Cool_Z

Hello fellow citybuilders, I just found out that you can play our good old SimCity 3000 in HD... and thought that documenting the procedue would be a good idea. Here's the short version (can be found here : http://www.wsgf.org/dr/SimCity-3000/en) And here's a more visual version, because some people might feel intimidated by the "hex editor" part. First you need a Hex editor, a good choice is Hxd Hex Editor, that you can download from here : https://mh-nexus.de/en/downloads.php?product=HxD Once downloaded and installed let's get to work. You'll need to work on a game file, so I suggest you make a backup of it or work on a copy of the file. Launch Hxd Hex editor and open the SC3.EXE or SC3U.EXE (it's in the "Apps" directory of the installation location of the game). Search for 8b 4c 24 04 8b 44 24 08 53 - you will need to change the datatype to "Hex-values" Now just replace the first four bytes by c2 08 00 90 in the editor (place the cursor at the beginning of the sequence and type) Repeat the same operation : Search for 8b 4c 24 04 8b 54 24 08 81 f9 Replace the first four with c2 08 00 90 again Now save the file. If you worked on the original it's done, if you worked on a copy you will need to replace the original file with the one you've modified. Launch the game, in the preferences you will now see all the resolutions your GPU can support being listed : Enjoy your SimCity 3K now in HD : (Note: The intro video works perfectly on Win 10 for me).

Good day everyone! I have become curious about how the simulation was working in SC4. Of course I know that unlike Skylines, Sims in 4 are simulated only in "presence", but how? I'm also cursious about health, wealth and education. Is it just a global percentage applied to groups of population in map areas or is it more precise? Do Sims get wealthier? Do Sims really age? I am wondering what the underlying mechanics are, do we have a full documentation about that somewhere or are we just guessing by observing what happens ingame?

Amazing! So you can really follow the aging process. Great job you did.

I keep on digging into SC4's game mechanisms and I was thinking about how far from reality the water system in SC4 is. It's also completely wrong in Skylines. I don't think any city in the world lays pipes under the ground to "cover" an area. Water pipes are usually running under the streets of a city. Also, water towers do not produce water (LOL...), they only serve to store water and provide pressure. I know it "adds some gameplay"... but it should be working about the same as the electricity system.

Wow, some very very interesting info here. Crazy that SC4 and even 3k had that much features planned.

It's... Roller coaster zoo tycoon. I just had a vision of a giraffe riding a roller coaster.

No idea if we can talk about BATs now, but C:SL ravived my desire to invest some time in city builders. My SC4 batting attempts were short lived, let's see if I can do better in C:SL. Here's what I'm working on, a modern house for one family. Only one floor but quite spacious with great big windows to let the sun in. Fully modeled in Blender, painfully (first time ever) uvmapped and about to get finished now. Early renders : Change of color scheme : Now ingame, (but not yet a growable, the ingame editor is quite mysterious, it will take some patience to have it 100% correct in terms of capacity and stats.). And... I wonder if I shouldn't go back to my first color choice for the windows.. creme was nice, blue is a bit toyish.

Well... last time I saw a BMW driver use turn signals he blinked left... and turned right.

I got completely bored with the "desperately try to make intersections work because the AI is awful and we won't fix it" game after a while.

Wow wow wow... bad, evil people that make a game and ask you money in return. if you want to rant about DRM go to EA. You can play CSL offline, you just need to have steam installed. And the steam overlay can be disables by the simple use of a keyboard shortcut. [Edited]

The "unknown error" is that your game is a pirated version, you admitted it in your request for boldlybuilding's WTC. Stop requesting stuff here, buy the game.

No piracy in Simtropolis.

It won't load "a bit faster", it will load ""incredibly faster"

Well... you can sell a kidney, you don't need both.

I'm giving myself a few kicks in the ass to finish remaking the nightlights of my old buildings so that they're as appealing as my latest ones... after that... we'll see I've got some other projects, not sure if I will keep on building for C:SL (maybe... who knows).

Yep I'm fully aware of that (I bought SC4 at release... and yep it was demanding... and still is because it can use just one core). But is that approach really less calculations-demanding? Also... I still marvel at how alive SC4 feels. The cities "breathe" and react like a living being.

So there no "solid" position for sims. I thougth SC4 had part of that by populating the buildings, and then applying changes to the group of sims inside it. Not going as far as taking each sim into account but still considering the sims in a building as a separate group. It is really fully statistical.

Hmmmm.... so in the case of wealth, it's the land that gets wealthier and it's applied to a certain number of sims according to the density?! edit : (and the same for education, heath, etc...)

Well... it will happen. Family reunion... (Not in CSL obviously. Still a few family members missing)...

I had a look at your imgur gallery... woah that's a big project and already a lot of good work !!

Yep, it showed people want citybuilders, and good ones (even if they can sometimes be fooled by "shiny stuff"° C:SL did not kill the genre, SC2013 almost did.

Well... you still have to compare citybuilders to other citybuilders to judge them. Independently of sc4, C:SL is still not a good citybuilder. It's a (deeply flawed) network manager with a topping of "city-building stuff".

I bought SC4 the day it was released. I liked it a lot, I think RH made it even better but it was already a very good game. All the mechanisms were there, better than sc3k, more city management but not too much. You see me ranting (and I've been very vocal at times) about CSL's day color, or its lack of optimization, but my main problem with it (and many people think the same) is that its basic simulation is wrong. The fact that the buildings grow in "levels", not separating density and wealth. the fact that buildings have to start at 1, even if the zone around has top land value. WHaaaat ? Also the lack of a middle density in zoning, pffffffffffffffffffffffffff !!!

And at the same time they destroyed the way the game looks during the day (and refuse to admit it or fix it, we have to rely on a mod) and killed the reflections because of the completely crazy stuff they did with snowfall. Yes they add things, but sometimes it seems they don't even look at the result until too late. Lots of the things (not all of it I admit) we point here is stuff they could make tons better if they just admitted there was a problem. The deathwaves are completely fixable, the game color is fixable, the traffic could be made TONS better if they just added a random lane choice when the engine determines a route for a car... etc etc etc... I just (again) use the growing color bug as an example. It might take five minutes to fix. Nah. Let's not do that. I have no idea what they're waiting for. I actually have no idea if they understand what their game is sometimes.

I think we can all agree about one thing. C:SL is not perfect, but SC2013 was (except on the visuals) a failure. I would prefer CO's devs to stop breaking the game even more working on expansions.