Arcologies!

[Quaternus 0]

I've been getting nostalgic for SC2K lately, and was wondering if anyone has thought of making arcologies for this game. I made a table for what I think some reasonable arcologies might be. The values in the table are based on the largest growable buildings of each class. My only concern is that there might be a limit of 65535 Sims to a building, which would require the R$ buildings to be reworked. I didn't name them, so everyone else can suggest names. I noticed that for growable buildings there is no desirability or pollution directly attributed to them, so it must just depend on how many Sims live or work in a building. I was thinking a building size of between 6x6 and 8x8 but input is welcome here.

Arcologies

Type	Capacity	Plop Cost	Bulldoze Cost
R$1	40730	135000	11400
R$2	63545	198750	16600
R$3	103890	270000	22500
R$$1	23015	191250	15900
R$$2	37485	230625	19200
R$$3	51955	270000	22500
R$$$1	15117	162000	13500
R$$$2	20156	216000	18000
R$$$3	25195	270000	22500
Cs$1	21990	115500	9600
Cs$2	25710	255750	21300
Cs$3	29430	396000	33000
Cs$$1	9936	207900	17280
Cs$$2	11610	460350	38340
Cs$$3	13284	712800	59400
Cs$$$1	4455	594000	49500
Cs$$$2	5940	792000	66000
Cs$$$3	7425	990000	82500
Co$$1	27192	189000	15720
Co$$2	42174	265500	22140
Co$$3	57156	342000	28560
Co$$$1	21438	256500	21420
Co$$$2	28584	342000	28560
Co$$$3	35730	427500	35700
I-R1	390	247500	20700
I-R2	520	330000	27600
I-R3	650	412500	34500
I-D1	4740	270000	22500
I-D2	6320	360000	30000
I-D3	7900	450000	37500
I-M1	2340	292500	24300
I-M2	3120	390000	32400
I-M3	3900	487500	40500
I-HT1	2910	315000	26100
I-HT2	3880	420000	34800
I-HT3	4850	525000	43500

[Muck308 55]

Hmm. It's an interesting thought.

One of the greatest things (to me that is) about the advancement of SimCity over the years is the degree of realism involved. Arcologies aren't terribly realistic but I think they might make a nice fit for SimMars. This is not to say that one must strive for realism when they play. Just my two cents.

[GMT 389]

arcologies aren't that unrealistic either.

there's plenty of thoughts on these monsters and even more artists impressions and I guess it's only a matter of time until the first real arcologies are build. ok it's quite a load of arcitectural hurdles to take to build these giant structures, but if I take a look at things like burj khalifa and equal wips, I can see a glimpse of what will come in due time. not to far to go to arcologies.

even tho I think it'll stay a scifi thing to house more than a very low 5 digit number in one building, but I'm open to be taught otherwise by scientific progress.

as for ingame sc4, arcologies are no new idea, but delicate:

first of all, you can't have multiple types in one lot, so you can have either R, C, I or 1 supplier of a kind (water, power waste etc) or 1 service of a kind (docs, cops, firefighters...) while the idea of an arcology is to have everything combined in 1 structure.

this means you must(!) create an arcology in sort of a puzzlepiece modules fashion so you get the visual illusion of 1 structure while the game handles it as several structures providing everything needed.

second, you got to consider the size limitations for a lot under the above mentioned occupant workaround. that's why I think a building size of 6x6 or 8x8 (96mx96m and 128mx128m respectively) is a little to small for an entire arco but maybe just fine for a mentioned module. of course having pictures of both the sc2000 arcos and actual artist impressions in mind.

third, you gotta work with the max limit of 65535. be it jobs of any kind or inhabitants (also I came to realize that this value is rather theoretical aswell, you can set it but you can hardly fill it, so be as realsitic as can be considering the matter at hand, one gotta tune down significantly these values)

and last, but not least, someone's gotta do all the modeling work. the bigger the structure gets, the more annoying it gets if the details are screwed, poor textures added and so on, so it's gonna be a hell of a lot of work for the person/team batting it.

so, long story short, it's possible, even tho feeling a little outlandish in a game that has become more and more realistic over years (just like muck said already), but it's also connected with a lot of mind bursting and plenty of working hours to get a decent result woth the effort