Organized log of Maxis's Reddit AMAA.

[Firebird 40]

You can read it as I create it live from this google doc.

A lot of the answers are everything us SimCity fans are dying to hear! Not kidding. These guys really want to create a real SimCity, not some dumped down game, and most have worked with Sim City since the start with Will Wright.

EDIT: Maxis is now done with their AMAA. The log can still be viewed at the link above.

  Edited March 8, 2012 by Firebird  

[The_City_Builder 299]

Really great idea, thanks for making them easy to read.

Loving some of the answers as well. Though some of the questions are quite rude...

  Edited March 8, 2012 by 1701adguru  

[Craig-Abcvs 1,595]

[Ocean] We’re making SimCity, not some dopey casual game.

Yeah baby.

[Pandemic 32]

Wow, awesome work.

[mattyriddy 12]

This should be pinned!

Such a great idea, this has been by far the most informative information about the game so far. Lots of worries and concerns have been discussed. I'm not more confident this will be a true simcity.

My remaining concerns however are:

[Ocean] ...the economic landscape that they’re operating in will be shaped by the actions of other players, even if they are only playing solo.

[Kip] We decided not to go hyper real, but hyper fun. (referring to art style.)

[Dan] The size of our new cities are roughly equivalent to the SC4 medium sized city (2 kilometers square).

On a positive note:

[Andrew] The underlying simulator definitely supports this. (referring to mixed use zones)

[Andrew] Fun disasters are definitely in our thoughts, suggestions welcome!

[Andrew] Zoning is pretty much the same as SC4.

  Edited March 8, 2012 by mattyriddy  

[KeanoManu 42]

That answer on Single Player was really confusing. They should clarify. I get MonteCristo vibes of this. Unfortunately.

But it's really good to see that they work on mixed-use zones.

[croxis 150]

This should be pinned!

Such a great idea, this has been by far the most informative information about the game so far. Lots of worries and concerns have been discussed. I'm not more confident this will be a true simcity.

My remaining concerns however are:

[Ocean] ...the economic landscape that they’re operating in will be shaped by the actions of other players, even if they are only playing solo.

We will see how this is actually implemented. My hunch is that instead of a nebulous and artifical suply/demand system to help city growth that the suppy/demand is rooted based on the SimVerse. I think they arnt even sure at this point what that will exactly shape up to be.

[Kip] We decided not to go hyper real, but hyper fun. (referring to art style.)

I have a feeling that if people got what they said they wanted, "realistic," they would hate it. Look at the beloved SC4 art direction. It is not a realistic art pallet the colors are far too vivid. "Realistic" art direction shows its age very quicly too. Styalized art, including SC4 and even SC3000, ages quite well and lasts much longer. It is also much better for the player to identify different elements on the screen.

[Dan] The size of our new cities are roughly equivalent to the SC4 medium sized city (2 kilometers square).

That also makes me sad, but we will see how the region system works out. If the neighboring cities are visible even though the simulation isn't active for them would go a long way to having a bigger city. I personally would much rather have this improved simulation with smaller city limitations than a simplified simulation over a bigger city.

[The_City_Builder 299]

So many questions that I can't even find the one that I asked...

[Firebird 40]

[Dan] The size of our new cities are roughly equivalent to the SC4 medium sized city (2 kilometers square).

That also makes me sad, but we will see how the region system works out. If the neighboring cities are visible even though the simulation isn't active for them would go a long way to having a bigger city. I personally would much rather have this improved simulation with smaller city limitations than a simplified simulation over a bigger city.

He goes on to say later that it is possible to blend cities together in a kind of metropolitan area. So, all is not too lost.

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

Well, it certainly sounds better than the announcement. I still have the impression that you will have to connect to the server to run because the server will be the repository for content, especially custom content. A money making/losing scheme probably requiring a subscription. I don't really object to this since you can play alone. You should not need massive amounts of disk space for this since everything will probably be on the server. Choice of custom content could consist only of a list supplied when you start up.

On-the-fly add of custom content would be nice.

[fatbuster 44]

[Dan] The size of our new cities are roughly equivalent to the SC4 medium sized city (2 kilometers square).

That also makes me sad, but we will see how the region system works out. If the neighboring cities are visible even though the simulation isn't active for them would go a long way to having a bigger city. I personally would much rather have this improved simulation with smaller city limitations than a simplified simulation over a bigger city.

He goes on to say later that it is possible to blend cities together in a kind of metropolitan area. So, all is not too lost.

If the region system is much more fully realized compared to SC4, I'd say losing large maps would be a fine compromise. The Glassbox engine seems like something will certainly tax newer systems as cities get large. I can only imagine how much havoc having the simulation run on a large, high population city will cause.

[The_City_Builder 299]

I doubt there's a monthly fee.

The question I asked them was:

"1. Will multiplayer be free? 2. Will there be weather?"

[Asheroo 53]

All seems pretty good and I'm very excited, but just two things...

1) 2x2km maps - I'll admit that when I sued to play SC4, I played mostly on the 4x4km maps as I prefer larger maps. But I guess they're trying to get the best performance possible, though they could implement bigger map options for those like me with more powerful computers. I'm at the moment used to Cities XL's 10x10km maps, which you can fit quite a fair bit in, but they're not connected to a region. However, it is good to see regions will definitely be in. 2x2km is just that bit too small for me, but I can live with it. May be a little difficult, but when I last played SC4 (before my teenage years xD) I didn't do the whole "big metropolis across a whole region" thing.

2) "[Ocean] ...the economic landscape that they’re operating in will be shaped by the actions of other players, even if they are only playing solo." - That concerns me. I'd rather play solo and not have my region or globe influenced by others in the whole Sim City game economy. They should implement a feature in the game where you can have your own globe and not be influenced at all by others in the Sim City game world. Though, maybe this quote refers to the prices of resources, if so then that's not too bad, I can live with that.

[tSlater 134]

[Kip] We decided not to go hyper real, but hyper fun. (referring to art style.)

I have a feeling that if people got what they said they wanted, "realistic," they would hate it. Look at the beloved SC4 art direction. It is not a realistic art pallet the colors are far too vivid. "Realistic" art direction shows its age very quicly too. Styalized art, including SC4 and even SC3000, ages quite well and lasts much longer. It is also much better for the player to identify different elements on the screen.

Not to mention with the number of polygons and textures required of a city simulation game, especially once modding opens up, our computers simply don't have the capability to handle a realistic art direction. A slight cartoony direction allows for less polygons and more shared textures (an example of this being World of Warcraft) where you can still create an environment that looks good and doesn't drop your framerate to three in the process.

It's either a mildly cartoony approach, or waiting another 10 years. I'd rather a mildly cartoony approach.

[BurroDiablo 222]

2. Will there be weather?"

Dan Moskowitz said this

[Dan] Yes absolutely, resources in our simulation engine are finite. As you extract oil or coal out of the ground it doesn’t get replaced, it’s gone. So if you’ve built up an entire city on the economic basis of extracting a certain resource, when that resource runs out your economy will collapse. For resources like water it works the same way, but can be replenished by environmental factors like rain

So I assume they have added weather

[TheRealDeadaim 38]

Only new piece of information I saw was that zoning is tied to roads and not grids. They didn't answer any of the real questions.

Still worried about the cartoon direction of the artwork though.

[croxis 150]

Actually, I am curious about this. What do you guys mean when you say "cartoony"?

  Edited March 8, 2012 by croxis  

[The_City_Builder 299]

Still want to know if multiplayer is free...

[Craig-Abcvs 1,595]

This is seriously good work Mr Fireyzero!

I think I even saw you editing the document while I was reading!

Kudos!

[Firebird 40]

This is seriously good work Mr Fireyzero!

I think I even saw you editing the document while I was reading!

Kudos!

Thank you! I really enjoyed doing it! It was way more fun than the Official EA announcement, and we learned way more. I really hope they do another one for suggestions on features for the game. I'm sure the modding community would have an earful for the designers.

Still want to know if multiplayer is free...

The vibe I get from everything I've heard so far is that it will be. They've talked about multiplayer a lot, but never once did they mention it being an 'extra option' or requiring some sort of payment. This is very early on though, so I doubt anyone fully knows yet.

  Edited March 8, 2012 by Firebird  

[Craig-Abcvs 1,595]

Actually, I am curious about this. What do you guys mean when you say "cartoony"?

I am still a little confused by what people mean by 'cartoony'...

What do people want....? 'photo realistic'?

Can you imagine how much computer power that would take? We would all need mainframes... Also I think people are being a little quick to judge on early concept art images... heck people were whining over the GlassBox presentation images... a presentation that was talking about the simulation engine.... NOT the graphics!

As the Maxis guys say... they are building this game from the simulator up... not the graphics down. There is a huge difference.

Still want to know if multiplayer is free...

Very unlikely. Who do you expect to run and pay for the servers that are required for multi-player? EA/Maxis is not a charity.

[mattyriddy 12]

I've decided i'm not to concerned about the art style/graphics. The image is from the slides from the glassbox presentation. If that is what they consider to be unrepresentative of the final game, I think it will be OK as there is lots of detail there all ready.

[Kip] Our models and environment are referenced from the real world, but stripped down of noise. What you’re left with is something that mimics maybe a detailed model railroad, instead of flat photo. You’re going to have to stay tuned as we haven’t released images with final game art, but you can get a sense of the direction we’re headed from the concept art from our website.

Still want to know if multiplayer is free...

Very unlikely. Who do you expect to run and pay for the servers that are required for multi-player? EA/Maxis is not a charity.

Also in the slideshow from the glassbox presentation they have these slides one, two, three that mention how the online may work.

  Edited March 9, 2012 by mattyriddy  

[TheRealDeadaim 38]

I am still a little confused by what people mean by 'cartoony'...

What do people want....? 'photo realistic'?

Of course not. I mean like societies, it just looks childish to me. It's hard to pin down why I don't like the look of it, It's not that the buildings look blocky - I think it's the terrain that ruins the look predominately.

I disagree when you say SC4 wasn't realistic, for the time it was. I've seen them mention a few times they are taking inspiration from the filter technique below - which would be good if true imo. (obviously not expecting it to look anywhere near as good).

[The_City_Builder 299]

Actually, I am curious about this. What do you guys mean when you say "cartoony"?

I am still a little confused by what people mean by 'cartoony'...

What do people want....? 'photo realistic'?

Can you imagine how much computer power that would take? We would all need mainframes... Also I think people are being a little quick to judge on early concept art images... heck people were whining over the GlassBox presentation images... a presentation that was talking about the simulation engine.... NOT the graphics!

As the Maxis guys say... they are building this game from the simulator up... not the graphics down. There is a huge difference.

Still want to know if multiplayer is free...

Very unlikely. Who do you expect to run and pay for the servers that are required for multi-player? EA/Maxis is not a charity.

Well, I'm starting to think it will be free for a multitude of reasons, one being that EA now has Star wars: the old republic as it's online money making option, and, to be honest, I can't imagine an "online P4P SimCity".

[Jasoncw 11,933]

I'm very excited that they're actively trying to figure out how to make wall to wall buildings follow the non-orthogonal streets.

About the realism stuff, if there's modding we can replace it all anyway. What matters most is the simulation, and the gameplay in general.

[croxis 150]

Multiplayer is probably going to be free. It is for games like TF2 or BF1/2/3. The real questionis will EA run all the servers or will there be a deticated server program.

[The_City_Builder 299]

Multiplayer is probably going to be free. It is for games like TF2 or BF1/2/3. The real questionis will EA run all the servers or will there be a deticated server program.

Probably. And note slide 2 of the online segment of the preview:

http://www.pcgameshardware.de/aid,871761/Sim-City-Inside-the-Glassbox-Exklusive-Videos-und-Infos-zum-Aufbauspiel/Strategiespiel/News/bildergalerie/?iid=1637650&vollbild

[Asheroo 53]

Still want to know if multiplayer is free...

Very unlikely. Who do you expect to run and pay for the servers that are required for multi-player? EA/Maxis is not a charity.

Completely disagree with you there Craig.

EA have several, several games that have single player and free multiplayer (I've played a heap of them over the past decade - more recently Battlefield 3). Plus, Sim City is advertised so far as being online only (and these Reddit answers seem to further confirm it) and the cost of the game would cover the server costs, as well as EA's money. Seriously, EA/Maxis are a very strong team and wouldn't want such a big backlash like with the petite Monte Cristo and the CXL Planet Offer (but Cities XL was both an offline and online game - the online was just talked about more), but lets forget about that, MC and the PO is long gone. That would be one of the stupidest things to do to charge more for multiplayer in Sim City and even though people may criticise EA, Maxis together with EA aren't that stupid.

Thanks for showing that too 1701adguru^

  Edited March 9, 2012 by Asheroo  

[Gamma Stardust 50]

Thank you for this.

[Techleo 18]

I was extremely excited when I read that each car is persistent. A car leaves a home for work, and comes home to park. Essentially meaning traffic is more or less literal. There are to many cars for a road, if there to many cars to fit. This opens up so many possibilities. If a farm takes to much nutrients from the soil, it produces less. If you rotate fields, it fixes that.

Basically a complex simulation which is easier to interact with because everythings more apparent.

As for the single player region interacting with a global economy. Actually Simcity 2000 had this and is something Id been missing. Economic trends such as a portion of your commercial demand were generated or lost from a global set of factors. I can still remember cringing when I read that cars were selling worse then usual due to a recall. My economy temporarily tanked. I had prepared for it though.

All in all, I am a very happy camper. I literally have nothing I am concerned with.