Almost zero demand on all cities in new regions?

[nudic2 0]

Hi, so ive been playing SC4 Deluxe alot lately and ive even managed to build quite a nice metropolis area with the help of the super demand ordinance mod. After about a month of playing this region i decided to start a new one. However upon starting my first city, i realized that i have -1000 for low and mid range residential. This is a problem because i can get no more than 500 sims in my city before it caps off. Thats with power, and at least one of each civic building. I thought it might just be the city i was playing so i tried another and i got the same result, i also tried a different region, same result. Checked back in on my big city and its doing fine i just cant start new cities for some reason. Here are some pictures:

 

 

Compared to my first region: 

 

If its any help, this started happening today when i statred playing, i just installed NAM last night and didnt really get to play afterwards so i dont know if that could factor into it. Also i tried uninstalling the super demand ordinance mod and that did nothing. Please help! i'd really like to get back to playing! 

[SimCoug 5,972]

You have a strong demand for industrial, so build that. Residential demand will follow, after Sims have jobs.

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

Actually, since it is a start up, try laying down a few farms, and build a farming village at a pair of streets that cross.  To give you a few more CPU cycles I'd turn off the UDI balloons unless you really want to do UDI at that time.  You can turn them back on later.

 

Having Sims is a matter of jobs.  When starting a new city, it is a good idea to create some jobs or at least put in a neighbour connection to someplace that has them.

[nudic2 0]

You have a strong demand for industrial, so build that. Residential demand will follow, after Sims have jobs.

 

Well i already tried creating an industrial sector and it helped residential grow to roughly 1,000 but then it tapered off again and so did industrial.

 

Actually, since it is a start up, try laying down a few farms, and build a farming village at a pair of streets that cross.  To give you a few more CPU cycles I'd turn off the UDI balloons unless you really want to do UDI at that time.  You can turn them back on later.

 

Having Sims is a matter of jobs.  When starting a new city, it is a good idea to create some jobs or at least put in a neighbour connection to someplace that has them.

How exactly do you turn off the UDI balloons? I looked in the game options and i didn't see it. Im starting to think that it really is NAM because the houses in the town are starting to abandon "due to commute time" even though the town is the size of 4 blocks and only has 500 people in it.  Any idea's? Im thinking of uninstalling NAM and then reinstalling it to see.

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

To turn off UDI press F3 to get to the My Sims Menu.  Click on the car wrapped up like a present, and then click the bottom icon.  It is a toggle, so click it once to turn UDI off.  If you want UDI back on, do the same thing again.

 

From your comment, I take it you haven't fully explored the user interface options as yet.

 

Function key review:

 

F1 - god mode

F2 - mayor mode

F3 - my sims mode

F4 - user supplementary menu

F5 - day only

F6 - night only

F7 - day/night cycle

F8 - save and exit to region

F9 - graphics options

F10 - audio options

F11 - game options

F12 - save and quit

 

Num-lock - toggle GUI.

[nudic2 0]

You're right i haven't   And i uninstalled NAM and nothing changed so i guess it isn't that after all. Could it have to do with the amount of plugins i have? I don't see how that could be the reason why but you never know. I just find it strange that there's always a permanent cap on all my demands in a new region.

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

If it is a new region with only one city, the initial demands are very low indeed.  Just tried it in my sandbox.  R$ 1000, CS$ 1000  IA 1500 ID 1500 all others zero.  As soon as I added three low density CS, a small IA (farm) and three houses to go with my wind power plant, things started changing on the demand.

 

Try adding a neighbour with a road connection. 

The demand here reflected the demands of the first tile.

Just placing a small farm and a windmill on this one caused changes to all areas of the demand graph.

 

The only face-changers I have here are the NAM and the SPAM.  I have no mods that touch the base parameters of the game other than the fixes for the various bugs, and these major items. 

 

Try this experiment:

• Rename your plugins folder to Plugins.old
• Open the game and your city
• Observe the demand now
• Close the game

If you got the normal demands I listed above on an empty city, your game is OK and the problem is in your plugins.  Delete the new Plugins folder and rename Plugins.old to Plugins to restore your conditions.

 

If your game is not OK, reinstall the game, but still restore your plugins folder.  Then see if you still have this problem.

 

If you have a plugins problem then search your plugins for any mod that might be the cause.  It is neither NAM nor SPAM.  There is a method above for searching large plugin collections called Binary Search.  For 1023 or fewer plugins this takes at most 9 steps.  For any above that the number of steps increases in a binary series.  Count your plugins (if you can) and you will find the number of steps is the power of 2 next higher than your plugin count.  For example of you have 1500 plugins it might take as many as 10 steps.