SimCity: Gameplay

[Pandemic 32]

Hoping IGN's accusation that the game is a round up of all the previous SimCity's isn't true!

[The_City_Builder 299]

Where did you see that?

[smirkazor 1]

I so hope this is all true and will be announced this week. so excited, even installed sc2000 again lol.

[BurroDiablo 222]

Installed SC4 again But can't find the time to play it

[+Guest tickleonthetummy]

Some IGN articles:

29 February

New SimCity Details Leaked

Curved roads!

Update: IGN Germany has confirmed that the magazine GameStar does have the SimCity reveal, stating it's slated for a 2013 release. The GameStar story also included an interview with Maxis President, Lucy Bradshaw.

SimCity is returning, if German magazine GameStar is to be believed. In a post on NeoGaf, images of alleged SimCity concept art have been posted, as well as a rough translation of GameStar's article on the title.

The article highlights a few details, such as the ability to create winding roads as opposed to the standard parallel and perpendicular streets of previous SimCity titles. It will also be entirely 3D, allowing players to swivel their cameras at will, and zoom in to inspect their creations up close.

The article also outlines online leaderboards and interconnected cities for SimCity players who want a touch of multiplayer. And apparently even players who want to run their city entirely alone will still be affected by some of the multiplayer components – the prices of commodities will be determined online.

We've reached out to EA for confirmation as to whether GameStar's article is true. We'll let you know if and when we hear back. For now, think of this as a very plausible rumor.

2 March

EA and Maxis to Reveal 'Mystery Game'

Watch our exclusive stream of EA's Game Changers event.

Maxis, creators of PC franchises like The Sims, Spore and more are revealing a "mystery game" during next week's Game Developer's Conference. While we've confirmed that EA and Maxis are indeed working on another SimCity, the first details you can read about here, EA is unable to confirm that this is what is being shown at the event next week. IGN has the exclusive on the live stream of EA's Game Changers Event, so if you want to be among the first to know what the announcement official is, tune in here on Tuesday March 6th at 6 PM PST.

An embedded video player will be added as soon as it's available.

3 March

New Details on the Next SimCity

The details are scarce, but here's what we know so far.

Earlier this week we reported that German magazine GameStar revealed SimCity. While there hasn't been an official world-wide announcement, IGN has translated the GameStar pages and gleaned the following details.

Simply called SimCity, a host of changes are coming to the series. For starters roads can now be curved, making for more organic city layouts than the grid framework the series was known for. The fixed viewpoint is also gone, allowing players to zoom in on specific buildings or move the camera around. Zooming in close to the ground also changes the audio, with close ups providing the cacophony of the city, and zoomed out views providing a much quieter atmosphere.

Visually, there's an increased level of detail (note: the currently leaked screenshots are concept only, not representative of the actual game). Buildings will have tiny pieces of signage, individual citizens will roam around and go about their daily lives, sometimes doing benign things like going to dinner, other times becoming proactive and protesting if jobs get low. The attention to detail actually has gameplay importance too, as you can see if a factory is working effeciently based on how it looks, how it animates.

Buildings also change over time in SimCity. Buildings progress overtime, unlocking new abilities, such as the power to put out fires faster for an upgraded firestation.

And you don't have to worry about trying to decipher the progress of your city via a number of graphs and charts, as these are being replaced with modernized infographics.

Multiplayer has been expanded for SimCity. You and your regional friends can trade resources via land, sea and air, hopefully resulting in collaboration between partners to build more effeciently. Online play also means there leaderboards, where you can see how you rank in fields like finance or production.

What's currently unclear is how the price of raw materials are determined. The article in GameStar alludes that prices in single-player are affected by what goes on in the online world. However, they don't get too specific about whether it's affected by a player-based economy or by actual, real-world events.

We should be seeing SimCity ourselves in the near future.

[JoeOh 20]

So far what Tickleonthetummy has stated, I am really starting to like what I read about this alleged SC5.....So far

I am really hoping that my previous post was nothing more than just a knee-jerk reaction by a SimCity addicted fanatic that has been let down so many times in the past.

I think I'll stow my pitchforks and torches until more is released on this up-coming title.

[Craig-Abcvs 1,595]

I think I'll stow my pitchforks and torches until more is released on this up-coming title.

[soapbox]An excellent idea.

I am amazed (well unfortunately not really) at the number of people who are so quick to bad mouth something, based on a tiny fraction of the information that they really need to form an opinion.

We only need to take a look at the comment area of You Tube to see what I mean. At Simtropolis we like to pride ourselves that we are better than that.[/soapbox]

[jacksunny 741]

Read on digg.com that curved roads are one of the key features in the game. I have also read on several sites that the game will just be called "Simcity" and not Simcity 5 or similar. Thoughts?

[Craig-Abcvs 1,595]

Dear EA/Maxis

We hope you are all well, as are we in the Simcity community. We have missed you for the last ten years, (well we last saw you in 2007, but lets not talk about that...) but please do come back.. all is forgiven.

Since this new forum was created last Wednesday it has generated around 11,500 individual page views, (around 2000 per day). So as you can see there is still significant interest in the Simcity community as to what you might be up to, and we do indeed hope that you will have something exciting to tell us on Wednesday.

Regards to all...

[whrm33 2]

Read on digg.com that curved roads are one of the key features in the game. I have also read on several sites that the game will just be called "Simcity" and not Simcity 5 or similar. Thoughts?

It has been while since SC4 was released (over a decade) and many people have never played the older "true" SimcCity games (Societies doesn't count). This might as well be a new series. Although, it still won't stop diehard SimCity fans from calling it SimCity 5, SC5 or even [gasp] SC5K.

[tSlater 134]

Or some new BAT tool SCURK? ;p

[Schulmanator 5,787]

Dear EA/Maxis

We hope you are all well, as are we in the Simcity community. We have missed you for the last ten years, (well we last saw you in 2007, but lets not talk about that...) but please do come back.. all is forgiven.

Since this new forum was created last Wednesday it has generated around 11,500 individual page views, (around 2000 per day). So as you can see there is still significant interest in the Simcity community as to what you might be up to, and we do indeed hope that you will have something exciting to tell us on Wednesday.

Regards to all...

PS: Please oh please make a good new SC5.... I have money I absolutely cannot wait to spend on it. And a horde of others as well....

and pretty please make it possible to have custom content and give it as many features as possible...

and we will love you for ever and ever!

[Ocram's Razr 963]

Well, node based roads with free angles and splines that do not reticulating (eg: roundabouts, bends, and culs-de-sac in SC4) have already been implemented by competitors so free angle and curvy roads are a must.

[BarbulaM1 38]

I am extremely excited, though I have my reservations and feel like we shouldn't get our hopes up too high. As long as they produce a game that we are able modify extensively (you know they won't make the game exactly how we want it...), then I think we will be good.

[Pandemic 32]

I really hope they don't screw it up, otherwise it'll diminish my interests for any future games they make, in regards to city building.

[unlawful_combatant 3]

Hadn't been here in years, but if it's SC5 coming up, I want to make the city on this box.

On another note, will it have waterfalls?

[hamsterTK 93]

Hadn't been here in years, but if it's SC5 coming up, I want to make the city on this box.

Oh yeah! I have an actual physical box like that somewhere

I've tried so many times but even in SC4 its not easy to get it looking right. At least in 2000 one of the bundled tilesets (tileset1.tst) had the buildings in the pictures.

[squeaky024 14]

Why does the entire world have to affect resource prices though? There has to be options to change this to only a group of friends or to set it yourself. Id like a multiplayer but I dont want to be forced into a global thing if I dont want it.

And I really dont want todays high gas prices

  Edited March 5, 2012 by squeaky024  

[Ocram's Razr 963]

Either the default will be expensive without Internet (like OmniCorp) or an 'always online' DRM is at play.

[Altus 111]

Its just been made official, the apparent trailer that popped up on youtube is real, its just been taken down by EA!! Simcity 5 here we come!!!

[City Planner 121]

How does taking that video down prove that it's real, EA may have demanded to have it removed because it's NOT real.

[Altus 111]

How does taking that video down prove that it's real, EA may have demanded to have it removed because it's NOT real.

And yet there are already dozens of fake trailers that EA has left alone? That theory doesn't really stand up.

[Ocram's Razr 963]

The New SimCity will be influenced by CXL (3D, curved roads, resources, multiplayer), SC4 (info graphics), CityVille (upgrades, animation showing activity, social aspects), Anno 2070 (fancy graphics, trade, leader boards), and previous SC titles (basic underpaying principle, zones, utilities, plopped civic services, infrastructure always remain).

[jacksunny 741]

How is it that the video has been removed, yet I can still get on to watch it :|

[Ocram's Razr 963]

Copies

[jacksunny 741]

nvm, I found the original and can't access it.

It says it was removed because of a copyright claim. This could mean it was removed simply because it had the Maxis and Simcity logos in it.

[Mithokey 96]

SimCity 5 now has a Wikipedia page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SimCity_5

Will love to see it start filling up tomorrow and Wednesday.

[jacksunny 741]

It will probably be removed, it goes against Wikipedia Policy.

[§haÅ--Ñ€ §hÅŽo 370]

I honestly think that we should try to contact Maxis about why it'd be a very good thing to allow custom content in SimCity. Though it probably won't work, it's worth trying. I can already come up with two reasons:

-Without custom content, SimCity 4 would've been dead 6 years ago.

a. Mods to customize the game and make it different from others made it very fun, and made it live longer. Without them, all of the cities would look the same as the others and the game would grow tiresome.

-Maxis and EA technically do save money and have the games lifetime expanded with Custom content.

a. Though this one may sound odd, it's true. All of this custom content has made SimCity 4 so much fun, and has made the community live for 9 years. The massive amount of custom content saves the people at EA and Maxis time and money. It would take a very long time to have the Maxis team make all of the buildings that have been made by the BAT'ers, and EA didn't have to pay a damn dime for all of the their time and hard work. That sounds like a very good deal.

[Craig-Abcvs 1,595]

More popcorn anyone?