I still prefer Sim City 4 over Cities XL

[ron.robinson123 0]

Hello everyone!

Although this may be my first post, I have been a member for a long time now, mainly looking at city journals and downloading mods and buildings for sim city 4. I was just wondering which game people thought was better, Sim City 4 or Cities XL. I obtained a beta key on the 7th of July and have been playing it, but still find myself enjoying Sim City more than Cities XL. What are your opinions everyone?

Thanks!

[leanser 0]

Overall, I like SimCity 4 better, specially for diversity of buildings, subway and rail system, though I wish it had the street level zooming like Cities XL.

[rsd6000 8]

well simcity 4 is good one but cities XL is new one - since SC failed because we wanted better things - but the solo mode on cities XL will be good

[io_bg 249]

A friend of mine sent me a few screenshots of the beta of Cities XL. Yes, the graphic is awesome... But I still think SC4 is better!

[JayStimson 212]

I've only seen pics from XL but I did see a tut on their equivalent of the BAT. If they provide a suite of tools for creating custom stuff and mods like Maxis did then the game might have some promise. For now, as far as I'm concerned, the jury is still out. Not likely I'd consider buying it when it first comes out. I'd be waiting and watching as things develop.

[RedImperator 16]

I think at this point it's impossible for most of us to judge without having played the game, and even if you have played the beta, it's difficult to make a fair comparison between the two. SC4 is a mature game with a mod community that's been at work on it for six years. Granted, a lot of that effort has gone into fixing things EA should have taken care of, but the end result is still a game with very diverse transport options, modular parks, airports, and seaports, dozens of civic buildings in every category, a variety of ground and water textures, a stable of world landmarks, and thousands of buildings available representing nearly every major Western architectural style since the middle ages, and more than a few Eastern buildings as well. Cities XL is in beta, with no existing mod community, from a small company. You just can't expect it to duplicate all those options out of the box.

What I'll be watching for from Cities XL is this:

1. Good core gameplay mechanic. Even if it's buggy or broken, I want to see some potential. You can patch a broken game into a good game, but all the patches in the world can't save a bad game.

2. Moddability. Obvious.

3. A commitment from the company to continue supporting it. I already play one city simulator that was abandoned by its creators; I don't need a second.

I'll wait and see how others react before spending money on CXL. Seeing as I don't own a computer that could efficiently run it, that's a somewhat academic position to hold, but I will pay attention to what the early adopters think.

[mayor_brando 8]

Yes, people need to remember that this is a beta, not the final product. Yes, the beta has some bugs, but i'm sure most of the bugs will be fixed by the time of the release of the actual game.

As far as comparing the two games is concerned, I'm sort of neutral right now; on one hand, you have SimCity 4 with it's devoted players and all the custom content availible to make it the best City-Builder yet, but on the other hand, you have Cities XL with it's flexible camera, plus not to mention that it's new and refreshing from the SC4, which we have to remember is about six years old right now (although with all the custom content it's more like three or two years old). So it's sort of nice to have a new city-builder to play.

But, like some others on here, I'm going to wait and see what others think about it before purchasing the actual game; I'm not going to pay 40$ for it until I know it's not a disaster. But, even if it's not as good or addicting as SC4, I will still probably give it a try, and see what I think, as people have different opinions, and someone's idea of a good game might be different from mine.

But isn't it a bit early to be comparing the two games anyway? I would give it at least a few days after release time to start comparing it to anything.

[Mike1814 0]

I have the beta and let me tell you. SC4 is better.

Then again it took SC awhile to get to where it is today.

but  Iwould really hate to pay an monthly fee for extra features (atop of the $50+ I might spend) when I might get bored of it eventually.

 

[ron.robinson123 0]

That is true, it did take Sim City a long time to get where it is today, I remember playing before the days of the Rush Hour expansion and internet access (for me, at least). Now that was a real challenge building a successful city.

[StanislausBabalistic 24]

If we're allowed to be honest... I just don't see how it will be possible for Cities XL to reach even a close approximation of the immediate playability that SC4 had when it first came out. And sadly, all the patches in all the world won't fix the core game mechanics...

[JakeMD 107]

If you are going to compare SimCity 4 to CitiesXL right now, take away Rush Hour and all of the plugins you have today. Then compare it.

[Death54 3]

At this point, with SC4 having a bunch of custom content and several patches and an expansion pack, it is definitely better than Cities XL, though CXL is still in beta, and the features that still aren't implemented into the game will make it better and more playable over the long and medium term. I just wish they hadn't made the Planet Offer and had instead worked more on what the community wanted in the game. Also, loosing custom content because of the Planet Offer would be awful, as I doubt many will actually pay to play the MMO part of the game, and custom content is what makes games last a long time, instead of seeming outdated in one or two years.

[Deathcat001 8]

Swat-medic is right CitiesXL is still in beta so you still need another 4 years to compare them. 

[Livin in Sim 83]

Hi, all, please correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't the rules for participating in the Cities XL beta state that there was to be no discussion of impressions of the game for the beta period?  I haven't logged on for a few days, is the restricted period over now?

--Liv

[RedImperator 16]

Originally posted by: Deathcat001

Swat-medic is right CitiesXL is still in beta so you still need another 4 years to compare them. quote>

OK, now that's swinging too far the other way.  If Cities XL's core mechanic is a substantial improvement over SC4's, we should know out of the box.  And likewise, if it's irredeemably terrible, we'll know that, too.  To make a comparison, SC4 vanilla was a decent game, even if it was limited without Rush Hour and the modds that came later, whereas we knew Sim City Societies was a wreck practically the day it was released.  I think we'll know early on if CXL has potential.