City Specialization feature---how many per city?

[UrbanChaos 0]

Hi all-- quick question: has anyone heard/read/seen anything relating to the "City Specialization" feature (mining, drilling, tech/electronics, gambling, tourism, trade) and how many "specializations" each city can have?  Is it possible to have more than 1?  From what I've read, the natural resources in each city will be finite, so once a city has used up its local natural resources (coal/oil/etc), that city will have to import that resource from the region.  Does anyone know if multiple city specializations are possible....such as: if I wanted mining AND oil/drilling?

 

The specialization feature is a cool concept, I hope the game allows for multiple selections in a city!

[buttonhead 9]

Hi there!  From the SimCity manual:

 

"You can of course dabble in all five of the business types, but focusing on one or two in particular gives your city more of an identity." [Page 26]

[Ocram's Razr 964]

I am almost certain that multiple specializations are possible but it might be easier to manage 3.

 

 

--Ocram

[Ma8thew 77]

Ocean Quigley said in a tweet that you can have as many as you like, but the space requirements of some (like mining and education) and the conflicting needs of others (like mining and tourism) would make it difficult to have many simultaneously.

[Zpike 79]

My understanding is that specialization is not a checkbox on a form kind of thing, it's more a function of the kind of buildings you build and the amount of cash you earn in a particular category along with population count etc.. Unlocks will happen based on certain criteria you meet. If you can’t meet the criteria then you can’t unlock the building.

 

For instance, in the beta you needed a certain amount of cash earned in gambling to unlock the next building type that improved gambling in your city. If you are specialized in industry with no gambling in your city it is impossible to unlock the gambling special buildings.

[nhgriffith 179]

My understanding is that specialization is not a checkbox on a form kind of thing, it's more a function of the kind of buildings you build and the amount of cash you earn in a particular category along with population count etc.. Unlocks will happen based on certain criteria you meet. If you can’t meet the criteria then you can’t unlock the building.

 

For instance, in the beta you needed a certain amount of cash earned in gambling to unlock the next building type that improved gambling in your city. If you are specialized in industry with no gambling in your city it is impossible to unlock the gambling special buildings.

And you needed a certain number of commercial buildings before you could even build your first gambling hall to even start earning the gambling profits.

I read somewhere that the developers mentioned dabling in the trade specialization a bit in any city that was primarily focusing on mining or drilling as it was an easy way to make these cities significantly more profitable. I tended to think that the education and electronics specializations would make a pretty natural/decent overlap as well. And well-policed gambling city could easily overlap into the cultural/tourism specialization.

But yes, the specializations are based more on meeting minimum requirements in your city like the gambling requirement of X commercial businesses (15 I think) before you can build a gambling hall, then X profit per day or month or something on your gambling halls before you can build the gambling HQ. And meeting these requirements doesn't rule out your possibility of also meeting whatever requirements are necessary for building the University or the Stadium, or a Trade Depot, etc.