Simcity 4 VS CityXL

[TheHaso2011 152]

Blood_Avenger: Very good Point. SC4 isn't Perfect But is very good.

[bloodygrail 1]

Ah, I think the author is just looking for suggestions so he can decide which one to buy. He's not in any way looking for a "perfect" game.

I like SC4 better mainly because of the dynamism I get from the add ons. There's something new from time to time.

[DCMetro34 577]

It'll be interesting to see how far CXL 2012 can go, since we will have new modding tools (and hopefully we can create our own buildings *crosses fingers*). Either way, it's gonna be another improvement to an already exceptional game. I tip my hat to Focus Home for picking up the pieces Monte Cristo left behind, and turning it into an enjoyable game for me, and hundreds of others.

[Romaq 18]

It'll be interesting to see how far CXL 2012 can go, ...

The modding tools, especially if pathing issues are resolved, would help a great deal. Highway connections, roundabout options.

At the moment, I'm seriously considering spending $50 to pick up the whole DVD collection from the STEX, I just have to scare up the $50 first. At that point, I'm going back to play SC4. I just don't want to deal with SC4 until I get the DVDs rather than trying to hunt and find the same stuff. STEX did the work, STEX *really* ought to have the cash. Thank you Dirk, and everyone else who keeps SC4 pumped up, you are wonderful.

SC4 doesn't do true 3d, the plugins need the plugin manager and there are SO many plugins it gets to be a nightmare in short order without the manager. CitiesXL handles the menu situation a tiny bit better, but not by much. CitiesXL does do true 3D, but all in the fixed square boxes and the transport system is nothing near as fun to work with as SC4. In fact, dealing with transport issues is the primary reason I'm really looking at going back to SC4. CitiesXL is just driving me crazy on transport management. If we can seriously do mods and handle pathing, that would go a long ways towards having me not hate CitiesXL time.

SC4 lets you drop single tiles of 16m x 16m, decide what kind of thing goes there and what maximum density is allowed, then your 'sims' decide what to build, and the land value. I find I really miss surprises like that, and the 'game' of trying to build up the land wealth enough to where the really rich would move in. With CitiesXL, what you plop is what you get as far as the land value. "I need more executives. I just plopped executive housing. Exec's move in. What a surprise." The sizes are fixed, mostly squares but there are the odd rectangle things. And every rectangle thing *MUST* make the land flat. As I recall with SC4, some plop-able things would deform to match the land so long as the land was 'close'. Fences would contour, the 'in plot' roads around buildings, and such. Nothing even remotely like that for CitiesXL, except for roads.

Regions. God how I miss SC4 regions. Also the ability to actually shape the land on SC4. CitiesXL maps can have portions 'flattened', but you have nothing of the terrain control available with SC4. A factor of this is in how CitiesXL maps are. You have a relatively small heightmap, and then the illusion of contours and shadows is made by a much more detailed 'fixed' map. If you were to flatten an entire map in CitiesXL, it will still show 'land shadows' and coloring as if it were still shaped. CitiesXL maps are much more pretty, and in 3D, but you have none of the 'fun' of region creation offered by SC4.

Both SC4 and CitiesXL are single threaded and 32 bit, meaning that while they are busy with the CPU, they can do *nothing* else but have you wait. Neither will work with additional CPU cores or additional memory afforded by 64-bit machines. The performance difference when running Civilization V bears out how huge the difference is on a multi-threaded game.

Anyway, I'll putz with CitiesXL 2011 for now, and hope that CXL 2012 makes some headway on some of the issues, but if EA Games would make a serious effort at SimCity5 using SC4 game play and regions, only full-up 3D and full-up 'no fixed axis' as it is with CitiesXL. Full-up mod with a menu system prepared for tons of STEX-like stuff. An intelligent means to organize plug-ins per region and/ or city. It should also take a tip from Civ V and be multi-threaded and 64-bit to take full advantage of offered memory and multi-core machines.

I think the vast majority of Simtrop visitors are also waiting on this game.