S70

Fantastic idea. Great story! Thanks for sharing it!

Great job, crazyyaya! I don't get a chance to drop in to ST very often and so only just bounce about to random CJs to check things out when I can. I'm glad I ran across yours, Jacqulina Natl Park is lovely. Totally enjoyed that! l8r!

All regions under My control operate within a strict theocracy. I give, and I taketh away. That said, I enjoy giving My Sims what they think they want, so it isn't all volcanos and meteor-showers.

Another great looking update! I like your use of the greenery surrounded by urbanity. There are a few parks in there I wish I could visit today, bring a snack, read a book... Keep it up!

Fantastic work on that update, sloppet! Nice effects with the presentation, and lovely city to present! Great job!

Hope you're feeling better soon, sloppet. Great CJ, awesome pictures.

I had a great time reading up to here. Nice job, Nardo69!

Nice to see some of your work, sloppet, it looks great! The houses coming off the diagonal streets in suburbia have an amazing look, and I love the creek. The new development is also coming along nicely. Looking forward to more!

Excellent update, as always! Have you thought about separating your 3RR cj from your tutorials, and posting your tutorials in the "City-Building Concepts" section or such? That way both CJ and Tutorial audiences get their fix based on their particular interest without sifting or risking losing one segment of the audience, and those of us who like both can just follow both threads... you could put the link to both CJ and Tutorials in your sig for easy reference... And if you're building 3RR from what you're doing in the tutorials, so much the better, as in the tutorial you can say "check out how it turns out here" and in the CJ say "if you like this and want to see how it's done take a look here"... that sort of thing. Just a thought. I like your work as it is, of course.

I never realized Santa was such a hard-nosed despot... lmao! The "elven ghetto" was a particularly nice addition. Looking forward to more!

Cool idea, can't wait to see how it comes together. An "Inukshuk Park" would be fun to see... any igloo lots out there?!

I joined right around when ST 5 started being rolled out, so I can't comment on the ST 4 to ST 5 comparison factor, but I can say that as an individual that rarely joins (and therefore knows little of the standard conventions and features of) any web sites or forums that ST 5 is very user friendly and easy to catch on to. I use the myForums area to both follow threads of interest and use the Hot Topics tab to see what's new, and I'm learning new things almost every time I go on. Good job, Dirk!

To me it looks like a fire wasn't caught in time and ran its course. If it were crime I would think a few other buildings close by would also show some distress, but they all seem well-groomed, which is why I'm leaning toward fire. (The cute "for sale" sign on the front yard is hilarious. I think it's Remax...?) EDIT: Here's a thought: when you go to the advisor, is there a "mayor asleep at the switch" type of message, or a property damage assessment message?

I can't see how updates of this quality and thoroughness could not be of use to many that frequent Simtropolis, myself included. I always gain insight into different aspects of SimCity when I read your update, and I have to thank you for the effort and concise manner in which you present your material. My concern is that you are going to burn yourself out maintaining such a high level of perfection! That said: Can't wait to see the topics you have in mind for the future!

My brother bought an Apple II back in the day, and that hooked me on the Apple side. That christmas he bought me a Coleco ADAM, with the tape drive and the top-loading slot that would play games from the Coleco game system. (It actually came with "Dragon Slayer", with Dirk the Daring!) About two summers later I bought an Apple IIe, which I owned until about '92, when I bought my first Mac, an Apple Macintosh LC. (The LC stood for "Low-cost, Color".) The selling point for that was you could get a IIe emulator card and an external drive, so all the 5.25" floppies with all my games would still work on the LC. I think it was running System 6-something. It was a big deal when I upgraded to System 7, big changes! (I think it was the LC that I first started playing SimCity, the original. Remember when you could buy the building-packs that would make the buildings be different eras or places? I forget the details, but it was cool, for the time.) Then I bought a Mac Performa PowerPC 5200, which got me through System 7 and 8. Then I bought an iBook G3, running OS X, which is primarily now my wife's computer (or when I want to work in front of the tv) after I got the iMac G5, which right now has OS X.3.9. I don't want to upgrade to OS X.4 Tiger because I'm afraid of how it'll react to all the studio equipment I have that runs with Logic Pro. I had a hard enough time getting my MOTU 828 mkII to work again after the last "minor update".

In case there are others out there that are using Safari on Simtropolis and can't seem to post to the forums after the new Forum Text Editor was implemented... my story goes a little like this... I'm running Safari on an iMac G5 with OS X.3.9. I also saw there was a note that if the error message "Toolbar set 'forums' doesn't exist" to clear the cache and restart the browser. Yesterday I saw there was some latest news posted, about a new Text Editor for forum posting. But when I hit a REPLY button in a thread, instead of the text editor I would get an error that said: --- Error An error has occurred. If you wish to notify the administrator please click here. To go back to the main forum page please click here. Error:# Variable width is undefined. The error occurred on line 132. --- After trying to post a few times in different places and getting the same result, I decided to click where it said I would be able to notify the administrator, and an email came up in my email program... but after sent it, it bounced back, with this: --- ----- The following addresses had permanent fatal errors ----- <admin@simtropolis.com> (reason: 550 Requested action not taken: mailbox unavailable or not local) --- I also tried IE for Mac, and got the same error. Cleared my cache, cleared my cookies. Nothing worked. Today I went into the Live Chat area, and talked to Mikeaut1 (who was talking to Zelgadis at the same time by PM), and they had some different suggestions to try. Zelgadis suggested using Firefox instead of Safari, and that's what finally worked. SO IF YOU'RE USING SAFARI AND KEEP GETTING ERRORS FOR POSTING --- ... the problem may be solved by downloading and using Firefox, at least until the issue is looked at and fixed by the powers-that-be. (Y'all there?) Thanks to Mikeaut1 and Zelgadis for the suggestions and the help! Much appreciated!

Confirmed! The standard text edit box appears, and if this post... uh... posts, it works fine. EDIT: And after posting I went in and made sure the "EDIT" function worked as before as well. If you can read this... uh... it does. The "standard text edit box" still doesn't recognize carriage returns, though. (Just thought I'd toss that out there. The first two lines were on two... uh... lines... in the edit box. Thanks, Dirk! And again, thanks to everybody that helped out! EDIT 2, for zelgadis, just below: Fair enough. I didn't get Firefox because I didn't want to DL one more thing, and I found Safari to be fine for whipping around the web. But I've liked it this last day or so while the edit box was sorted out. I figure I'll keep trying it for ST to see how it compares. Thanks for the "push"! All that aside, hopefully this exercise has helped out those Mac users that DON'T want to make a switch still use Simtropolis.

@kbooms1w: Not sure if I should post a reply or send a PM, sorry... I'm still too new to know what really constitutes a legitimate "bump"... I didn't post to the "Bug Report" thread, mostly because I figured (1) it was Mac-specific, (2) this would be where us Mac-folks would check, (3) I had a possible work-around solution while the issue was being addressed, with thanks again to Mikeaut1 and zelgadis, (4) the powers-that-be would notice it here anyway as far as bringing it to their attention, and (5) then when I posted here didn't want to cross-post... It was kind of a toss-up between here or there. @dirk: I humbly volunteer for mac-testing, if need be. And I'm sure you'd have a line-up of volunteers if you made the call here in the Mac section, and likely far more experienced testers than I. Have I mentioned this week what a great site this is...? --s

I'm loving the "postcards" style of presenting your pictures, and the mini-map insets that show the overall location of the site within the city. And the city looks great!

@N_O_Body: Have you had a chance to see either the Orson Welles or Roman Polanski directed versions? Very different versions by very different visions, but an absolutely fascinating look at the depth of Shakespeare's writing, in my opinion.

I always feel like asphalt drives smoother, but then it breaks up faster which negates the smooth silence eventually.

Excellent updates! You've posted beautiful pictures, and I like that you've made some steps to make "referring back" to updates and pictures really easy. I think it's also great that you are so thorough on listing your mods, giving credit to the folks that have contributed to the STEX, and walking folks through tutorial-like how-to sessions. You're adding to my benchmark list of "things that make a great CJ great" with every update! Wow!

I'm totally enjoying your CJ, dedgren. I really like hearing about your style of play, in addition to the great pics. Your description of your plug-in folder is very interesting, I'll be referring to it again as I explore the STEX and try to keep track of everything. Great job. It's funny you mention Alaska. I've only been into the NWT of Canada and haven't yet had the pleasure of visiting Alaska, but the Wind River pics you've shown remind me of northern scenery. "#8 - North shoreline" is beautiful. And don't let any thread rating bother you, please! I figure of people that like to vote, some will always vote the highest number, some will always vote the lowest number, and some will always vote the mid-range numbers. I think it's so difficult to get a benchmark from which to compare a personal opinion that there are very few people that use any sort of objective criteria. I know I can't, and who am I to say one person's work is better than another, anyway? That's why I'm one of those "always votes the top number" voters. Keep it up, can't wait to see more!

MsD said: @shizu00: Respect for others is a great way to start, but you have to be able to respect yourself first before you can respect others. @MsD: This is a great site and a neat threat, it's not just you! Thanks for the thought-provoking question! And (to go way back to your post from the morning) it is a very good point that one must respect oneself before being able to respect others, and by no means do I take that as a dig against me, no worries. Either, I think, is a great way to start, depending on where you are. The question you raise has so many different opinions and perspectives that it is unlikely one will possibly be The Solution For It All, as I'm sure you're well aware. But that's sort of the beauty that I find in your original question. Personally, all I can hope for is a deluge of biases and opinions from a wide spectrum of folks who have a suggestion as to what would make this world a better place, from their perspective. Some ideas will make sense. Some may seem delusional. But it is important to hear and consider both, and all in between, and perhaps create a new opinion for myself, that fuses the elements of everything that made sense (to me) into my own world-view, much as RiverCocytus described toward the end of his post in opposition to moving in political tones. But that's just me. I wish I was more awake to respond properly to RiverCocytus' and hym's posts. I agree whole-heartedly with RiverCocytus, except in what he actually thinks would make the world a better place. (Which is funny, because that is exactly the point he makes right before saying what he thinks would make the world a better place. I love it. ) And I should say that I very much respect that position, even if I do not myself share it. And my two cents on hym's post is that he is entirely, if unfortunately, correct. War is a tool, just as any other, and sometimes inevitable if there can be no compromise. Fun thread, MsD! Thanks! Hope I haven't offended anyone, I already know my grip on reality is tenuous. I've come to terms with it.

I believe that if we expect to live in a civil and polite society that we must ourselves be civil and polite. Respect for others, saying excuse me or thank you or sorry... it's not just for one's grandmother, in my opinion. Change begins on the inside and moves out.