Romaq

Not to rez a dead topic, but I've just started playing SimCity (2013). There do appear mods that work for online and offline, and it will usually say so in the mod. I'm also using the "Mods Switch" program that deals with mods before I start playing, and it seems to work well. I'm using online so my wife can enjoy the game with me in cooperative play, the only reason I picked SimCity rather than the superior offerings. SimCity also keeps things simple which helps my wife. If you still have questions or would like to chat over SimCity (2013), I would be glad to do that.

After a very long hiatus from Simtropolis, I decided to purchase SimCity with my wife so we could do "co-op". I thought of trying to do it with SC4, but for my wife and I to do "co-op" it seemed we would be looking for trouble, even with a shared hard-drive or using Dropbox. I think what so many of us were looking for... I know what *I* was looking for: SimCity4, only 64 bit, 3d, curved roads. Let us have mods. My wife and I played Civilization for a while. Do you want offline? Sure! How about setting up a quick game online through their servers, picking and choosing what DLCs everyone agrees to? Ok! Would you like to play private LAN? No problem! Civ didn't care. Just have fun! Sweet plumbob... I would so love to have SimCity4 baked in new 64 bit 3d tech with co-op/ competitive modes like Civ or Minecraft offers. Anyway, my wife and I are playing SimCity, and it's "ok". A decent break from our Minecraft server. But I sure wish EA had gotten out of Quigley's way.

I'll miss single-player off-line the most, but mostly I plan to enjoy CitiesXL and SC4. I'll reconsider SimCity:MMO if it gets around the $20 price point and the hinky-dinks of playing SimCity "MMO style" have been worked out. Let those who enjoy their MMO city-building suffer the pain first.

SC4 plateau, SC:MMO plateau, whatever. 1) What control do we have over the interaction of other people in our online region we invited or were invited into, and what control do we have over the interaction with other regions within the world that run counter to our own interests, whatever our interests may be? 2) EA/ Maxis abandoned the SimCity franchise for a decade following Rush Hour. We have EA's history to know both the good and the bad of EA keeping game servers alive. SimTrop has been very good about keeping SimCity 4 a vibrant new 'game' in the decade since the franchise was abandoned by EA/ Maxis. How can we expect this to play out with SimCity:MMO? We can keep talking about how the game might plateau without the benefit of other players, finding other players in ADD ME! spam boards, it is just my opinion they are side tracks from point #1 of controlling negative aspects of forced online play we do not yet have details on. Point #2 is rather serious in my mind also.

Yay! Spam/ ADD ME! threads in forums so you can be 'friends' with a bajillion people you don't know or care about, never talk to, will never hear from again. And you can get to hope like hell they don't screw you over, nor have means to do so. Sure sounds like fun to me!

EA/ Maxis abandoned the franchise after SimCity: Rush Hour. I don't see why they should be any different. EA has been shutting down servers for games people have paid for, in one case in as little as 18 months after release. I don't see why this should be any different. Online games with interaction between people attracts griefers who make it a point to spoil the fun for everyone else in every conceivable way possible. I have no idea why this should be any different.

http://www.simcity.com/en_US/blog/article/if-you-build-residential-homes-your-friends-will-move-in-SimCity-Social Quote: Let us know what you want to know about the game and we’ll take the best (and yes, some of the hardest questions) and answer them for you ... Leave your questions below, on Facebook or Twitter and stay tuned to see if your questions get answered. I posted the following on the blog, but it's likely to be ignored. People here are welcome to recycle my points below to express their concerns. If there is a solid wall of "WTF Online Required?", EA/ Maxis may still choose to ignore it, but those who review games for a living will certainly see it, and they may choose to pose these issues to the Dev team for the Dev team to continue to ignore them there. Note: #7 is simply a restatement of #1. I believe it is possible to be polite, but firm and insistent on getting some sort of answer. I also want to state, while I am hardly active on SimTrop, it really does chafe my undies that SimTrop has had no direct mention, no direct thanks that I have seen, that everyone else has had the benefit of direct interaction with SimTrop getting everything second-hand after-the-fact. Ocean's quote in my point #2 was like, "Thank you nameless modders for keeping our game selling over the last ten years, we know what you have done and we are happy for it. We are aware of it, we are not idiots. Thanks. Now go ___ yourselves." At least, that's how I see the EA/ Maxis response to a decade of SimTrop. If someone can correct that impression, I would be happy with correction. Right now, I am very unhappy with this mess of SimCity:MMO. Anyway, my 'seven' points concerning the online ball & chain I'd really like EA/ Maxis to address: 1) What possible compelling benefit is there to "forced online play" even between regions where the players are in 'solo online play' that makes this a core required "feature"? How are we to perceive this 'Net requirement as anything other than a ball & chain? How is it that Civ V appears to be able to work just fine with private LAN or 'Net play as an option, but EA/ Maxis can't? 2) It was stated that Mods were considered a vital part of the SimCity Franchise. Per an article on the new SimCity: "It's worth pointing out that the reason people are still playing SimCity 4 today, 10 years after we shipped it, is because the modding community essentially recreated it. They filled it with new content and fixed bugs, and made it as much of a hobby as a game. We're very cognoscente of that -- I mean, we're not idiots." Exactly how do mods work without creating exploits and griefer opportunity in an environment of forced online interaction? If I want a money-tree mod, how could I possibly be allowed to make one where it gives me advantage over anyone else playing? Again, I note that the technically competent staff over at 2kGames/ Firaxes offered mods out-of-the-box, hired a well known modder as a producer for Civ V and set up a system for solo players to enjoy mods fetched off Steam complete with ratings. For LAN and 'Net play, only DLCs are allowed. How could a mod environment thrive, the one Ocean recognizes preserved and bugfixed SimCity 4 possibly exist in a forced online environment? 3) Speaking of the fan community having to step in when EA/ Maxis appears to have abandoned SimCity for a decade since the release of Rush Hour, what assurance do we have of a 'live team' continuing to develop new content and breath fresh life into the game, and most importantly keep the required servers running so SimCity would continue to function in the face of ongoing EA layoffs and shutdowns of online services, including EA Sports MMA essentially shut down 18 months after game release? What is the assurance we have of EA's investment the lifespan of this SimCity release given the server requirement? 4) Given the nightmare of stories surrounding Settlers 7 and the online requirement... the server being down, quirks with the server, total inability to play the solo campaign mode offline, and how UbiSoft patched out the online requirement for many of its other games, even to the point of using an illegal cracked version of Rainbow Six: Vegas2 to patch problems with their legal online players, what steps will EA/ Maxis/ Origin take to make this forced online requirement less onerous to those who do not have a good 'Network connection, particularly to Americans visiting overseas or those in countries such as Egypt where the government can shut down The Internet at whim, or China where The Great Firewall of China can potentially cause issues with gameplay? What consideration is there for fans of the franchise who have metered bandwidth? 5) What is the plan to cover the costs of the server over the lifetime of the game without a subscription fee? If there will be a subscription fee, what is the justification for the comparatively steep price of the preorder for SimCity? 6) Could we have some details on how this forced online interaction is to take place between 'solo play' regions? Could we have details on how to promote SimCity to our friends without spamming them over Facebook? Could we have details on how we will find 'helpers' to assist us on building our regions? Details on 'eviction' of helpers who cause more harm then help within our region? Details on the protection of 'helpers' from 'evil' region controllers who express their gratitude over your work building your city in their region by banning you from your own city you created in their region? Could we have details on what happens to my forced online city when I go on vacation or extended stay away from being online? What harm does this cause my friend who invited me to help develop his region? What happens to my friends helping me on my region when I am the one who goes on extended leave? Are they forced to tolorate the behavior of a rogue member until I can return? 7) Could we please have a compelling arguement as to why this must be a core feature of the game that requires online interaction, even for 'solo' region players, where having this as an option would mitigate the above issues and even more? Please help us understand why forced online play for SimCity is such a compelling arguement in spite of the difficulties, concerns over EA/ Maxis's lack of involvement since SimCity: Rush Hour, EA's shutting down of servers and so on. I really strongly want to understand why this one feature makes all arguements against it simply not matter to EA/ Maxis.

Gell-Mann's Totalitarian Principle states: "Everything not forbidden is compulsory." While this statement was created in reference to quantum physics, it applies in a social sense also. If a given behavior is not explicitly forbidden in reference to "screwing over the world economy" in SimCity:MMO, such behavior will be compulsory, and the world economy will necessarily be screwed with. And people are endlessly creative in gaming the rules to run afoul of one another. I really like how Civ V avoids this problem. You can play solo, you can play LAN and you can play over their game server, and *YOU* get to choose. Too bad EA/ Maxis is not competent enough to see how to do that.

Online = 'Stealth DRM'. You can't DRM 'crack' an MMO without creating a back-end server.

So I explained to my wife, "THIS is how you would expect SimCity to look like, so the developers are working to make the game look like THIS. " I'm still... concerned about the "Online only/ Solo a region that is affected by all the other regions/ we won't call it DRM" aspect. Great eye-candy, though.

I'm going to be at the Emerald City Comicon in Seattle this Saturday, and I'm not sure if we'll be back home in time. I also need to see if my wife will even consider it. I may just leave the house and go for a walk for the hour. The event will be 8:30pm my local Bellingham, WA time. I simply don't know. But I *do* thank you, Hahei, for bringing this up. I didn't even know about it. If the occasion arises, I'll ask about it at work. I brighten the corner of the world where I am because by doing so, it is good for *me*. I'm not sure what I'll do, but thank you for reminding me to at least consider it.

It does look fascinating, a game I'd really like to play. I just want to know if the game would survive a decade as well as SC4 has.

It still looks like Glassbox is server code that only runs on their server machines. EA has been shutting down servers, including a game that had only been on sale for 14 months. For my wife and I to both have a 'seat' at the game, and for both of us to enjoy the international packs on the pre-purchase, we have to spend $160 USD. Do I go on the basis of how well EA has supported SC4 over the last decade in my decision to trust EA to not bone us over the purchase of SC5 to enjoy for the next decade?

On the Multi-player aspect, I'm interested to know if my wife and I could work on different parts of the city within the same region without having to allow other people to join in. $160 USD is rather steep for two copies of the game, but that is something we are looking for. I'm also annoyed SimTrop is getting all this info second-hand, as if Maxis has to find every OTHER news outlet to talk with first before giving SimTrop the time-of-day. "Gee guys, you've kept this game going nearly 10 years, and we are really grateful for that. As an expression of our gratitude for your passion, let's just talk to everyone ELSE in the world, and y'all can go sit & spin."

EA Games wishes to thank you for supporting SimCity 4, your contributions to extending the game and your passion that keeps us visible and selling on the shelves. The best way we can come up to thank you for your support is by leaking SC5 concept art and in-game screen-shots to every frackin' body damned ELSE and letting you guys sit & spin. Thanks again for your support over the last decade. --- No I SERIOUSLY hope EA/ Maxis isn't that stupid in their treatment of SimTrop. Games come and go. QUICKLY. SimCity Box is STILL on the shelves for $20 USD at both my local Wal-Mart *AND* at BestBuy. I can't possibly see EA wasting space on a nearly 10 year old game nobody's buying anymore. I don't see how they could afford it. I also can't see why anyone would purchase SC:Box for SC: S. I have no idea if any of this is legit or not. But it would really suck bollocks if EA/ Maxis didn't get on the phone and invite Dirktator to PLEASE extend a warm thank you to SimTrop and pass along a few OFFICIAL tid-bits of what is going on. Then again, this is the same EA that produced SC: S, so ... whatever.

3 copies of SimCity Box are still on the shelf at the local Bellingham Wal-mart. It appears to keep selling. What a delight it would be if EA were to offer some measure of gratitude towards SimTrop for keeping SC4 so fresh and alive by having SimTrop co-announce a serious SC5?

"Sim City Box" is *STILL* on the shelf at the local Wal-Mart for $20, and I can't see anyone buying it for SC: S. I'd 'like' for EA to make a true SC5, but I won't hold my breath on it. And I'd rather the source code anyway to resolve stuff. But I've not played SC4 in a LONG time, and so much stuff to do, and I'd really rather full-up 3D. SC4's game play, CitiesXL 3d support, Civ V's technical engine... yeah, make a wish.

Fantastic!

I'm still looking for SimCity 5.

The modding tools, especially if pathing issues are resolved, would help a great deal. Highway connections, roundabout options. At the moment, I'm seriously considering spending $50 to pick up the whole DVD collection from the STEX, I just have to scare up the $50 first. At that point, I'm going back to play SC4. I just don't want to deal with SC4 until I get the DVDs rather than trying to hunt and find the same stuff. STEX did the work, STEX *really* ought to have the cash. Thank you Dirk, and everyone else who keeps SC4 pumped up, you are wonderful. SC4 doesn't do true 3d, the plugins need the plugin manager and there are SO many plugins it gets to be a nightmare in short order without the manager. CitiesXL handles the menu situation a tiny bit better, but not by much. CitiesXL does do true 3D, but all in the fixed square boxes and the transport system is nothing near as fun to work with as SC4. In fact, dealing with transport issues is the primary reason I'm really looking at going back to SC4. CitiesXL is just driving me crazy on transport management. If we can seriously do mods and handle pathing, that would go a long ways towards having me not hate CitiesXL time. SC4 lets you drop single tiles of 16m x 16m, decide what kind of thing goes there and what maximum density is allowed, then your 'sims' decide what to build, and the land value. I find I really miss surprises like that, and the 'game' of trying to build up the land wealth enough to where the really rich would move in. With CitiesXL, what you plop is what you get as far as the land value. "I need more executives. I just plopped executive housing. Exec's move in. What a surprise." The sizes are fixed, mostly squares but there are the odd rectangle things. And every rectangle thing *MUST* make the land flat. As I recall with SC4, some plop-able things would deform to match the land so long as the land was 'close'. Fences would contour, the 'in plot' roads around buildings, and such. Nothing even remotely like that for CitiesXL, except for roads. Regions. God how I miss SC4 regions. Also the ability to actually shape the land on SC4. CitiesXL maps can have portions 'flattened', but you have nothing of the terrain control available with SC4. A factor of this is in how CitiesXL maps are. You have a relatively small heightmap, and then the illusion of contours and shadows is made by a much more detailed 'fixed' map. If you were to flatten an entire map in CitiesXL, it will still show 'land shadows' and coloring as if it were still shaped. CitiesXL maps are much more pretty, and in 3D, but you have none of the 'fun' of region creation offered by SC4. Both SC4 and CitiesXL are single threaded and 32 bit, meaning that while they are busy with the CPU, they can do *nothing* else but have you wait. Neither will work with additional CPU cores or additional memory afforded by 64-bit machines. The performance difference when running Civilization V bears out how huge the difference is on a multi-threaded game. Anyway, I'll putz with CitiesXL 2011 for now, and hope that CXL 2012 makes some headway on some of the issues, but if EA Games would make a serious effort at SimCity5 using SC4 game play and regions, only full-up 3D and full-up 'no fixed axis' as it is with CitiesXL. Full-up mod with a menu system prepared for tons of STEX-like stuff. An intelligent means to organize plug-ins per region and/ or city. It should also take a tip from Civ V and be multi-threaded and 64-bit to take full advantage of offered memory and multi-core machines. I think the vast majority of Simtrop visitors are also waiting on this game.

Something about laying pipelines... that was SC4, not SCS. SCS let you take your city in a number of different directions, and I'm not clear on how a 7 year old would get any entertainment value out of SCS anyway. I think it is important we are aware of these Op-Ed videos, but that one was certainly a total waste of time. They do not have their facts straight, and even more silly in my opinion... who the hell *CARES* about SCS? If people are buying 'Sim City Box', I'm reasonably sure they are buying it for SimCity 4. Which, by the by, I'm happy to report it is *still* on the shelf at my local Wal-Mart for $20. But that these morons could only scare up "Fate of the world" (I know nothing about that one) and SCS to make their point is just sad.

Perhaps I did not make that clear... I have been worried about his personal safety and if he survived. NOB also.

Just after the Earthquake, I went to look at SOMY's site at http://translate.google.com/translate?js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&layout=2&eotf=1&sl=ja&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fhomepage2.nifty.com%2Fkamurai%2Fsimcity%2F (his website translated via Google) but I have nothing. Is anyone aware of how SOMY made it through the recent earthquake in Japan? This isn't the appropriate thread for it, but I wasn't sure where to ask and I hope the recent post has the right people looking here. A discussion on how he is doing could really be made at SOMY's English fan site at https://www.sc4devotion.com/forums/index.php?topic=352.40 but I do not see anything there either. Sorry to poke this thread with an off-topic, but SOMY's SC4 work has always stuck out in my mind as OMFG WTF incredible.

Yeah, it would be cool to redo Seattle except for the horrid freakin' highway interchanges and their inability to cope with elevation changes. But I always look for Smith Tower, as I am a 'Smith'. I pointed that out to my wife, and she was like, "Yes? And?" Well, it's an early skyscraper, and it's Smith Tower? "Uhm.... And?" Sometimes these things just kinda get lost on wives. But it would be cool if we can get the necessary file format data to create our own models instead of reskinning existing buildings.

I'm wondering about some sort of 'Best Practices' document. Ok, so a given mod works, it may even be highly desirable. But what about 'Best Practices', or things that someone can do on the meta level (not directly with the mod itself) to have it be more useful? 1) Should the mod be zipped from the .patch file? I would say yes, because that would allow 'meta-data' in addition to the mod. 2) What should the mod name/ zip file name be? I would suggest something like CXL11-Romaq-Map-TableLand v1.0 for both the .patch and the .zip, though inviting comment allows people to scare up better ideas. I'm looking at this from the enduser. With a filename like that, I know it is CXL11 'ready', I know the author, I know what I should expect it to do, the specifics of what it is called, and then what version it is. I would suggest this for both the .patch and the .zip, keeping them the same because I will have those questions both when I look up the .patch in the /mods folder and when I have to muck about in the archive where I keep the zip. BTW, at LEAST having both filenames be the same saves a great deal of pain. The exception, of course, is when the .zip contains more than one type of file such as for lo-rez or hi-rez versions of something, or other packages where one or more .patch files inside the zip would be in use. Also, uploading the .patch file as a .zip just keeps everything consistent, even if there is only one .patch file. ... On thinking about it, perhaps 'CXL' should be enough so you don't run into problems with 'This works with CXL09 OR CXL11, BOTH, or NOT BOTH, and then CXL13 comes along. Does this old .patch work with CXL13? Maybe this should be put in the README-en.txt commented on below. 3) What all goes in the README-en.txt? I would strongly suggest a README-en.txt file, at the very least. We could have in the forum here a 'standard README' posted so people could just copy it, edit to suit and run with it. So I'm looking at this collection of .zip files I downloaded last year now mixed in with fresh CXL11 stuff I just fetched. I would love to have something in the .zip file with the following information 3a) Where did I fetch this file from? https://www.simtropolis.com/stex/details.cfm?id=25212 would be handy to know, as I believe you can do updates of the same mod to that same link. 3b) Who wrote it? Romaq (asmith@mik-maq.com) tells me who at that location to credit, and an email would be skippy if you don't mind providing me that. 3c) What is it/ Version info (I had that in the filename, having that as part of the README-en.txt would be happy also. Toilet Factory v. 1.0 3d) License - Permission to redistribute on any fan site/ only allowed to distribute on *MY* fan site, building exclusive to members of the STEX who bought the DVD, I don't care what you do just keep this README-en.txt intact... This would be very good for someone on http://www.citiesxs.net to explicitly allow redistribution on the STEX, or to explicitly DENY distribution as it is something of a reward only for those who are members or donated to a fan site. 3e) Description/ Instructions/ Details. This would be what you normally would put on the stex page. 4) What's a thumbnail.jpg? That, of course, would be the same image you would upload to the stex that goes with your file. What I'm really thinking of is that if I have the .zip file, I should not have to go to the .STEX to see the image that could be packed right along with the file. There may be more, and perhaps some would argue that what I've given is already too much. However, that is why this is 'best practices' rather than something required. I *WANT* to see the collection of mods for CitiesXL provide much of what we enjoy with SC4, and I would like to see gigs of such mods. But we need a way to wade through it all when it's sitting on a hard drive or DVD collection. Creating a 'Best Practices' document gives moders a common format for this stuff and provides a common frame of reference for people who wish to use the mods. One of the recent mods does not have the .patch filename the same name as the .zip file, so I had to make note of it in case I have to go back later and straighten things out. But I don't want to nag the fellow or discourage a new up & coming SOMY for CitiesXL. If a 'Best Practices' document were out there that made sense, could be upgraded/ changed over time, and gave people a place to start, perhaps we could have gigs of CXL mods and have it not be a train wreck when CXL13 or CXL20 comes out. I'm really trying to think long term with this thing. Also note I used a 'README-en.txt'. SOMY didn't speak English at all, and as I recall some people were able to get permission to upload his work on his behalf, and they had to translate for him. In such a package I would expect to see both a README-jp.txt and a README-en.txt. Some of my mods are originally German (README-DE.txt). If the license explicitly said it could be uploaded to the STEX, and if a README-en.txt were not part of the file, I would then be free to translate it then upload it to the STEX where the mod could get some STEX love, and the original author would get credit as well as the link to the source. Would anyone else see a 'Best Practices' document as a good thing to promote both here and on the other CXL fan sites? I'm just looking at the year 2013 when the new version of CXL is released and we already have several Gig of CXL mods. All those mods are dumped on a single DVD... now *what* should I see in the file directory listing? And if I look at any single mod (.zip?), what will let me know everything I need to know about the mod without installing it, and what will lead me back to the main source for that mod where an upgrade is waiting, if only I knew where to look? Thanks for taking the time to consider my proposal.