2 new pictures

[Tramwhet 53]

[wacky32 0]

Nice!

[The_City_Builder 299]

Wow! Lots of new buildings in those pics. Nice share!

[Vahr 341]

I really like the second shot, it's rather eyepleasing and those trams are nice. The building variety is great too.

The first pic, erm, I've never seen graffiti sprayed onto roofs like that, and somehow paint can cover windows as if they weren't there... I would hope that's simply b/c they haven't fleshed out the crime layer yet.

EDIT: Realization... traffic lights are on the proper side of the intersection now!

[aparrot7 82]

Omg Trams! That's good to know that we have lots of transportation options! From the other picture you can see the real issues we have to face- in this case night-time graffiti it appears, as there is an abundance of police cars. I guess we have to make decisions on how to combat it? Cool- thanks for sharing.

[Blurque 9]

I'm becoming more excited every day.

[T Wrecks 10,209]

I sure hope they'll give those buildings some suitable textures/materials before the release.

However, the pictures show well how static, rectangular lots look good in a static, rectangular road grid - not new for a SimCity player. I still think static, rectangular lots along sweeping curves look dumb, though.

The trams are good to see, although I wonder how people get to the stations without killing themselves in the road traffic? Guess such details are still to come. Oh, and does anybody else think that the trams look considerably underscaled?

[IDS2 3,344]

The cartoony look of those pictures worries me. A lot of the buildings seem to suffer lack of detail and many of the textures appear to be rather bright and sterile.

[Mark Waybill 242]

I agree on the points of the graffiti being absurdly placed and the textures being simple.

[Azurespecter 506]

The first pic, erm, I've never seen graffiti sprayed onto roofs like that, and somehow paint can cover windows as if they weren't there... I would hope that's simply b/c they haven't fleshed out the crime layer yet.

I think it's safe to assume that final textures will come much later in development. And if not, just having graffiti is a step up from SC4. If we're given some basic tools, this community can make the graffiti look realistic even if Maxis doesn't.

The trams are good to see, although I wonder how people get to the stations without killing themselves in the road traffic? Guess such details are still to come. Oh, and does anybody else think that the trams look considerably underscaled?

I hope those details are still to come. SC4 vanilla was extremely lacking in road details... SC2013 looks very promising, but now that I've been given some details, I want the whole package. Every last detail to be correct. Also, the trams looks to be about 2x the height of cars, and about the height of a standing person. I've seen trams this small, so I wouldn't say they are "considerably underscaled" ... honestly, its the sims that look out of scale to me. Just IMO

[Zarpia 12]

The second pic looks great

But I dunno about the first one; it seems like there was a graffiti competition going on... :/

[RoseCityAlive 9]

Is it just me or dos it look like we might be advancing slightly through time? By that I mean look at some of he cars in the second picture. Some of the ones in the parking lot look older and even the trams look older. Also so far I like the way everything looks. The modle city idea is shining through, IMO

[_MostlyHarmless 17]

I feel like there is still too much dead space. Cool update though, love the trams

[The_City_Builder 299]

Is it just me or dos it look like we might be advancing slightly through time? By that I mean look at some of he cars in the second picture. Some of the ones in the parking lot look older and even the trams look older. Also so far I like the way everything looks. The mi city idea is shining through, IMO

Could just be wealth difference, like in SC4.

[steelersfan95 6]

hey it looks good

[zimmie 521]

Still no driveways. Just jumping curbs.

I think SC'13 is going to be all about the advancement of game-play and less about the advancement of visual realism/graphics or whatever. I was kind of hoping for both.

  Edited June 28, 2012 by zimmie  

[Ocram's Razr 963]

I like the pictures but I am not in love. Also, how would hooligans get to the rooftops of apartment complexes and condominiums?

[Cockatoo 2,256]

Hey, with tilt-shift off that second one wouldn't look bad at all. But those textures... please turn down the saturation a bit! I mean, how much better does this one look:

[The_City_Builder 299]

Well it's a model city so of course theres going to be more saturation then usual.

  Edited June 29, 2012 by The_City_Builder  

[Ocram's Razr 963]

I just noticed that the sims are bigger than their cars!

[steelersfan95 6]

Hey, with tilt-shift off that second one wouldn't look bad at all. But those textures... please turn down the saturation a bit! I mean, how much better does this one look:

yeah youre right im definitely going to turn tilt shift option OFF

[The Avatar 1,088]

I like the feel of both pics. They both are lively and show off the details in micro-level that Maxis is adding to SC2013. The streets look alive, in a way. I like the nightlights; they look much better than in SC4. I also like the variety of buildings in both pics, and the tram line in the second one. However, I also don't like some things.

For one thing, there is way too much graffiti on those buildings in the first pic. The graffiti also looks like it's glowing, which wouldn't happen at night unless the people who created the graffiti used glow-in-the-dark paint. I also think that there are an excessive amount of police cars and ambulances in the night pic. I assume Maxis is going for a low-wealth area here, due to the number of police/ambulance vehicles, the buildings, and the graffiti. The lots in the night pic look very bare, in my opinion. In some cases, this is okay; but I think there are too many bare lots. For instance, the lot in the bottom left corner looks like a black square.

Although I do like the look of most of the screens Maxis has released, and I like the textures, I do feel that they still could use some work. However, whether or not Maxis works on the texures (at this point, I don't think they will) is not a deal-breaker for me. I'll still buy the game if the textures stay the way they are. If they got any better, my laptop probably couldn't run the game, anyway.

[RoseCityAlive 9]

One little detail that i noticed is the trash bags next to the side walks in the first picture. Possibly be able to set trash days. I know some cities cut the number of trash days they have or put a limit on house hold trash bags to save money. this might be an interesting little aspect of the budget.

[Fatherted 129]

There was graffiti in SC4! I saw some on the back of a building!

The first pic, erm, I've never seen graffiti sprayed onto roofs like that, and somehow paint can cover windows as if they weren't there... I would hope that's simply b/c they haven't fleshed out the crime layer yet.

I think it's safe to assume that final textures will come much later in development. And if not, just having graffiti is a step up from SC4. If we're given some basic tools, this community can make the graffiti look realistic even if Maxis doesn't.

The trams are good to see, although I wonder how people get to the stations without killing themselves in the road traffic? Guess such details are still to come. Oh, and does anybody else think that the trams look considerably underscaled?

I hope those details are still to come. SC4 vanilla was extremely lacking in road details... SC2013 looks very promising, but now that I've been given some details, I want the whole package. Every last detail to be correct. Also, the trams looks to be about 2x the height of cars, and about the height of a standing person. I've seen trams this small, so I wouldn't say they are "considerably underscaled" ... honestly, its the sims that look out of scale to me. Just IMO

[T Wrecks 10,209]

I'll still buy the game if the textures stay the way they are. If they got any better, my laptop probably couldn't run the game, anyway.

I don't see why that would be the case. It's not like textures are blurry or devoid of any reflection. If this were the case, then it would take higher-resolution textures (to overcome the blurry look) or higher reflection settings (to overcome the lack of reflections). Both of these measures would probably make the game more resource-hungry.

However, this is not the problem. The textures are crisp, and they are reflective - too reflective. All buildings shine as if they were made of plastics. Fixing that would require toning down reflections and playing with texture patterns and saturation, both of which would probably not affect performance.

@ Azurespecter: Well, the trams may just be on the small side, not underscaled. I'm used to considerably bigger vehicles from where I live, so that might have contributed to my impression. Here's a scale drawing of the trams I am used to, and they normally go in double configuration, like here. This probably affected my view on things.

In any case, now that you mention it, I think you are right about the Sims.

[meowza 230]

Interesting shots, thanks for posting.

I like how the first picture looks so crime-ridden, while the other seems clean and quite classy.

By the way, that intersection looks sick...

  Edited June 29, 2012 by meowza  

[Supertask 29]

They look really nice, especially the first one, they look vibrant and detailed and the lighting works well. The location and frequency of the graffiti is rather weird (also the fact these buildings look fine other than the graffiti, in most cases buildings with a lot of graffiti on them would also have other signs of dilapidation) - but then these are the sorts of things they will probably tweak in the coming months.

There was graffiti in SC4! I saw some on the back of a building!

Yes but that is a specific graffiti prop which is only applied to a few buildings and shows up when the crime rate in the area reaches a preset limit (and always appears exactly the same), this graffiti appears to show up on any building.

[elavery 1,013]

I like the look of the second picture, although the cartoonish feel is still there. I wonder if there will be W2W buildings, I don't like how everything is on its own lot and separated from the building next to it. Those graffiti buildings are the type that are all joined together like rowhouses.

[RoseCityAlive 9]

I like the look of the second picture, although the cartoonish feel is still there. I wonder if there will be W2W buildings, I don't like how everything is on its own lot and separated from the building next to it. Those graffiti buildings are the type that are all joined together like rowhouses.

I was wondering the same thing. I love the look and feel of urban w2w areas. Like Detroit. Gives a real feeling of history

[Frode789 70]

Why are the sims higher then the cars?.. Please get this stuff right! (scales of people,cars, buildings, sidewalks etc..)