The more I play this game, the less fun and more frustrating it gets

[MallowTheCloud 41]

I've had soooo many problems with this game, it's just not fun. I was very excited to play it, and had some moments of enjoyment. But my overall reaction is strongly negative. So far, I like every previous iteration of SimCity (even SimCity Societies) more than this game. The following is a non-exhaustive list of "complaints" I've already accrued, after only having played the game for two days. I'm concerned that every time I try a new aspect of the game, I'll find similar issues.

 

1. City sizes too small, and city-speckled regional landscape looks silly. Everyone has already talked about it. But it's true. If this were the only problem, I could easily look past this and enjoy the game. Since it's not the only problem, it's instead the first of my long list of complaints.

 

2. Server problems. Of course, this is expected at launch. Again, if this were the only issue, I could live with it. But I'm just starting.

 

3. Small bugs add up. There are so many small bugs with this game, it might as well have never been beta-tested. Some of the ones I've noticed include: industrial/commercial zones inexplicably being "re-zoned" as residential, then when you de-zone the residential areas the industrial/commercial zones are still there underneath; tiny sections of zoning randomly disappearing; attempting to plop the trade HQ sign doesn't work... it plops, and then disappears... I've noticed this with a couple other ploppables, though for those I could just try again and it would work; some of the longer messages that show up on the top of the screen are cut off, and there's no way to click to read the rest of the message; once, the game randomly made me go through the whole initial tutorial again, or else I couldn't play; there are plenty more that I can't remember off the top of my head.

 

4. Water. Now we start getting into the big ones. My city of less than 80k ran out of ground water. What's more, nuclear power is unusable because it sucks the water dry in a matter of a couple "years". I have yet to see it "rain" and replenish the water table. The one solution is to take advantage of an odd bug-like feature that allows you to build only one water pump, attach a bunch of filtration systems, and plop it all next to an outflow pipe (I'll get to sewage in a couple points). Importing from neighboring cities would be great, but they'll run out soon enough as well. And more importantly...

 

5. Intercity play. I must be missing something, because I'm having trouble getting this to work logically. Obviously it can take a long time for one city that's producing, say, excess water to become "available" to send it to another one, which is annoying but I could otherwise look past. But then when I buy water, it costs the buying city money. But I have yet to see a dime of this in my selling city--it's simply not earning money from the water it's selling. Sending safety vehicles must be more complex than I would expect, too, since I haven't been able to do it yet. And annoyingly, I tried to send a gift of 100k simoleons from one city to another. It left the original city, but never arrived in the city it was destined for, even though I waited over 15 minutes in both cities (several times). I'm also having issues with great works, but I'll bring that up in my complaint about sending/trading resources.

 

6. Sewage. Maybe it's just a bug, but I originally had one main sewage treatment area in one corner of my city. I tried the method to fix number 4 above by adding other sewage options in another part of my city, and deleting some of the original capacity of the first sewage treatment area. Although the game claimed I had plenty of sewage treatment capacity, it was backing up big-time in the original sewage treatment corner. The other corner of the city had sewage going towards it, but it seems having two sewage treatment areas in my city broke the game's sewage treatment algorithms, and it couldn't figure out how to parse the sewage properly. As a result, a large high-wealth chunk of my city deserted because of "too much sewage", when I had plenty of capacity to take care of it.

 

7. Disasters. They're WAY too frequent, and their impacts can be WAY too significant. I had two monster attacks in less than one "month" of game time. The first destroyed a bunch of important buildings, including my main trade center. Which, after all the other problems I noted from above, was one of the only things keeping my city afloat. If the city tiles were larger, I could have enough economic diversity to recover from this, but with the tiny cities we have, that's just not really a viable option. Now the only option I have is to turn off my few remaining services, which is going to make all my tax-paying residents/workers leave... so a catch-22. All because of one disaster. If they were less frequent I wouldn't mind so much, because I'd have time to recover between disasters... but before I had really even made a dent in my recovery, another monster attacked my city.

 

8. Sending/trading resources. Some of this is due to my ignorance of the mechanics, but that's part of the problem... this is one of several aspects of the game where there's really no guidance on how it works. There's overarching ideas, but the specifics elude me. Is all my production of alloys coming from my recycling center, or is some coming from somewhere else (industry?)? When I select to export to the global market, does it still allow some local use, or is all of it sold to the global market? If the latter, why don't I have an option to use some (what's needed) locally, and sell the rest to the global market? If I want to send resources to a great work, should I choose "use locally" (where "local" in this case means regional)? Why did a giant chunk of processors get sent to the great work, but alloys and plastics are being sent extremely slowly? And why does it often tell me I have no resources available to send, so deliveries have stopped, even though I do have the resources? And why does it seem to not be correlated to whether or not I have "Sell to the global market" selected? And when does the game decide to send chunks of resources to the great work? Because as far as I can tell it's completely random... play the city long enough and every once in a while, where "once in a while" is some random amount of elapsed time, you MIGHT send something to the great work, if the resource is "available" (even though the resource IS available). I understand so little of what's going on that I can't even tell you whether some of these behaviors are "bugs", or whether it's just that I don't understand what I'm doing and I'm missing some critical point. But the game manual is completely and utterly useless when it comes to answering these questions.

 

...

 

 

Considering I've only tried maybe 10% of the game content and I've already run into so many brick walls, I can't imagine how many other "complaints" I'd have if I had a sampling of the rest. Some of the problems listed above are clearly just bugs that can be fixed. Others are minor gameplay mechanic problems that could easily be tweaked to fix the issues. But some are basic, essential gameplay mechanics that couldn't be fixed without a major game overhaul. Obviously having a city I worked on for some time completely broken by all of the above problems has me frustrated, and maybe if I start another new city/region it will allow me to "try again" using what I now know, but when you pile the uncontrollable (disasters) on top of the controllable issues that I just don't understand (in many cases because there's no official documentation that I can find), it's a recipe for frustration, and it's not being balanced by any real fun. So why am I playing this game, exactly?

[thatsarap 25]

Well stated! 

 

On the other hand, at least you've been able to play! 

 

I was able to play on the NA servers for the first few days.  Albeit with a number of crashes.  Today, it's a no go. All those Europeans and Oceanic's coming online have ruined it for the rest of us!

 

Guess I'll try back in a week to see if EA has figured out how to let their customers use the products they buy.

 

But I really do agree with your analogy. Those issues you mention do hurt the game.  Not being able to dispatch fire trucks really hurt one of my cities.  Haven't run out of ground water yet, but that would really suck.  But the music is soothing, which helps to take the edge off the frustrations.

 

Hope I get to play it again soon, and I'm really really really hoping they put out a major version upgrade, not just patches, to address the issues they should have understood before releasing it.  Thanks, EA!

 

 

[Xenocity 343]

Well the game isn't for everyone.

 

I mean I've gotten frustrated to the point of quitting on every Simcity game because each game got the better of me at one point.

 

But I always go back and realize why I love them...

 

Now EA has promised they are bring on more servers in the next two days to meet the demand.

Personally I play on the Western Europe 1, because of the 6-8 hour difference (depending on country).

So they should all be going to bed soon.

[nhgriffith 179]

Half of your issues are related to the launch issues with the lag and server problems.

And half of your issues are related to your ignorance of game mechanics and apparent refusal to try to figure them out. I can't remember where off-hand, but there's a link to a game manual in the main menu of the game, so maybe you should check that out.

As for the rest of your issues (I know, I already accounted for two-halves, but that's the bulk of them) are what seem to be bugs that are minor and or easily patched out, but also issues that I haven't personally run into (not saying they don't exist, just saying they might be rare issues).

[Zpike 79]

Well, your water problem is not the fault of the game.  Water is a resourse and you need to think about that when claiming a city.  If you claim a city with no water you will have water issues and you will need to make a deal with a nearby city to handle your water needs.

 

I have several cities with around 150 - 200k population and plenty of water.  I also have a couple of cities with 50 - 100k population that need water shipped in from other cities.

 

Note also that the filtration plant and sewage outflow trick is not a bug.  They designed it that way so low water cities can make their own water.

 

 

You make the statement that some of your frustration is due to your ignorance and I must agree.  I think most of your frustration is due to it.  City builder games are ment to be technical and strategically difficult.  That's their purpose.  If you are getting frustrated learning how to use your resources then SimCity may not be the game for you.

[kgpurrs 107]

This game was never about, scream at the top of your lungs I'm having the time of my life fun!  The fun is building your region and having a strategy in doing so.  Have you built your 4 great works in a region of 16 cities?  If you've already done that, post a screenshot and then I can take your comments seriously.  

 

Maybe city building simulation isn't your type of game.

[MallowTheCloud 41]

Half of your issues are related to the launch issues with the lag and server problems.

And half of your issues are related to your ignorance of game mechanics and apparent refusal to try to figure them out. I can't remember where off-hand, but there's a link to a game manual in the main menu of the game, so maybe you should check that out.

As for the rest of your issues (I know, I already accounted for two-halves, but that's the bulk of them) are what seem to be bugs that are minor and or easily patched out, but also issues that I haven't personally run into (not saying they don't exist, just saying they might be rare issues).

 

Ignorance of game mechanics, sure. Refusal to try to figure them out? No way. I have been to the game manual. It explains everything in the least helpful ways possible. It gives info on overarching ideas, but doesn't go into specifics. And specifics are where I'm running into brick walls.

 

And let's be fair, only one of my issues is related to lag/server problems. Not "half".

[GoldenShadowGS 0]

Half of your issues are related to the launch issues with the lag and server problems.

And half of your issues are related to your ignorance of game mechanics and apparent refusal to try to figure them out. I can't remember where off-hand, but there's a link to a game manual in the main menu of the game, so maybe you should check that out.

As for the rest of your issues (I know, I already accounted for two-halves, but that's the bulk of them) are what seem to be bugs that are minor and or easily patched out, but also issues that I haven't personally run into (not saying they don't exist, just saying they might be rare issues).

http://akamai.cdn.ea.com/eadownloads/u/f/manuals/GAME-SIMCITY/SimCity_2013.pdf

[MallowTheCloud 41]

Well, your water problem is not the fault of the game.  Water is a resourse and you need to think about that when claiming a city.  If you claim a city with no water you will have water issues and you will need to make a deal with a nearby city to handle your water needs.

 

I have several cities with around 150 - 200k population and plenty of water.  I also have a couple of cities with 50 - 100k population that need water shipped in from other cities.

 

Note also that the filtration plant and sewage outflow trick is not a bug.  They designed it that way so low water cities can make their own water.

 

 

You make the statement that some of your frustration is due to your ignorance and I must agree.  I think most of your frustration is due to it.  City builder games are ment to be technical and strategically difficult.  That's their purpose.  If you are getting frustrated learning how to use your resources then SimCity may not be the game for you.

 

 

This game was never about, scream at the top of your lungs I'm having the time of my life fun!  The fun is building your region and having a strategy in doing so.  Have you built your 4 great works in a region of 16 cities?  If you've already done that, post a screenshot and then I can take your comments seriously.  

 

Maybe city building simulation isn't your type of game.

 

 

Um, you guys do realize that SC4 is one of my favorite games of all time, right? I know how city-simulation games work. I've played pretty much all of them (even Cities XL).

 

Zpike, the city I ran out of water in was a city with "max" water supply. It now has almost zero. As for the sewage->treatment->water not being a bug, that's fine, but there's no way I would have figured out that that's a way of "fixing" my water problems by myself. I would have assumed, logically, that dumping sewage would not lead to an infinitely-replenishing water table. That makes no sense.

 

kgpurrs, it should be a challenge to build a large, successful region. It should take strategy and wise use of resources. There should be moments of frustration, but it should be a moment to learn and recover. That has not been my experience so far. My experience has been that I don't even know what's going on in my city half the time, and have no idea where to even begin looking. How can I learn from a mistake when I don't even know what the mistake is in the first place, and have no idea where to find out? They claim data layers give you more information about your city than ever before. But not all mechanics have a data layer, and for those that don't, you're stuck just accepting that what's going on is intended behavior (if you can even know what's going on).

 

 

EDIT: I'd also like to point out that I could easily create a large, successful region on my own if I wanted to given what I know of SimCity so far. But I'd have to forego some of the aspects of the game I want to try in order to do so. Which is ridiculous game design... "we have made this available for you, but good luck figuring out how to implement it how you want to successfully, because we're not going to explain how it works in-game".

[KCJC 367]

Some of the people responding to this thread make me sick.

 

How can you call some one ignorant for complaining that vital game mechanics are not functioning as they should, or are ridiculously unrealistic? Not to mention that you generalize the issues into categories so that you can simply sweep them aside without addressing them. So you go on blaming every issue on the launch (which, by the way, is not an excuse), or accusing the OP of not knowing what he's doing.

 

The fact is that SimCity is, in it's current state, not only a flawed and unrealistic simulator, but simply unplayable.

 

If these people aren't going to apologize for their disgusting conduct like they apologize for the actions of their beloved EA, then I will say to the OP that I am sorry people here behave like this.

[tomfoolery_79 85]

The more I play, the more I like it.

[MallowTheCloud 41]

Half of your issues are related to the launch issues with the lag and server problems.

And half of your issues are related to your ignorance of game mechanics and apparent refusal to try to figure them out. I can't remember where off-hand, but there's a link to a game manual in the main menu of the game, so maybe you should check that out.

As for the rest of your issues (I know, I already accounted for two-halves, but that's the bulk of them) are what seem to be bugs that are minor and or easily patched out, but also issues that I haven't personally run into (not saying they don't exist, just saying they might be rare issues).

http://akamai.cdn.ea.com/eadownloads/u/f/manuals/GAME-SIMCITY/SimCity_2013.pdf

 

Yes, do you see how unhelpful that is? Just an example quote, and this is the MOST helpful type of quote I can find...

 

"Other services, like police, fire, or transportation, can be volunteered to another city. To 

send help to your neighbor, you must first have enough resources to supply your own city. 

Once the needs of your people have been met, you can choose to assist others. If you have 

surplus, select the icon of the resource, and then select the number of vehicles to volunteer 

to that city. Your services are then on the move, and help will arrive in your neighbor’s 

city shortly. Note that vehicles you volunteer do not subtract from the number of vehicles 

available to your city."

 

Great. Something I would have logically concluded on my own. And yet it doesn't answer my question. What, exactly, constitutes "enough resources" to supply my own city? What's the threshold, and why? This is one of the most technical paragraphs in the whole manual, and even it isn't that helpful. The game manual simply does not answer most specific questions about game mechanics.

[MallowTheCloud 41]

I'd also like to point out that there are aspects of the game that are amazing. The level of detail of the buildings, the fact that every sim is accounted for, etc. If it wasn't for the unnecessary frustrations (there are necessary frustrations, but I'm not referring to those here), there would be quite a bit going for this game in my eyes. And I do believe things will improve with time. The game has a lot of potential.

 

But as it is now, it's very tough for me to enjoy the game as a city simulator.

[thatsarap 25]

Ignore the arrogant posts in your thread, Mallow.  You're right, there are game mechanic issues along with the technical issues that are glaringly apparent.   This game has flaws, even if some refuse to see it, deflecting it with haughty responses that do nothing but underscore their shortcomings.

[GoldenShadowGS 0]

As I understand, excess means extra capacity. If you are generating 150megawatts of power, but your city only needs 50 megawatts, then neighbors can buy that extra 100 MW of power. However, if your city expands and starts consuming 150 MWs, then you don't suddenly run out of power, the neighbor is cut off first, telling them you no longer have power available to sell them. 

Cities who keep their utility capacity at optimal levels are terrible at supplying other cities in the region since it will fluxuate and constantly disrupt service in the receiving city.

[mastorofpuppetz 199]

Half of your issues are related to the launch issues with the lag and server problems.

And half of your issues are related to your ignorance of game mechanics and apparent refusal to try to figure them out. I can't remember where off-hand, but there's a link to a game manual in the main menu of the game, so maybe you should check that out.

As for the rest of your issues (I know, I already accounted for two-halves, but that's the bulk of them) are what seem to be bugs that are minor and or easily patched out, but also issues that I haven't personally run into (not saying they don't exist, just saying they might be rare issues).

Please elaborate? Many users are mentioning a bug with the water system. Or you dont have anything factual to add? good to see the EA defense force are out in full damage control mode lol. Most of his issues had ZERo to do with launch or server issues, can you reaD?

[MallowTheCloud 41]

As I understand, excess means extra capacity. If you are generating 150megawatts of power, but your city only needs 50 megawatts, then neighbors can buy that extra 100 MW of power. However, if your city expands and starts consuming 150 MWs, then you don't suddenly run out of power, the neighbor is cut off first, telling them you no longer have power available to sell them. 

Cities who keep their utility capacity at optimal levels are terrible at supplying other cities in the region since it will fluxuate and constantly disrupt service in the receiving city.

 

Yes, again, this is perfectly logical, but not what I was talking about. Take a look at my post again. I'm asking about "excess" as it pertains to police, fire, medical, etc. How am I supposed to know how many ambulances I need to reach the "excess" threshold?

[mastorofpuppetz 199]

Some of the people responding to this thread make me sick.

 

How can you call some one ignorant for complaining that vital game mechanics are not functioning as they should, or are ridiculously unrealistic? Not to mention that you generalize the issues into categories so that you can simply sweep them aside without addressing them. So you go on blaming every issue on the launch (which, by the way, is not an excuse), or accusing the OP of not knowing what he's doing.

 

The fact is that SimCity is, in it's current state, not only a flawed and unrealistic simulator, but simply unplayable.

 

If these people aren't going to apologize for their disgusting conduct like they apologize for the actions of their beloved EA, then I will say to the OP that I am sorry people here behave like this.

Every thread has the blind homers, the same people posting in other threads saying the same blind sheep garbage, thise guys cannot even formualte a critical thought in theri brain. Ignore them theya re blind.

[MallowTheCloud 41]

Half of your issues are related to the launch issues with the lag and server problems.

And half of your issues are related to your ignorance of game mechanics and apparent refusal to try to figure them out. I can't remember where off-hand, but there's a link to a game manual in the main menu of the game, so maybe you should check that out.

As for the rest of your issues (I know, I already accounted for two-halves, but that's the bulk of them) are what seem to be bugs that are minor and or easily patched out, but also issues that I haven't personally run into (not saying they don't exist, just saying they might be rare issues).

Please elaborate? Many users are mentioning a bug with the water system. Or you dont have anything factual to add?

 

I'd also like to point out that many of the issues I originally brought up (certainly more than half) are neither related to launch issues nor simple game-mechanic-ignorance. Like the fact that my city selling water wasn't earning any money for it. I'm reasonably convinced Mr. Griffith didn't even really read my post.

[Xenocity 343]

 

Half of your issues are related to the launch issues with the lag and server problems.

And half of your issues are related to your ignorance of game mechanics and apparent refusal to try to figure them out. I can't remember where off-hand, but there's a link to a game manual in the main menu of the game, so maybe you should check that out.

As for the rest of your issues (I know, I already accounted for two-halves, but that's the bulk of them) are what seem to be bugs that are minor and or easily patched out, but also issues that I haven't personally run into (not saying they don't exist, just saying they might be rare issues).

Please elaborate? Many users are mentioning a bug with the water system. Or you dont have anything factual to add?

 

I'd also like to point out that many of the issues I originally brought up (certainly more than half) are neither related to launch issues nor simple game-mechanic-ignorance. Like the fact that my city selling water wasn't earning any money for it. I'm reasonably convinced Mr. Griffith didn't even really read my post.

Could be a bug.

 

My Capital City (Main city) sells Power, Water, Sewage to its neighbor.

It in turn buys garbage and something else.

 

This keeps my city from completely going under.

[MallowTheCloud 41]

 

 

Half of your issues are related to the launch issues with the lag and server problems.

And half of your issues are related to your ignorance of game mechanics and apparent refusal to try to figure them out. I can't remember where off-hand, but there's a link to a game manual in the main menu of the game, so maybe you should check that out.

As for the rest of your issues (I know, I already accounted for two-halves, but that's the bulk of them) are what seem to be bugs that are minor and or easily patched out, but also issues that I haven't personally run into (not saying they don't exist, just saying they might be rare issues).

Please elaborate? Many users are mentioning a bug with the water system. Or you dont have anything factual to add?

 

I'd also like to point out that many of the issues I originally brought up (certainly more than half) are neither related to launch issues nor simple game-mechanic-ignorance. Like the fact that my city selling water wasn't earning any money for it. I'm reasonably convinced Mr. Griffith didn't even really read my post.

Could be a bug.

 

My Capital City (Main city) sells Power, Water, Sewage to its neighbor.

It in turn buys garbage and something else.

 

This keeps my city from completely going under.

 

Ugh, so apparently bugs just like me, then?

[shorty2 94]

I was watching a live stream yesterday and the guy experienced the sewage problem you described. He managed to get his residents back though because he had a lot of cash.. but only just! After placing another sewage plant, and basically experimenting with turning them on/off, he managed to get the whole thing resolved. If he hadn't saved the cash he wouldn't have been able to afford the plant and he would probably have lost the city.

 

Saying all this stuff will be patched is fine, BUT.. it makes you wonder whether they actually tested the game before releasing. It's not the first time I've thought that about a game, one of the FIFA football games also got me thinking like that. Just some ridiculous errors that would have surely been spotted if the game was tested properly.

[pkderek 51]

I was watching a live stream yesterday and the guy experienced the sewage problem you described. He managed to get his residents back though because he had a lot of cash.. but only just! After placing another sewage plant, and basically experimenting with turning them on/off, he managed to get the whole thing resolved. If he hadn't saved the cash he wouldn't have been able to afford the plant and he would probably have lost the city.

 

Saying all this stuff will be patched is fine, BUT.. it makes you wonder whether they actually tested the game before releasing. It's not the first time I've thought that about a game, one of the FIFA football games also got me thinking like that. Just some ridiculous errors that would have surely been spotted if the game was tested properly.

I'm sure it was tested properly but what good are tests if nothing is fixed? I mean they had 2 "beta" tests to see if they could handle server capacity. Most of the time the servers were down during their "betas". In hindsight do you think they fixed anything?

[MallowTheCloud 41]

I was watching a live stream yesterday and the guy experienced the sewage problem you described. He managed to get his residents back though because he had a lot of cash.. but only just! After placing another sewage plant, and basically experimenting with turning them on/off, he managed to get the whole thing resolved. If he hadn't saved the cash he wouldn't have been able to afford the plant and he would probably have lost the city.

 

Saying all this stuff will be patched is fine, BUT.. it makes you wonder whether they actually tested the game before releasing. It's not the first time I've thought that about a game, one of the FIFA football games also got me thinking like that. Just some ridiculous errors that would have surely been spotted if the game was tested properly.

 

Glad to know I'm not the only one.

 

While it is annoying that bugs like this are in the game at launch, I have come to expect that with games. And really, I would happily look past ALL the bugs if the other problems didn't exist.

[ETK 14]

Alright, bought the game. Not able to play, and not even able to log in to Origin to give feedback how bad it is that I can't play a game I've paid money for. I try to log in to Origin and it says "Sorry, this service is temporary unavailable." .. they didn't even bother to write proper english there ...

 

Hey I guess it doesn't matter, they have my money already.

[infoman96 27]

I didn't think I'd say this, especially  about a game that has so much potential but I want a refund; this is ridiculous , I haven't had a real chance to play the game or utilize all the features because of the lack of servers. I just want to use the multiplayer feature that is treasured so much by EA but how can I when the servers are down?

 

This pretty much sums up why I want my money back, I've never seen a server say full until now so I'm assuming the problem will only continue to get worse and I wont get any gameplay at the hours I want it and that's the real problem. It doesn't make sense that I can't play a game I paid for at the time I want to play it, I understand piracy is terrible but don't punish all of us for it especially on a game that we all treasure so much. I remember when I first purchased SC4, I was like 13 or 14 and I was originally trying to purchase City Life but they were out of stock so I decided to buy SC4 instead and it was amazing. So for them to lose my trust, a person that bought SC4 about four to five times, means they really have messed up this time. I'd suggest Maxis separate from EA because EA has the wrong interest for Maxis; if Maxis had separated from EA and made a 'Kick Starter' account to fund SimCity, I bet you it would've been far better than what it is today. 

 

 

But anyways, I'm done with my rant.

[Ixtellor 2]

1) Water is a problem in many cities in America. I like this realistic aspect. You basically have to do what REAL cities have to do, import water or filter your sewege and reuse it. No idea why people are complaing about this.

 

2) Why is it self evident what the "right" amount of police is, or fire protection, or medical attention? There is no right answer to any of those questions, in real life, so why are people expecting to just look at a chart and plug in the "right" amount of fireman in game?

 

Also, our simcities grow a lot faster than real cities, so of course we are going to struggle with sewage, water, trash pick up, etc.

If you don't want to have problems, dont' expand your city so rapidly.

Build a small city with few zones areas, save up enough money to expand services, then add zones.

 

People are trying to go from 0 population to 200K population overnight, then get surprised when they can't handle all the challenges that kind of INSANE growth leads to.

 

3) Server issues are causing many of your problems. City #1 isn't talking to City #2 via the Cloud, hence you're having trouble with sharing resources.

 

4) The game is a puzzle, so don't get upset if you dont' solve it on day 1.

[MallowTheCloud 41]

1) Water is a problem in many cities in America. I like this realistic aspect. You basically have to do what REAL cities have to do, import water or filter your sewege and reuse it. No idea why people are complaing about this.

 

2) Why is it self evident what the "right" amount of police is, or fire protection, or medical attention? There is no right answer to any of those questions, in real life, so why are people expecting to just look at a chart and plug in the "right" amount of fireman in game?

 

Also, our simcities grow a lot faster than real cities, so of course we are going to struggle with sewage, water, trash pick up, etc.

If you don't want to have problems, dont' expand your city so rapidly.

Build a small city with few zones areas, save up enough money to expand services, then add zones.

 

People are trying to go from 0 population to 200K population overnight, then get surprised when they can't handle all the challenges that kind of INSANE growth leads to.

 

3) Server issues are causing many of your problems. City #1 isn't talking to City #2 via the Cloud, hence you're having trouble with sharing resources.

 

4) The game is a puzzle, so don't get upset if you dont' solve it on day 1.

 

Again, someone that apparently assumes I'm dumb and haven't thought of any of this myself.

 

1. No, it's not realistic. A realistic water supply is a reservoir. Aquifers are secondary. Untreated sewage dumped into an aquifer and then re-extracted and treated is certainly not a large source of our drinking water in real life. "Water problems" are normal for a city. These are not normal solutions.

 

2. I wasn't asking what's "right" for my city, I was asking what the threshold is (and why it's there) to be able to send an ambulance, say, to another "city" (read: neighborhood). This is something that has to have a definitive answer in the simulation, and there's no "real-life" counterpart to compare it to. And my problems aren't with building a successful city, they're with trying to figure out what's going on in my city and why, and whether or not I'm seeing a bug.

 

3. That's what I figured, but I wasn't sure. And how am I supposed to know that? Wouldn't it be logical to have some way of keeping track of everything so I know things aren't just getting lost, or so that I know about how long it will take to see the results?

 

4. That's not why I'm upset. "Figuring it out" from the perspective of "finding a good balance of services, growth, etc" is fine. My problem is "figuring it out" from the perspective of "finding out why the game is doing things I don't think it should be doing, or isn't doing things I think it should". And again, this only pertains to some of the complaints I listed.

[Ixtellor 2]

Again, someone that apparently assumes I'm dumb and haven't thought of any of this myself.

 

1. No, it's not realistic. A realistic water supply is a reservoir. Aquifers are secondary. Untreated sewage dumped into an aquifer and then re-extracted and treated is certainly not a large source of our drinking water in real life. "Water problems" are normal for a city. These are not normal solutions.

 

2. I wasn't asking what's "right" for my city, I was asking what the threshold is (and why it's there) to be able to send an ambulance, say, to another "city" (read: neighborhood). This is something that has to have a definitive answer in the simulation, and there's no "real-life" counterpart to compare it to. And my problems aren't with building a successful city, they're with trying to figure out what's going on in my city and why, and whether or not I'm seeing a bug.

 

3. That's what I figured, but I wasn't sure. And how am I supposed to know that? Wouldn't it be logical to have some way of keeping track of everything so I know things aren't just getting lost, or so that I know about how long it will take to see the results?

 

4. That's not why I'm upset. "Figuring it out" from the perspective of "finding a good balance of services, growth, etc" is fine. My problem is "figuring it out" from the perspective of "finding out why the game is doing things I don't think it should be doing, or isn't doing things I think it should". And again, this only pertains to some of the complaints I listed.

 

I don't think you're dumb, not my intention.

 

1) Your simcity is basically on an aqufier, But you use up all the water faster than nature can replenish it. So you basically have the exact same choices real cities use. Import water (See California) or Treat your water and reuse it. In the game, your treatment center treats the water and puts it back in your 'aquifer'. I see it as a pretty reasonable simulation, although in reality, the treated water would go straight into your water system.

 

2) I don't know the threshold anymore than people in real life know the threshold for police protection

 

3) This is also part of the answer to #2. Your ambulance coverage is broken because the servers are broken (between cities)

[catty-cb 4,412]

Well, your water problem is not the fault of the game.  Water is a resourse and you need to think about that when claiming a city.  If you claim a city with no water you will have water issues and you will need to make a deal with a nearby city to handle your water needs.

 

I have several cities with around 150 - 200k population and plenty of water.  I also have a couple of cities with 50 - 100k population that need water shipped in from other cities.

 

Note also that the filtration plant and sewage outflow trick is not a bug.  They designed it that way so low water cities can make their own water.

 

 

You make the statement that some of your frustration is due to your ignorance and I must agree.  I think most of your frustration is due to it.  City builder games are ment to be technical and strategically difficult.  That's their purpose.  If you are getting frustrated learning how to use your resources then SimCity may not be the game for you.

 

 

>This game was never about, scream at the top of your lungs I'm having the time of my life fun!  The fun is building your region and having a strategy in doing so.  Have you built your 4 great works in a region of 16 cities?  If you've already done that, post a screenshot and then I can take your comments seriously.  

 

Maybe city building simulation isn't your type of game.

 

 

Um, you guys do realize that SC4 is one of my favorite games of all time, right? I know how city-simulation games work. I've played pretty much all of them (even Cities XL).

 

Zpike, the city I ran out of water in was a city with "max" water supply. It now has almost zero. As for the sewage->treatment->water not being a bug, that's fine, but there's no way I would have figured out that that's a way of "fixing" my water problems by myself. I would have assumed, logically, that dumping sewage would not lead to an infinitely-replenishing water table. That makes no sense.

 

kgpurrs, it should be a challenge to build a large, successful region. It should take strategy and wise use of resources. There should be moments of frustration, but it should be a moment to learn and recover. That has not been my experience so far. My experience has been that I don't even know what's going on in my city half the time, and have no idea where to even begin looking. How can I learn from a mistake when I don't even know what the mistake is in the first place, and have no idea where to find out? They claim data layers give you more information about your city than ever before. But not all mechanics have a data layer, and for those that don't, you're stuck just accepting that what's going on is intended behavior (if you can even know what's going on).

 

 

EDIT: I'd also like to point out that I could easily create a large, successful region on my own if I wanted to given what I know of SimCity so far. But I'd have to forego some of the aspects of the game I want to try in order to do so. Which is ridiculous game design... "we have made this available for you, but good luck figuring out how to implement it how you want to successfully, because we're not going to explain how it works in-game".

 

 

 

... some of us know who you are and still have your maps in our region folders, they were and still are great maps

 

-catty