that my firefighters can put out is not worth going to. However, if I go by there, I can see it. It will come to my attention if it gets out of control (or is a big building).

50. Complete redevelopment doesn't happen nearly as often. More likely, a renovation will occur.

51. Traffic is no longer random. For example, you will occasionally see trucks with oversize loads, pickup trucks (if your city has lots of farmers or college students) or SUVs (if you have a lot of suburban soccer moms)

52. Cell phone towers.

53. The option to have what the city is "known for", like the "Sticksville, the Eggplant Capital of the World"

54. A completely redesigned light rail system. You can have it Above Ground, Ground, or Underground (replacing Elevated Rail, GLR, and Subway, respectively). You can specify number of cars (more cars can carry more people but may be impede traffic if at-grade) and the funding (poor funding means graffiti and breakdowns). You can even specify the subway lines and times.

55. Better tools for intersections and on-ramps. Third party opportunity?

56) An updated traffic system. Rather than have trips "fail" (which in reality, they never do), it builds up stress levels (again, like SimTower) especially if they don't have a decent-paying job.

57) What Giligone said (below this post). You can also REBUILD horribly dated schools (like the ones that face OUT)

58) City first, people second. SCS (and CXL to an extent) has focused too much on this.

59) Festivals and protests. These bring people out to parts of the city (or lack thereof). Downtown Sticksville has their Eggplant Festival every year. These can be downloadable!

60) Networks no longer have a "set speed", all vehicles are "microsims" with their own objectives (and some drive...badly).

61) TIF incentives for areas you want businesses to go.

62) To keep things basic, only three view options (Street, Birds Eye, and Isometric)

63) Some may have mentioned this but you have the ability to pick advisors. Three options (the ultra-annoying one that's probably best for young players, the normal advisor that most people have on, and one who couldn't care less for the experts)

64) Bus and HOV lanes, especially the latter. HOV lanes are sort of funky things, they have specific enter/exit points, only open at certain times, and so on. Specifically, US-290 northwest of Houston.

65) Sea level is no longer absolute. You can make your own rivers, lakes high above sea level, and, of course, a New Orleans-esque set-up being BELOW sea level!

66) Others have said to get rid of the grid, but I disagree. Make the grid SMALLER.

67) The GEMs seem like a flawed concept, especially considering you do everything inside of Cities XL and that's only available with the Planet Offer. This kind of goes along with the Will Wright vision of the 1990s where you could buy a product to create, say, a car, and place in an existing world. This opens up a world of expansion for SimCity (you know, the RCT fans are getting restless...)

68) An import feature allowing you to bring SC4 and SC3K cities into the city, along with SC4 items.

69) The ability to budget items. This means you could set aside X number of Simoleans (or some other currency) to build, say, that super-highway on the east side of town. When you run out of budget money, that may be a good warning to not spend more than you want to.

And now, the following comes from an old SC2K FAQ about what people wanted in SimCity. Some came true as of SC3K, and some are now available as custom BATs and mods. I have edited a few to shorten on words. Names have been removed where the wording was significantly altered.

70) Wildlife Preserves. You could designate an area of land as a wildlife preserve. This would increase tourism and Sim-happiness, but the designated land would be locked out of development. (Dave Lartigue)

71) Underground power lines, along with undersea power lines. (Darin Gurney)

72) Bridges that go over land, from one hill to another. This I think might have been created for SC4, but this would come naturally. (Sushil Gupta)

73) Special events like the Olympics.  Will cost a lot, but increase industry and commerce revenue, as well as tourism. Would create a heavy toll on traffic. You would have to have a large built-up city with suburbs and stadiums. This would be a great sponsorship opportunity.

74) Highway Patrol.  If you have enough miles of highway you could get a highway patrol office. Might reduce traffic. (Sushil Gupta)

75) An UNDO! (James Walker)

76) Bookmarks within your city.  I'd like to be able to assign, say, five bookmarks and jump directly to them. (Dave Lartigue)

And now, back to our regularly scheduled program.

77) And now, back to our regularly scheduled program. Master planned communities, like The Woodlands in Texas.

78) It's dangerous and scary, but some rails (heavy) do cross the road grade at bizarre angles with the road (unprotected), including regular roads and straight through intersections. This includes street running.

79) Actually, I failed to mention that before #78 there needs to be a "developer" mode (in addition to "god", "mayor", and "citizen") that can build fancy subdivisions with a theme. You know the type. This would be an expansion to #36.

80) Citizen mode now is a bit better. You can communicate with citizens one-on-one, drive around your city, etc. It replaces "My Sim" mode.

81) Now that I think about, maybe a 1 meter x 1 meter system would be better for a grid, so it helps with backwards compatibility AND gives the illusion of not having a grid.

82) Rural areas. Outside of your city, these will grow, sprouting farms and middle-class subdivisions with large yards but inferior roads. When you annex this, you can tax these denizens.

83) A region mode. Easily expandable.

84) A terrain editor. Advanced users can Photoshop their way to a cool terrain.

85) Full color buttons (unlike SC4, more like SC3K)

86) Sewage lines. A yucky idea but realistic.

87) An alert system in the form of emergency radio. This is used for traffic situations too, as well as overhead electronic signs.

88) Spectacular wrecks on the streets. This is a city we're talking about after all.

89) Residential is green, industrial is yellow, and commercial is blue. A "red zone" is added, allowing for a zoning free-for-all that will produce some pretty interesting combinations. Based after Houston.

90) An expansion from #22. DISCONNECT SIMCITY FROM THE SIMS FRANCHISE.

91) Make it fun! A small city should be just as interesting as a larger one.

92) Various vegetation for different parts of the world.

93) Should be easy enough to pick up and play, but a thick manual with all sorts of neat information would be awesome!

94) A new soundtrack that perfectly fits that SimCity feeling.

95) Achievements to help fit in with the modern gaming world. These don't actually unlock anything in the game, however.

96) Stability is really important.

97) Lose the socialism. Freight railroads are private, and they build in your city first, randomly. Power, you don't raise or lower the maintenance, you charge them for it. Of course, these are all options.

98) Cars. Cars everywhere. Daytime, nighttime. You might never see an unused road (unless it's in the subdivisions, or something).

99) Weather and its effect. Lots of rain means more accidents, sun means water and power use go up.

100) A city has to GROW. It can't be Perpetual 20th Century. It could grow from any era, from a Medieval village to a modern European town, from a colonial trading post to a regional metroplex, from a Western boom town to a futuristic center. The Future has to be CREATIVE, not too SILLY, and without an AGENDA.

  Edited August 27, 2011 by LivingInThePast  

[Snateraar 0]

Basically, five things:

1. Any of the bugs in SC4 fixed. Oh, and no new bugs, of course <img src="https://community.simtropolis.com/assets/emoticons/2.gif" border="0">

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...

<font color="#0000ff">~Ditto.~</font>

This, pretty much. And perhaps something so you can access the Exchange from in-game and download stuff into your game while it runs.

And an official tool to make buildings, one that's more advanced than those SC4LotEditor things

[pablo94sc 0]

Said this in the SC5 thread stickied at the top, but here are my thoughts (edited) since this seems to be the proper thread to place them in.

Tiles / Zoning

1. Tiles become ~26ft/sq, or 7.9m/sq. 4x4 grid would be roughly 1/4-acre, while an 8x8 would be roughly 1-acre. This is an easier concept for people to grasp as most small homes are on 1/8 acre plots, middle class are on 1/4, and upper level are on acre or above.

2. Integrations of trailer parks and other small residential/businesses/industry buildings that could fit on a 1x1 grid. A drive-thru only bank ATM, dry cleaners, or fast food restaurant comes to mind for commercial. Industrial... think small road-side farmers markets or a small machine shop.

3. Speaking of farming, integrating the SPAM farming mod into the mix.

3a. Same with the park mod and pedestrian pathways, with pedestrian bridges/underpasses.

4. Mixed use commercial/residential. You see these all the time in urban areas, usually a converted brownstone or row house.

5. Being able to define a low-density residential zone for single or multifamily use. This would allow whether or not condos, townhomes, row houses and small apartment complexes can be built in a neighborhood as those can be lower property values and desirability in higher wealth residential areas.

6. Custom, larger city sizes would be lovely instead of the current large which is about 4km/sq. The city I live in currently is 17.6 square miles and it's only an incorporated suburb of Memphis.

7. One budget shared across the entire region unless the area currently being built is incorporated as a separate town (think incorporated suburbs), or allow the adjacent areas to be annexed into the main city and share its budget as it grows. This will provide more realism.

8. The ability to make lakes, rivers, etc above sea level.

9. Better garbage handling: Upgradable recycling centers, constant power output from incinerators, something like that.

10. Parking garages that can be built underground, such as the one under Fountain Square (a city square/park) in Cincinnati, OH. Make money off your parks!

Roads / Buses

1. Streets are one tile wide. The average street is, at most, 25ft across. Restricted freight traffic. Traffic lights optional only at road+ intersections.

2. Roads are 2 tiles wide and 5-lane (4 with middle turn). Traffic lights optional only at road+ intersections.

3. Avenues are 3 tiles wide, 6 lane roads, small median, and turn lane(s). Traffic lights standard.

4. Parkways 4 tiles wide, upgradable from 4 to 6 lanes as the population grows (this requires repaving and an upgraded monthly maintenance fee) with a large median and shoulders that can be planted with trees. Also uses on/off ramps. Think current ground highways: higher speeds but with restricted freight traffic. Can be ended at avenues like rural/state highways do when they come into a town.

5. Highways are more like US expressways and are 5 tiles wide, upgradable as the population grows from 4 to 10 lanes. Medians and shoulders can be planted with trees until 10 lanes as they are basically a solid sheet of pavement at that point.

6. Bus stops and subway entrances/exits are integrated into the sidewalks of special, ploppable roads/avenue tiles. This will make it so much easier to zone and increase/descrease capacity as needed.

7. Transit hubs for buses in a couple varying sizes/capacity.

8. More realistic commute times and (mass) traffic capacities based on samples of real world cities.

Commuter Rail / Subways / Trolley / Mono-Rail

1. A one tile wide, 2-rail system is appropriate. Passenger cars vary in length, but a common passenger car size is 85'x10'6". Could be scaled to single rail if you wanted within the same tile size.

2. Small commuter stations would be two tiles wide with a bus stop and/or subway entrance built in. Platforms and ticket kiosks aren't very wide, but are long. Sample 12 car LIRR station is about 52'x1020', so a 2x39 station would be equivalent (using the 26ft/sq tile). I can see using smaller stations and shorter trains for game play (8 car would be 2x25).

3. Larger train stations of varying sizes/capacity for transferring to different trains or forms of mass transit. Something like Penn Station or Grand Central Station would look awesome, but be on a huge lot.

3a. Suburban train stations that are elevated with parking underneath, 3 tiles wide.

4. Subway stations look like subway stations, not little gray bubbles underground. They would be 2x or 3x wide (depending on whether connected to a road or avenue) and run about 20 tiles long. This would be the equivalent length to a smaller NYC subway train, or a little over 500' long. Again, I could see smaller for simplicity, but why?

5. Street-cars/trolleys in road would be nice, but even better in pedestrian walkways/malls.

6. Mono-rails for short trips and low noise/pollution options for intra-city commuting. Increased cost and maintenance, lower capacity as in real life. Think Disney World or the one that runs to JFK International from Jamaica Station in NYC.

6. More realistic capacities as mentioned above.