Why do you play SC4 and/or city builders?

[MarkShot 631]

I started with SC4 and CS around Christmas.

I was a tired old wargamer looking for something different, sophisticated, ... not requiring hours of strategy and planning ...

I picked SC4 and CS as what appeared to be the best two options in the genre.  I don't consider Tropico and Caesar... as city builders.  They are hybrid games.

Well, I was wrong.  I have read enough articles about game mechanics and real city planning ... that this hobby rivals war gaming.  It is not beer and pretzels gaming.

I was curious for what reasons do people play this genre?

I now see it as a a lot more than just painting with a PC.  (my first impression)

I now see it as more than a dynamic painting; meaning that on its own it evolves and changes.

I now see it as more than just a game of growth problems and challenges.  I felt that traffic, growth, ... were gaming challenges to be solved as density create new strains and stresses.

My current view of this hobby is table top modeling where the model is alive.  Similar to trains or dioramas or battle miniatures ...

---

Now the reason I am asking.  I am not sure city builders are for me.  I have been fascinated learning about them and looking at the mechanics behind them (my career had been systems design; so I love software and games).  But I am not sure that I am modeler.

So, here I am in the middle of a dedicated community of folks who love these games.  I wanted to know:

How do you play?

What do you find in it?

Thanks for all the assistance I have received and your time!

 

[markussaage 762]

Well, when I started playing Simcity 4 back in the days it was all about creating a Mega city with lots of skycrapers and stuff like New York City. Nowadays it's not a game anymore to me, it's a hobby. All the mods and possibilities you have around makes it still an amazing "game" to play with. Modding and lotting stuff to do, exploring every new release of the NAM and first and foremost: It's not a violent game... No blood, no shooting, no killing...

Yes, sometimes it can be a hassle to make all the mods and stuff work and you need to be willing to learn something about how this game works. The learning curve can be quite a challenge. It helped me a lot though, I (almost) never have any problems running this game, except I screwed something up...

Kind regards!

[PaleoCardio 150]

I started playing SimCity 2000 way back when. It was fun to see things grow and to draw out the roads and highways and try and build a megacity. 

That still exists today, but SimCity 4 is a different beast that is so much more (thanks to all the excellent mods, lots and bats), but is also the best game around when it comes to strategy and planning. However, that strategy and planning is there if you want it, if you don't, then you can just enjoy the game for what it is.

I find I play a vanilla game with NAM and some well chosen mods, lots and bats. I like to build highways, love to see the sims using those highways and I like the connectivity of region play (when done in consideration of the commuter bug). I love to take it easy amongst the farms and prefer small to medium tiles for that. Playing to build small towns and farmlands is a nice relaxing way (for me) to enjoy the game. It gets a little more stressful for me in the big city environment, but then that is because things start to go wrong and need to be solved in a different way.

What I get out of it? A very peaceful game, no shooting or killing needed, just tootling along building environments that I can either keep or dismantle and re-build another way. It takes time, which is good for me because I have time on my hands, for the most part. It is a good game whereby you cannot really do anything wrong. It is up to you to provide some basics of gameplay (water, power, amenities etc..), but for the most part the sims tolerate much of everything.

I do enjoy the mods, lots and bats. There are some incredible ones out there and in the beginning it can be hard to find what the best setup is, but I have a folder in my plugins with about 20 MUST HAVE files for making the game workable. Once you have that, it is then to just download the lots and bats (and yes, dependencies) that you need for improving the overall experience. I also partition the game up into pieces. Right now I am trying to learn highways and junctions and not really bothered how my zones look, but next I plan on spending more time on learning how to build with MMPs and custom kits (like railyards, airports, seaports), but take each one slowly and so I can understand how they work.

I hope you get something out if this thread when others come along and give their responses. I think this will be a fin thread to follow and see why people play, in my eyes, the best strategy and planning game and definitely the best city building game out there. 

[MarkShot 631]

I have looked at the screenshots others have posted and they are really impressive.

My initial efforts were boring and ugly grids.  (looking very much machine generated)

[PaleoCardio 150]

22 minutes ago, MarkShot said:

I have looked at the screenshots others have posted and they are really impressive.

My initial efforts were boring and ugly grids.  (looking very much machine generated)

Remember that many have played this game for many years and also use a lot of ploppable lots and MMPs. I prefer the growable way of playing and leaving it up to chance for growing areas. Also, grid building is a good way and a normal way to start before you move on, look at tutorials and figure out new ways of building zones. 

[MarkShot 631]

I am at the moment reading the history of this genre on the Internet.

It is interesting that SimCity as a genre from Will Wright came from in house map building tools that he found to be more interesting than the game itself (a helicopter simulation) he was building maps for.

[RobertLM78 1,598]

I started off with SC 2000 in '97, then to 3000 a couple years later, and only about 2011 did I get SC4.   There is a steep learning curve, but if you're willing and patient, it can be rewarding seeing what you've built.   @MarkShot - your analogy is about how I see it - a dynamic painting.  But then there is also the aspect of management.   As others have mentioned it's (mostly) a chill game - no violence, you can be creative, etc.   I say mostly because I still play in many ways like I did in SC 2000, generally making large cities, which can get hectic to manage.  Though, since I've installed SPAM, I've really started to enjoy the smaller towns with agriculture. 

[Cyclone Boom 17,004]

Seriously, where else can you elect yourself into office, and then take up the dual role of city Mayor and God?

There's something about SC4 which is seldom found in games of today's era. A kind of authenticity, which makes it so deep & compelling, even in these days of modern hardware, mobile apps, and flashy 3D graphics. I suppose you could also say the same about similar titles which appeared just before or around the turn of the millennium.

For me, the great thing about these 'games' is they provide ultimate freedom to the player, without fixed objectives, and no right or wrong answer. Personally I tend to use a relaxed approach, and see how each action leads into the next. Rarely planning in advance, and kind of making it up as I go along through slow stages of expansion. But there are endless ways to go about building a city, and the various strategies involved. Whether you prefer laying out a grid, managing and slowly handling the simulation, or simply using it as a blank canvas. There is no script or storyline.

The choice is yours, and creativity is only limited by each person's imagination, or perhaps the loading time of your plugins folder...

[markussaage 762]

And yes, I forgot one really important thing: You don't need to be ONLINE to play it... you can play it just by yourself! Anytime you want it... No servers needed, how awesome is that?!

Kind regards!

[jeffryfisher 2,176]

I started with the aboriginal SimCity ~1993. I got SimCity2000 later. Years after that I noticed a cheap 3-pack of SimCity 4, Societies and some other game I'll never play. I tired of Societies as soon as I realized that there's no economic model in it -- I just plop buildings and wait for the rent to roll in.

In 2013 I finally got around to installing SimCity 4 and discovering the already mature online community and its mind-blowing array of sometimes contradictory mods. After wading through patches, CAM (& CAM-e-lots), NAM, BSC, PEG, SPAM and all of their dependencies (and weeding out all of the downloads that had been superseded later developments), I discovered Minecraft and its Java modding, and so I took a three-year hiatus.

I've come back in the last few months because I still like networking (both with people and with operational models). It's the same thing that keeps me playing RR Tycoon II after 15 years. I like hooking things together to see if they work, then and tinkering until they do. To keep things interesting, my tinkering includes fiddling with the guts that most people view as deep dark magic.

Tweaking exemplars is child's play. For some past games, I've written C++ programs that edit saved-game data files, and I've poked at program EXE files in hex editors. If I weren't spending so much time looking for paying programming / database work, I'd dive into CAM or NAM or the new DLL bug-fixing work.

And still I am slowly developing a to-scale SF Bay region where I intend to build a thriving metropolis in which Stanford really is just "the farm".

[anonymous1234 216]

I like to play this type of games, first of all, because you can create something that is unique, both a city and its history, and then you can be a part of communities like this where you can share it, it's like creating an interactive book or movie. Another reason it's because I'm interested on politics & policy, it is a good game for that because you develop the role of a mayor and you learn things about how your local administration works, the taxes and everything. 

I also love the sense of humor in the SimCity series. It's pure satire of the real world issues, for example, when you lack healthcare on your city and they say you "well, we know that healthcare is usually at the bottom of your agenda, but not today", or when the city is dirty because you don't have a dump and they say you "make sure the city is clean or you will trash your fancy italian shoes"

[divadarya 20]

I've played this game since it came out; bought the CDs several times over. I played  SimCity 2000 when you build towers of waterfalls as a water source. I agree that Societies was kind of a bust. SC4 is a meditative, considered game; I never feel alone because I'm using mods made by this amazing community. To echo what the original poster said, city planning is a real challenge, especially when you get deep in the SC4 mods like the NAM.

It feels like I'm here doing graduate work now, even though my current project is one I've done three times now; New York City, or my sloppy approximation of it, because A)this game is definitely not the real world-we can't make diagonal bridges, in spite of  valiant efforts of past modders B) I love the city and especially love the NYBT models, especially Aaron Graham's beauties and MattB's practical fixes Again, we stand on the shoulders of giants who changed this game for the better. C) if I ever get obsessed enough to make a map for NYC I'd make it cover more area, have Manhattan island fit on three or four unsplit large tiles and cock it so that the Brooklyn and Manhattan bridges come in at the right angle(again, not complaining: dreaming.) D) NYC has an amazing interface of rail and rapid transit, great pizza and MOMA.

I'm currently converting all of Maxis gray highways, which brought me hours of joy, to the Symphony ones that match NAM. They seemed maddeningly slow at first but then I realized that there aren't freeway(I'm from SoCal) or parkway entrances on every street, are there? Time to be a wise a city planner. Again, the challenges make me come back here and interact with you wonderful people and our wise and helpful moderators. 

[rsc204 21,835]

10 hours ago, divadarya said:

we can't make diagonal bridges, in spite of  valiant efforts of past modders

Actually this has been possible for a long time, it requires a special NAM download, the Diagonal Bridge Enabler and it is very much for advanced users:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5vHN2UE9Ufo&t=6s

[divadarya 20]

9 hours ago, rsc204 said:

Actually this has been possible for a long time, it requires a special NAM download, the Diagonal Bridge Enabler and it is very much for advanced users:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5vHN2UE9Ufo&t=6s

If this is the one where we drain the water, I gave up after spending three hours with no results. I'll watch this, though, thanks.

[rsc204 21,835]

14 hours ago, divadarya said:

If this is the one where we drain the water, I gave up after spending three hours with no results

Yes, the DBE tool removes the water and it isn't exactly straightforward sometimes to use. This is because in order to work it must create special network settings that are very restrictive, but ideal (and very necessary) when building what will be the bridge.

However, that said the very reason I made the video was in the hope that it would help users to see some of the problems you can run into. Plus it goes into some detail regarding how to pre-prepare an area before using the DBE plugin. If you run into problems, you can ask for help on the NAM support thread here.

[simster007 373]

5 hours ago, rsc204 said:

However, that said the very reason I made the video was in the hope that it would help users to see some of the problems you can run into.

Watching your tutorial parallel to fiddling around with the DBE finally "enabled" my diagonal bridges some times ago. Highly recommended for everyone having problems in getting it to work.

Very helpful, Thx for that!

[divadarya 20]

 

18 hours ago, rsc204 said:

Yes, the DBE tool removes the water and it isn't exactly straightforward sometimes to use. This is because in order to work it must create special network settings that are very restrictive, but ideal (and very necessary) when building what will be the bridge.

However, that said the very reason I made the video was in the hope that it would help users to see some of the problems you can run into. Plus it goes into some detail regarding how to pre-prepare an area before using the DBE plugin. If you run into problems, you can ask for help on the NAM support thread here.

I watched the entire thing and it's very exciting. I'm going to play with it and when I'm ready to put the Brooklyln and Manhattan bridges where they ought to be I'll share a screenshot. Thanks for doing these videos, they've helped me enormously.

[Jackspital 391]

I think for me it started when I was young and got my first laptop. I remember picking SC4 up on boxset and playing it without mods on Windows XP. in the early 2010s I discovered Simtropolis, and as they say, the rest is history. Citybuilders have always interested me, they scratch that part of my brain. I love to relax after work with a podcast on and play SC4. I can sink countless hours into the same region I've been working on since 2018. 

When C:S came out I bought that on release day, (The same for SC2013, but we won't talk about that...) and have sunk hundreds of hours into that game too. I love a lot of other games and have been recently completing Red Dead Redemption 2. However, I think i'll always return to SC4 and i'll always be waiting for the true SC4 successor. (The pipe dream would be EA releasing the source code so that I could help develop an opensource version!)

[Lazarou Monkey Terror 1,835]

Many of us have that pipe dream too, I suggest some kid of heist for the source code! 

[dohraymii 427]

8 hours ago, Lazarou Monkey Terror said:

Many of us have that pipe dream too, I suggest some kid of heist for the source code! 

Dirktator's 11 - the heist movie you must see!!