CitiesXL First Impressions talk

[sim-fan192 4]

I was sold at free form roads. After that, it just got better and better. Will there be mutlible "lanes" for the railroads like the roads and highways?

Originally posted by: Duke87

The other, more important one, is that it would mean getting Vista. Eeew.quote>

I know what you mean. Just got a new computer around Christmas, and its a vista. *gasp* They completely suck at playing games more than 2 years old which means no more Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic . Sorry, I'm getting off topic.

[DuskTrooper 316]

Originally posted by: dirk

Originally posted by: DuskTrooper

Excellent! This game looks like it could easily surpass SC4 in terms of customization and the like.

I certainly hope they can come up with some sort of region play however. 10x10 km is a nice size, but it's only about the size of 4 large SC4 cities placed together; hardly large enough for a metropolitan area.

Excellent review, Dirk! The anticipation is building!quote>

I am almost certain based on what we talked about when I was there, that you can build mutliple cities in single-player and connect them to each other, and trade resources, so, essentially "region play". But I'll get more official info on this.

quote>

This is so awesome, that I need a smoke...

jk

Can't wait, mate!

[jirnsum 0]

Great read Dirk! Thanks for sharing your impressions!

[Milju Delem 0]

Originally posted by: dirk

I am almost certain based on what we talked about when I was there, that you can build mutliple cities in single-player and connect them to each other, and trade resources, so, essentially "region play". But I'll get more official info on this.

quote>

in this "regional play" would it be possible to create a continuous regional transport system, or do the cities trade only via citylinks, with no continuous transport system from one city to the other?

[Asheroo 53]

Some good questions about this regional play. Hopefully all this is true. But also, is the option to have bigger maps than 10km by 10km in single player true?

[crazyarchitect 7]

Wow, I'm so beefed up on this game now. When I first heard of CitiesXL, I was kind of just poo pooing it off just waiting for another Sim City. Then I started looking into it, then your preview, I was blown away by everything. Now I'm just waiting on how they'll take on airport, maybe we'll finally get diagonal runways!!!!! All I can say is thanks to Monte Cristo for having a set to take on this undertaking, and for Dirk for showing us all the opportunities that this new game has.


So many duckies for everybody involved
And bunnies too

[Patricius Maximus 236]

Originally posted by: sim-fan192

I was sold at free form roads. After that, it just got better and better.quote>

I was sold only at Dirk's review and subsequent elaborations. I suppose I'm more skeptical than average.

[DARKO 3]

Hey Dirk did you get any insight on how this game will run on computers. As far as(I'm sure it will be direct 10) but whether the game will take advantage of say a quad core processor or 8800 + graphics card?

[+Guest]

THe thing is can we see these cities connected to each other or will they be their own entities. If we can zoom out to a greater piece of land and see the overall larger city then AWESOME. If not that will suck a little.

[IonWind 3]

Thanks to Dirk for his impressions on CXL. I searched through this topic and I see that anyone has not yet questionised this one subject; the building lot behavior on terrain slopes. Some months ago Philippe told in one relevant thread that they were working on the slope issue (here to be exact), but so far at least I've heard no new news on this.

Did you, o mighty Dirktator, notice anything on how the buildings behave on slopes? Do they still have the concrete walls beneath the lots or have the knights of Monte Cristo solved the puzzle of ugly and unrealistic slope structures that has been bugging the city simulators since Simcity 4?

[Joe123456789 0]

How do highways join up to each other?

can you do custom ramp setups / brake lines off of roads at will?

[Alkaola 18]

Hey there Dirk,

Maybe this has been discussed before but I still have some questions to ask,

Will they make bigger city tiles ? And can they be connected to each other?

Is there a weather thing involved in the game? (cloudiness, rain, day and night and stuff like that)

[lakeyboy 12]

Brilliant write up Dirk, and it was exciting seeing new features which had not been announced on the official Cities XL website. I in particular loved the highway signs. I would faint if I was told you could customise them. I just hope that you can create your own textures for roads, to make them look like the roads in my home city of Melbourne for example. This seems all too exciting for me. I would also love to see the system requirements. I hope to be able to run it on my new 2009 MacBook White with XP on Boot Camp so I will just have to wait and see. Try and grasp every minute detail of info you can out of the Monte Cristo team!

[crazyjoo17 0]

I can't seem to get the article to load, for some reason firefox is acting all weird with it. Could someone please copy the article text to some other forum thread or (if you want to earn massive thank you points), e-mail the text+pics from the article to me? I'm pretty sure my e-mail address is listed in my profile page.

[harpo068 0]

Thanks, Dirk! As so many others have said, this is a great article, the best one I've read about Cities XL. Kudos to the development team, too, this all sounds really exciting. I just have one (two-part) question, maybe it is a silly question, but I'll ask it in case others can't figure this out either--for online play, do you need to (1) install a copy of the game on your computer and (2) access the site from that computer (that is, a PC that meets the minimum system requirements)?

I've been using a Mac since my PC died a few months ago, and I always assumed that I would have to buy a new PC when the game came out. But maybe not, if you just want to play the online game? You can access most other online games from any computer. But that won't work if the game has to be installed on the computer that is accessing the site. 

[City Planner 121]

Thanks for the information, I think it lends a great insight into the game so far.

My usual concerns are (because Im cheap), whether or not any GEMS are going to become necessary to have a fully functional city (i.e. leave out some gameplay to add it to a gem later on) and how much a couple bucks actually means.

I'd hate to think of fully getting into the game too (online mode) only to be told that there wasn't enough subscribers after a year for them to bother keeping it online anymore.  Although I don't think this will happen, still it would bother me to invest not only my time online gaming but my money as well.  I consider MMO's that I play have a persistant character and that character has value to me, as would my city.

[ODST_27 1]

Wow, this preview has sold me on the game. There wasn't one thing I read that I didn't like, apart from the graphics, but you already said it wasn't a finished build. I do have a question though:

Did you guys discuss how much it will cost per month for Online play?

[Dirktator 2,327]

Originally posted by: IonWind

Thanks to Dirk for his impressions on CXL. I searched through this topic and I see that anyone has not yet questionised this one subject; the building lot behavior on terrain slopes. Some months ago Philippe told in one relevant thread that they were working on the slope issue (here to be exact), but so far at least I've heard no new news on this.

Did you, o mighty Dirktator, notice anything on how the buildings behave on slopes? Do they still have the concrete walls beneath the lots or have the knights of Monte Cristo solved the puzzle of ugly and unrealistic slope structures that has been bugging the city simulators since Simcity 4?

quote>

Ah yes we did talk briefly about the slopes, and Monte Cristo has been working to make them look their best. 

[Dirktator 2,327]

Originally posted by: lakeyboy

Brilliant write up Dirk, and it was exciting seeing new features which had not been announced on the official Cities XL website. I in particular loved the highway signs. I would faint if I was told you could customise them. quote>

Yes, I asked when I saw them if the highway signs could be customized, or would show the name of the connecting city.. but alas, they currently do not.

[Dirktator 2,327]

Originally posted by: ODST_27

Wow, this preview has sold me on the game. There wasn't one thing I read that I didn't like, apart from the graphics, but you already said it wasn't a finished build. I do have a question though:

Did you guys discuss how much it will cost per month for Online play?quote>

Yes, I had asked what the cost would be of course I can not say in any official capacity, so take it with a grain of salt until we get some official words, but they were mentioning about around USD12 bucks

[Dirktator 2,327]

Originally posted by: City Planner

Thanks for the information, I think it lends a great insight into the game so far.

My usual concerns are (because Im cheap), whether or not any GEMS are going to become necessary to have a fully functional city (i.e. leave out some gameplay to add it to a gem later on) and how much a couple bucks actually means.

I'd hate to think of fully getting into the game too (online mode) only to be told that there wasn't enough subscribers after a year for them to bother keeping it online anymore.  Although I don't think this will happen, still it would bother me to invest not only my time online gaming but my money as well.  I consider MMO's that I play have a persistant character and that character has value to me, as would my city.quote>

No, I have brought up that as a concern, and the answer was aboslutely not.  CitiesXL will ship as a major player in the City Building genre, MC has worked closely with the community to understand where  the players want to take the game. They have said on numerous occassions that the game will be solid and will be supported throug patches or toolkits to ehance the game.

Having said that, GEMs sound like a nie addon, but the game mechanics aren't necessarily directly related to managing a city.  For example, the Ski Resort gem is like a mini Tycoon game, where you have tasks like placing buildings, lodges skilifts, adusting prices rates and really getting down there and micromanaging this micro-simulator. The only appreciable effect it has on your city, is, if you were succcessful, the venue would attract more popele to spend a vacation there, and that you can now offer up vacation tokens for sale or trade. But when more people come there's going to be new problems, so your successes are always balanced with something you'll need to weigh.  The Gem just pauses the city, and let's you focus on that microcosm.

[Asheroo 53]

Thanks for the answers Dirk! I myself, the creator of the 'Building on Slopes' thread in the official CXL forums am very happy that MC are still trying, trying to make the supports looking good or trying to work through and solve this problem.

Also, do you know some of the other map size options we will have apart from 10km by 10km and whether we can customise the map size in single player?

[nousername 0]

Nice job on the article, and i can't wait for Cities XL to come to stores... hey Dirk did MC give you an est. release date...

[Kevin 101]

Originally posted by: dirk

Originally posted by: ODST_27

Wow, this preview has sold me on the game. There wasn't one thing I read that I didn't like, apart from the graphics, but you already said it wasn't a finished build. I do have a question though:

Did you guys discuss how much it will cost per month for Online play?quote>

Yes, I had asked what the cost would be of course I can not say in any official capacity, so take it with a grain of salt until we get some official words, but they were mentioning about around USD12 bucks

quote>

Awesome. As long as it stays within that range its pretty reasonable.

Hey look, we're on About.com: compsimgames.about.com/b/2009/04/09/simtropolis-plays-cities-xl.htm

[herenthere 0]

Dirk,

The only reason I got a lot more into SC4 and this site was b/c of its amazing plugins produced on this site (kudos to its creators.) If Monte Cristo does not include a plugins feature (the customizable features talk), do you think that Simtropolis will lose some of its fanbase? And will ST be hosting CXL content if it does?

Great review of the game BTW! And I def agree with your opinion of SimCity Societies-when EA unveiled it at E3, my first impression was "No way I'm getting that."

-herenthere

[Kevin 101]

And will ST be hosting CXL content if it does? quote>

From the 6.0 news story on the front page:

Things will change, evolve, and improve, I promise.quote>

I imagine the the STEX would evolve if there is a 'plugins' feature similar to Sc4. The new city journals section already has the capability to make journals for CXL.

[herenthere 0]

Thanks Cheese89!

I was also wondering...since Dirk mentioned that holding SHIFT would build el-roads, would you be able to do the same for subway lines (so that you can essentially plan a line just like buses?)

[ratsportrm 0]

I really enjoyed the review, Dirk. Sure looks like this will be a fun game.

Now I cross my fingers that my computer specs will be enough to  play it.

[KeanoManu 42]

Originally posted by: dirk

Having said that, GEMs sound like a nie addon, but the game mechanics aren't necessarily directly related to managing a city.  For example, the Ski Resort gem is like a mini Tycoon game, where you have tasks like placing buildings, lodges skilifts, adusting prices rates and really getting down there and micromanaging this micro-simulator. The only appreciable effect it has on your city, is, if you were succcessful, the venue would attract more popele to spend a vacation there, and that you can now offer up vacation tokens for sale or trade. But when more people come there's going to be new problems, so your successes are always balanced with something you'll need to weigh.  The Gem just pauses the city, and let's you focus on that microcosm.

quote>

Are that only possible if we have the GEM?

That's not good if it's true. That has nothing to do with managing the things. That restrict our ability to build a fully functional city.

[Herdervriend 46]

I had read your impression Dirk, I had read all the info from the site. And the only thing I can say is: I CAN"T WAIT!