Biggest Failure of CXL?

[Mattaust 0]

Removed inappropriate comment.

[TigerXtrm 0]

You want a reason why everyone keeps comparing CXL to Simcity 4? Because MC themselves said they wanted to be the new Simcity 4. In their eyes they were making Simcity 5!

Cities XL isn't even close to SC5. It's not even close to SC1. Even the first Sim City had a more realistic simulator than this.

The biggest failure in this game is that MC thought that building the city is what counts. We don't just want to build a city, we want to manage it. In a city building game I want to micromanage EVERYTHING. Down to the color of the police car. MC promised all these nifty things. We could adjust roads, add lanes, make double lanes, we could make almost any road combo we wanted. What did we get in the demo? We can decide which way the traffic flows... whoopie.

Same for just about everything. Does it even matter if I put a house next to a factory? Would there be a reason for me not to just plop 16 police buildings in the corner of the map, since my citizens would be happy just for them being there. And what exactly would be the point of mass transit when it does finally make it into the game? Can I micromanage it? Do I put down busstops and program routes through the city? All these things were mentioned and promised at some point or another and I can assure you that non of it will make it into the game. Ever. No matter how long you wait.

Let's just face it. We were promised a delicious home made pie which we eagerly waited on and all we got in the end is a lame 3 day old store bought pie. We didn't get what they promised us, we will never get what they promised us.

Actually, let's not buy the game at all and spend the money we save on getting every single forum member over to Will Wright's house to beg him to make the next gen city builder the way it's supposed to be. I'd rather burn my money before I waste it on this lame excuse of a game which is nothing more then a polished version of Citylife.

[LivingInThePast 364]

Here's three I prepared earlier:

- Visual management of utilities: This was one of the greatest downfalls of Societies, and I've seen nothing of the sort.

- Custom Content: While, in theory, Monte Cristo would approve most custom content, we can kiss goodbye to most brand names. "A Jack in the Box? You want a Jack in the Box? That's not one of our sponsors! Pfft!". This makes cities one-sided and generic at best, which brings us to...

- Lack of themes: If we want to make a city as it would appear in the 1960s, it would be difficult to replicate if we have "modern" in-game ads that contradict other things.

[morriswalters 16]

Originally posted by: LivingInThePast

     Here's three I prepared earlier:

     - Visual management of utilities: This was one of the greatest downfalls of Societies, and I've seen nothing of the sort.

Doesn't seem to be in the offing,  don't know as I'd give up on it yet though.

     - Custom Content: While, in theory, Monte Cristo would approve most custom content, we can kiss goodbye to most brand names. "A Jack in the Box? You want a Jack in the Box? That's not one of our sponsors! Pfft!". This makes cities one-sided and generic at best, which brings us to...

Wait for the guidelines on CC,  until then this is speculation.  They could make a distinction between PO and SP.

     - Lack of themes: If we want to make a city as it would appear in the 1960s, it would be difficult to replicate if we have "modern" in-game ads that contradict other things.quote>

Did't I read somewhere about a Medieval Pack for PO? Elsewise same as above. Ads will be a fact of life or may peter out.

You might be right, but  I like facts when I can get them.  As pure speculation if MC opens the specs for the models and puts restrictions on PO only then any CC wouldn't violate the TOS or EULA.  You could also speculate that they would allow anything that didn't compete against there online assets.  It's not to much of a stretch to believe that their adspace will be limited to European companies, unless the game turns into a blockbuster.  An outcome most people (includeing me) don't see on the horizon. So some branded content might be possible.  The cars modeled in the game  seem to  be real models.  And somebody there seems to have a sense of humor.  Man I love acronyms.

My apologies I'm still learning .

[Ocram's Razr 964]

If you want to customize the police "Down to the color of the [darn] police car" then Monte Cristo already said that you would need a GEM for that kind of micromanagement. I think that eyecandy power-lines should exist and I think that power substations should also (multiplies amount of electricity produced or produces a small amount of clean electricity while hiring unqualified workers). I would love to have a utility GEM but that will probably never come. By the way, you cannot place police stations in the corner, they have a range that is limited by your transit speeds (and probably capacity also) and need workers. You cannot place a factory (or even wind power plants because of the noise) near to a residential neighborhood because the pollution will make the residents complain (and I have had people move out because of this). Buses will have micromanagement but I think that Mathew_MC said that it will become available via PO "hopefully by November."

EDIT: I hope that they include "City Life Roads" in the game soon, where you can draw (or have the option to use them while zoning or have a new zoning tool that adds 20x20m, 20x40m, and 40x20m lots and uses that road) wide-sidewalked small roads for $5 (or M or C) more and you will have the ability to change the direction or upgrade (small road to wooded avenue, small to 2-lane highway, wooded avenue to 2-lane highway, 2-lane highway to 3-lane highway, 3-lane highway to 2-lane highway, 2 lane highway to small road). I would also like a suburban street with parking and greenspace (lawns or gardens between the sidewalks and roads) and it could be upgraded to a 2 lane each direction (or 4 lanes one direction) city street with parking and a wide sidewalk. Those 2 types of roads would increase beauty and ease of playing.

[LivingInThePast 364]

Actually the GEMs are a pretty cool idea. See, if you pull out your old SC2K disc and load WillTV, there's a part where Will talks about Sim games of the future, where you can (I'm paraphrasing here, so it's direct quotes) have a software that can make, say, a car, then place that car in a larger world. And there'd be a lot of different software, all interacting (end paraphrasing). So why am I mad?

It's because GEMs are not going to be for everybody. They're going to be significantly priced and only to PO subscribers. What they should be is small, stand-alone mini-games that can be played with or without Cities XL. GEMs could even be rebranded products (for example, the theme park GEM could be a special version of RCT3 with new branding).

[Omniassiah 3]

GEMs are cool and I like them but it should not have been at the cost of even minor micromangement. The fact that current budget management is adjusting taxes and Bulldozing buildings is annoying. They didn't even put in the option to shutdown a service to reduce cost. As Living said GEMs as effectively game expansions that add a bit more to the game are cool. GEMs adding basic stuff that should be in there to begin with no so cool

[edcase2k4-thugangel1983 1]

i think the only positive (new) thing i've read about CXL in many months now was in fact quite encouraging. simply put: it's the fact that the game could be very easily moddable as (according to the author) its code is extremely well segmented and structured, meaning that it should be a lot easier to manipulate. hopefully it should also be quite easy to decipher files where necessary.

this enlightening revelation could in fact mean that the community could improve the game significantly and more easily than SC4. it could mean that correcting many of the game's shortcomings and expanding its features and capabilities is also very possible indeed. it may not be possible to change some parts of the simulation we don't like that are hard-coded, but by the sounds of things - there should not be that much which is out of reach.

it is very great news because it means that it doesn't matter for us how the game sells, or whether planet offer subscriptions are plentiful enough, or whether the company makes a profit or even survives. i feel sorry for MC and its employees if they do go under due to their high-risk Planet Offer gamble and "all eggs in one basket" approach to both CXL in general and the Planet Offer - but at the end of the day, it could make not one bit of difference for us as end consumers. if the game is that easily modified, then we can make CXL into almost anything we want, or into the ideal city-builder we were looking for all along. i think the sad truth is, MC will NEVER make CXL into what the die-hard fans see as the ideal city-builder for anyone, be they Planet Offer subcribers or not, and whether the game or P.O. are a financial success or not... simply because they have a different vision to the die-hard fans of what the game should be like, as has become increasingly clear.

i also don't believe anymore that they will give P.O. non-subcribers ANYTHING new at all for free after release, other than bug-fixing patches. i don't believe there will be free new content or features at all for non-subscribers.

so, from our perspective: who cares what MC do now? or if the P.O. flops and the company doesn't make a profit and can no longer have any involvement with the game (like what happened with Starpeace)? provided the game is moddable enough - our most talented community members can and will fix almost everything we don't like but MC do like or wish to keep the same for sake of performance or their own preference. we can hopefully also add a lot of content and features which MC want to add in GEMs and updates for Planet Offer subscribers only. we may even be able to do a better job than them with adding new content as well! since we don't like and have improvements in mind for some of what they've already implemented, i'm sure we'd also feel the same way about new features they add in the future...

[Ocram's Razr 964]

StarPeace was made by Oceanus and Monte Cristo only published it because it thought that it was lucrative and profitable. After Monte Cristo stopped it, Sega picked it up. Eventually 2 diehard fans bought it and distributed it on 2 separate sites/servers and another fan made an open-source clone written in Java. Lastly, EVERY SINGLE LAST MOD has to be approved by Monte Cristo! That means that all custom content needs to be sent to Monte Cristo, approved, then redistributed by Monte Cristo. This removes all cheating but also quite a bit of creativity. I think that there is something wrong with Simtopolis.

[ifurkend 0]

edcase2k4-thugangel1983, yes. But I assume you're aware that MC's EULA will never allow any reverse engineering made to the CXL. At least it isn't likely to be distributed openly within 5-10 years. Transport Tycoon (1994/1995) is modded into TTDpatch(1999) and OTTD(2003) because apparantly TT is considered an abandonware so no one out there bothers to cease the modding projects.

[edcase2k4-thugangel1983 1]

hell, maybe i'm being too optimistic...

as i said in a follow-up post to that previous one of mine:

great posts.

and also great work in your "i modded the game" thread... but after reading your quoted posts in this thread i think maybe the ray of light that your own thread shed on this game's future may have just been a flash in the dark. i thought i'd suddenly seen a light at the end of the tunnel that this game entered some months back, but i think i was perhaps too optimistic in trying to revive some hope in my mind for

CXL

.

i really think i'll probably stop posting about

CXL

at forums again because there's nothing more to discuss in all honesty.

CXL

is out of our hands completely right now, and our opinions are more than known.

there are a hell of a lot of fundamental problems with the simulation of the game and other core aspects which just may not be fixable. it may not be possible for modifications to be distributable while keeping within the law if those changes require modifying of the hard-coded files. some of the problems are just "too deep" in the simulation that i can't imagine they are fixable without changes to hard-coded files...

ah well, i'm completely and utterly tired of this anyway. my enthusiasm for anything CXL-related has been almost completely exhausted which is obviously a massive turnaround to anyone who was active at the public citiesxl forums for the 2 years i gave it my all along with everyone else, and who witnessed it all. i guess i'll just quote my "goodbye" post to the soon-to-be-gone CXL community here as well...... not that i'm leaving here, but for the sake of preservation here it is:

thanx for the mention Bounty. indeed, i gave up some time ago on the beta and on the idea of communicating our impressions to MC or even on discussing the game or what the hell they are trying to do. to give a precise, official date, i would have to say around the end of July was when i gave up.

here was my post from August 11 on the secret hidden forum at simphoni.net for beta testers only:

"

sorry but i'm not going to be able to play the Cities XL beta at all for the forseeable future as i'm very rarely at home. if things change at all and i can play the beta then i'll change planets to whatever one we are all using. just a heads up.

"

that was the last time i spoke about the game at all, anywhere, until the past week... and the last time i loaded the game on my PC was at some date before that post was made. i haven't 'completely' given up on the chance of

CXL

evolving throgh intense community modification, even if the game is not a financial success and MC abandon it, or if MC continue to take the game in offbeat gimmicky directions while disregarding the 2 years of invaluable discussions and intensely detailed preferences for content and simulation which we gave them on the old public citiesxl forums before deletion.

but i have given up on the beta, demo, initial release, and discussing the game. there is nothing more we can give to MC or

CXL

through repeating the same old discussions and opinions we've been going into at such a high level of depth for 2 years. they have their own plan and it really doesn't seem to be the one we wanted. no amount of further discussion is going to change that after 2 years of it they've already seen.

i really do miss the old citiesxl community, in all honesty. there's so many members i could mention and i'll try and include all that come to me. i know some are members at other forums, but not all. it was definitely the greatest online community i'd ever seen or been involved with... i wish it didn't have to end but the anti-climax of

CXL

inevitably put the nails in its coffin.

i'll miss you all and the old times...

André090904

Asheroo

biglower

Bountytaker

Bumpkin

CottonO

dedgren

Don Mikimax

eric

g314

Ionwind

Jahnri

Joe2102001

jon

KeanoManu

Nate

Pedro Rodrigues

Romaq

simpol

sirupflex

Sleepy Hollow

Steven Heuer

tbg10101

The Floyd

The Yeti

Titaniumnutz

ToeJam

Tropod

Tuscan

urbanlife

wisdom_bin

and everyone else... from our misguided but nonetheless always insightful, intelligent and purposeful fellowship.

you can always still find me at simphoni.net (edcaze2k3), simtropolis.com (edcase2k4), sc4devotion.com (tr0ub1e/tr0ub1es0me), simcitycentral.net (tr0ub1es0me), and simvision.net (tr0ub1e/tr0ub1es0me).

though my activity in online forums has pretty much evaporated with the fate of

CXL

, there's still always my CJs that i make - the current one being a revamped V2.0 of Tendring which you can find at Simphoni,

ST

, and SC4D. incidentally, the death of the CU/

CXL

community has lead to my lack of involvment anywhere. from January 2003 until November 2006 my 'home' was at SCC (SimCityCentral) until the community there moved to Simphoni. a new SCC was created from scratch and that again remained my 'home'. a whole new community formed from some old and some new members where we discussed the next SimCity in the same way we all discussed CU/

CXL

for 2 years - maybe not quite to the same degree - but it was almost like a smaller prototype of the kind of community we had here. the death of that community was sparked by the public release of information about SimCity: Societies and the realisation that the SimCity series as we knew and loved it would be killed off - meaning all of our intense and purposeful discussion was in vain. (it makes this all feel like deja vu to me). after the release of SC: Societies my new 'home' became Simphoni where the old SCC forums and community had migrated and been preserved back in 2006. it wasn't until the CUPlanet forums opened and had been running for a couple of months that it replaced Simphoni as my 'home', and my involvement began in trying to an insane degree along with the rest of us to help MC make this into the greatest city-builder which we all wanted.

now that almost the same fate has plagued the

CXL

community as that which killed the new SCC community, i don't really feel i have anything left. the

CXL

community has gone or will soon be gone, and although Simphoni is still my most frequently visited forum - it's not the most active place and doesn't have the same vibe as the old SCC days.

in some ways, i just have to "move on". i have my real-life which i am pretty happy with for the most part and pretty much just stay involved with the

SC4

communities for downloading new content and giving ideas/feedback, and posting CJs or reading others' CJs. doesn't mean i don't miss the old 'community' vibes that i had been a part of for the past 6 and a half years and had made different ones my online 'home' at different times...

the

CXL

one i will miss most.

[Asheroo 53]

Originally posted by: Ilikeseattle

Lastly, EVERY SINGLE LAST MOD has to be approved by Monte Cristo! That means that all custom content needs to be sent to Monte Cristo, approved, then redistributed by Monte Cristo. This removes all cheating but also quite a bit of creativity. I think that there is something wrong with Simtopolis.

quote>

It would be impossible for MC to get every single mod. Here on Simtropolis they will do that. But, people will still mod the game, not send it to MC for testing and approval, and post it up on sites MC doesn't have authority or contact with.

There will still definitely be mods without MC's approval. But, if they are worried about cheating in the PO, they should just remove and cheater when they spot them, and they shouldn't be too hard to spot since they will have a rediculous amount of something or something that doesn't make sense with the normal game engine. But, when you are on the PO, MC do have hold of your files, so they should easily tell if you're cheating or not by that too.

I can see that 2 paths will come up here... (Path 1) - The PO subscribers and MC with official additional content (Path 2) - The single players and the modders with custom content

Anyway, it shall be very interesting to see what comes out.

[Easy Bakes 253]

I truly dont see the PO/online game lasting any time.

So from what ive read so far the only way to  have all the game features is to join the PO?

So that means  iv got deals with other players in PO for rescources and stuff that my city realy needs to grow and prosper, What happens to my city if someone i have trade deals with decides to give up the game and delets thier account? My economies goes in the tank and my city is toast.

I played the beta and recources in most citys were scarce to say the least you HAD to trade for the things you didnt have.

I can see the pure frustration from just that problem driveing many many people away from this game.

just my 2 cents

[DazzaDazza 29]

I agree with ASheroo they should just they should just leave the single player custom content up to us the fans , people are going to add there own custom content in to the game wether MC like it or not.

[TrendyGuy 0]

Originally posted by: Easy Bakes

I truly dont see the PO/online game lasting any time.

So from what ive read so far the only way to  have all the game features is to join the PO?

So that means  iv got deals with other players in PO for rescources and stuff that my city realy needs to grow and prosper, What happens to my city if someone i have trade deals with decides to give up the game and delets thier account? My economies goes in the tank and my city is toast.

I played the beta and recources in most citys were scarce to say the least you HAD to trade for the things you didnt have.

I can see the pure frustration from just that problem driveing many many people away from this game.

just my 2 cents

quote>

I just started the demo about two days ago and started making my first trades yesterday. A few hours after confirming a few deals a bunch have already been cancelled. What good is making trades that can be cancelled at any time? I thought after you made a deal you couldn't cancell it for 5 days.

This game isn't going to do well with the current trade system setup. I for one am not going to purchase this game at release. Maybe I will see how it goes after a month. They should really stay in beta longer until they can figure out a system that actually works.

My one other complaint is that I can't actually do what I want in the game. If we are going to be limited to only a few types of maps because the good ones get taken up quickly then why am I going to pay extra money to not be able to play the way I want?

[morriswalters 16]

One of the problems with trading is that resources get used two ways, in trading and by your city.  As your city grows so does it's use of resources.  As population grows  they use more of everything.  This causes a lot of the trade fails.  Probaly if you buy the game I would set up deals only with serious players or maybe a trading group.

[USA_Pride 49]

Originally posted by: morriswalters

One of the problems with trading is that resources get used two ways, in trading and by your city.  As your city grows so does it's use of resources.  As population grows  they use more of everything.  This causes a lot of the trade fails.  Probaly if you buy the game I would set up deals only with serious players or maybe a trading group.

quote>

But at this point is trading fun, or is it a chore?  The whole point of an MMO is that the coloboration is fun.  Seems to me that trading implemented in this fasion does nothing but get in the way of what you want to do; build cities.

I partially liked what SC4 did with trading power, water, and garbage.  It had to be with directly connected cities, not just another city somewhere on the planet you happen to be on.  The only thing I didn't like about SC4 trading was that the water trading was broken (the graph didn't show true usage and what you need), and the pricing seemed to be a little off.

[johnwibble_uk 0]

I've just had a first go with the demo and am so disappointed. I expected a lot more from this game as I've been following it for some time (like we all have!). I have no interest in playing online and just wanted something I could play single player mode.

I found the interface "clunky" and unhelpful. I'm not sure if it's because I'm used to Rush Hour, but I think there are more keypresses in CXL just to do basic things and I found that bridges wouldn't connect to roads very well, which is not what I expected at all.

I created a couple of zone and didn't like the way that happened, it's as if I have no control of how these are created - although I may have done something wrong in the tutorial and missed something important!

Overall I've seen nothing here to temp me away from Rush Hour and I've been wanting something newer to replace that for ages. Seems like Rush Hour might be the last of a great genre of games sadly.

[rtil 1]

I mentioned this in a deleted topic and I don't think it's something anyone has really touched on, but the avatar customization thing is really limiting and frustrating. I couldn't make my character look like anything but a bizarre, disfigured middle aged man. And the people walking around in the cities were equally ugly, and their animation was poorly done. It makes me not want to zoom in and see what they're doing.

[Ocram's Razr 964]

Originally posted by: rtil

I mentioned this in a deleted topic and I don't think it's something anyone has really touched on, but the avatar customization thing is really limiting and frustrating. I couldn't make my character look like anything but a bizarre, disfigured middle aged man. And the people walking around in the cities were equally ugly, and their animation was poorly done. It makes me not want to zoom in and see what they're doing.quote>

They should have included cleaned-up City Life people with maybe some more variation.I do not like the purposely cartoony characters but I would be OK with it if they had class stereotypes (Suits, Elites, Radical Chics, Fringes, Have-Nots, and Blue Collars) as well. If they reused things from their previous game, they would have a much better selection/variety.

[Lukfi 3]

=>likeseattle: While it's probably true that you don't build your fancy villa next to a redneck trailer park, I think that most of us here are looking for a game where this kind of thing sorts itself. After all, in real life you don't restrict who may and may not buy a lot based on their social status. Most people here are SC4 fanatics and City Life is a different kind of game, more like Societies.

So here MC was, deciding whether to make an improved City Life or an improved SimCity 4... and in the end, we got an MMO that resembles neither.

As for cartoony characters, I couldn't care less. If I were a developer of a city building/management game with an ambition to replace SC4, zoomed-up graphic details would end up on the bottom of the "nice to have" feature list. This is something that SC4 never had and it never stood in the way of its awesomeness. The limitations in the traffic simulator are a far more severe problem. But then again, nobody but us cares about that, people want eye-candy. That's the general direction computer gaming has been going in the last decade, and unfortunately, often to the disadvantage of gameplay, duration, replayability...

[johnwibble_uk 0]

I've deleted the demo after a day. Back to SC4 Rush Hour for me!

[morriswalters 16]

Some of the discussions about zoning and social classes confuse me.  In point of fact money is the great seperator.  Anybody can build anywhere they want, if they  have the money.   And what makes this different from a strict caste system is the freedom to be mobile, that is to be able to improve your level of wealth, by whatever means.  Not the ability to live whever you want. What people seem to want  to do is not deal with it.  They don't want to say that if your poor here is where you live.

SC4 takes that responsibility by making neighborhoods "upgradeable" so to speak.  What is  seldom said is that when a neighborhood reverses a period of decline and becomes gentrified, then the poor people who lived there are forced to new areas.  Not because some says you can't live here, but because as things improve it becomes less affordable.  How do you model that?

In terms of improving things on the map there are any number of things I would like to see. All of them are things involving visible change.  The map seems kind of dead Particularly from height.

[Stomtroopa 3]

I guess Cities XL just needs time for it to evolve. Just look at how much SC4 has evolved in these years! As for the game play who knows...Maybe they'll update the game once in a while.

[mcchoppy 0]

Ok I know this doesn't really fit this thread, but I have a good remark about CXL.

I really enjoy the depth that CXL brings to the economy in the context of a city builder game. The addition of trading between cities really changed the game from a city builder to more of a city-state builder.

To me SC4's greatest flaw was the trading of resources and services. In SC4 a factory was simply a place for people to be employed, and anything the factory produced got sent to the edge of the map to some magic resource hole where it was never heard from again.

Just as SC4 focused its main attention on traffic and mass transit CXL focuses its attention on resources, services, trade, and cost of living. Something that SC4 largely ignored / over simplified.

I'm not saying CXL is SC5, it is just a new and different challenge compared to SC4. Also, I am happy to buy this game and support MC since they seem to be the only ones aiming to make a good city builder ( not that CXL is one ). But, if you choose to let CXL and MC fail, I don't see how you have any right to complain when no company out there wants to make city builders. Sandbox city builders like SC are disappearing and the companies that take the risk to make a decent city builder deserve a little support from the tiny sandbox city builder community. ( they deserve atleast $39.99 for a decent effort, if you can't afford 39.99 you need to be doing something more productive )

I agree CXL isn't for everyone, it is harder and more complex than SC4. If you don't like CXL thats ok, all I'm saying is it did get one or two aspects right compared to SC and I believe that MC is trying to improve its games, comparing city life to CXL, they made a big leap. Im not saying im buying CXL b/c i like it over SC, what i mean is i support the future of MC games. But, if MC doesn't continue this positive trend im not going to worry about them anymore.

[hanskamp 1]

Originally posted by: mcchoppy

To me SC4's greatest flaw was the trading of resources and services. In SC4 a factory was simply a place for people to be employed, and anything the factory produced got sent to the edge of the map to some magic resource hole where it was never heard from again.

Just as SC4 focused its main attention on traffic and mass transit CXL focuses its attention on resources, services, trade, and cost of living. Something that SC4 largely ignored / over simplified.quote>

I agree with you, especially the part that I quoted. Secondly I cannot give a good judge until after the 8th of October, when I will have been playing CXL for a while.

These are things that I found attractive in ancient city builders like Settlers 6 and Caesar IV (only Caesar - at least the earlier versions - tend to malfunction when the Roman city is too big). I am glad that I see these things in a city builder with a modern look (not with horses and chariots, but cars and freight cars instead).

Therefore, I will give MC with its CXL the benefit of the doubt.

[sparky66 0]

For me the biggest failure of CXL is the planet offer and the way single player mode comes second to it. i have been having a look at some forums specially for MMO games and they say that pointless trading and a chat box it isn't enough for them to buy it. MC would have been better just making this game a single player city builder. i wouldn't have minded having to pay for a mass transit add on like rush hour for SC4 but i doubt that will happen. Single player mode doesn't get anything. not even buses to drive around on those 'fantastic' curvy roads. They have made a game stuck between genres that pleases no one.

[redura 0]

I really can't comment because I couldn't even get my demo to work-though I suppose that that is in itself a reason to complain. I've got Windows XP, and forgive me for my ignorance, a graphics card that was good enough to play Roller Coaster Tycoon 3. Come on.

But I am also kind of looking out for a bit more detail in the economy. Maybe a little bit more action from the actual behavior in the market place that we see in the real world. Also, perhaps a little bit more of an interactive bureaucracy would be nice. I mean like bonds, tariffs, perhaps a bit more of a complex taxing system. A big thing that I hope they also have is a bit more of a complex diversity model. One of the things I didn't like about Sim City 4 was that even though the lots would differ in terms of props, they would have the same building and would make no difference. I haven't heard anything about any sort of "every lot is different" claim.

If anyone could answer me, that would be totally awesome.

[Everclear 0]

CXL's biggest failure, is that it's not a year from now, the game seems like it's got a good engine, the graphics are impressive. There is tremendous potential in the game, alot of tweeks and fixs need to be made.

[smg77 0]

Originally posted by: edcase2k4-thugangel1983

i think the only positive (new) thing i've read about CXL in many months now was in fact quite encouraging. simply put: it's the fact that the game could be very easily moddable as (according to the author) its code is extremely well segmented and structured, meaning that it should be a lot easier to manipulate. hopefully it should also be quite easy to decipher files where necessary.quote>

Why would you think MC would allow mods to be created that would compete with PO? If they were interested in providing a fantastic base game that was easily moddable they wouldn't have tried to make it into an MMO that you have to pay for every month. They have been pretty clear in the last few weeks where their priorities lie.