tomfoolery_79

Haha, Will Wright said the tile size felt "small" in his interview. It was easy to miss.

I don't know if SimPeg is here, but I'd LOVE to see what he could do in this new game. Can't wait for modding tools if he can work his magic with it!!

Knowing EA, it's possible they won't release modding tools, so that they themselves can push out small incremental DLC packs you need to buy, like The Sims. Although, they just need to look at Skyrim, to know a game can be super successful with both.

This isn't a surprise to anyone is it? Every game does this now.

Time to get off the crank.

Wow, you had a great looking city. Thanks for the info on trees. I thought this beta was more difficult and I had a harder time getting to 16,000 population than I did the first time. Heck you got to 26,000...kudos! Can't believe you did that in one hour.

tomfoolery_79's review: I only got to make 3 cities cause I got my key so late yesterday, but I did some thought comparison to the first beta weekend...here is my thoughts/questions. 1) The game seemed more difficult this time. The first beta weekend was EASY...by the end of the hour I had a city that was chugging along quickly and more money than I knew what to do with. This time, I actually had to watch my funds and my buildings were more reluctant to grow up. Fire, Police, Power, Health etc. also seemed more demanding and I had to actually monitor them. For example, first beta weekend, I only needed 2 windmills by the end of the hour. This time I needed 6 to keep up. It could have been just me, but if they did ramp up the difficulty I'd say it's better. 2) Less bugs, specifically, I had no graphical glitches at intersections especially and I got a lot in the first beta. Good. 3) The white road guides are still confusing to me as is the zoning. Does the white line show where you put the roads or where you need to put every other road because the buildings back up to the one in the middle? I'm sure I'll figure it out, but since we only had an hour I felt rushed to not try and figure it out. 4) Parks can piggy back on each other, albeit not that gracefully, but they can. Is this new? I didn't see it first beta. Placing parks almost instantly upgraded surrounding buildings. 5) Art design is still cartoony, but I've gotten used to them and it didn't bother me as much. 6) I still do not like zoning being restricted to the kind of road it's on, nor is the zoning tool as intuitive as SC4 (even with the recent tweak showing depth). If it's not broke, why fix it? 7) My thoughts on city size hasn't changed one iota...it's SMALL.

Couldn't agree more Sun. Guess we have to wait for an official expansion that we'll have to pay for increasing map size. jlt, EA's servers probably just suck...nothing to do with file size.

Am I the only one who feels like we shouldn't have such a big city after 1 hour? SC4 you'd never have a city this large in 1 hour.

I have pre-ordered and still do not have a key.

Multi-player isn't going anywhere, it's here to stay. With that in mind, I want to do multiplayer with people who are passionate about their cities and the quality of them. Honestly, I don't have any "real world" friends who are interested in playing and if they were, I know they wouldn't have honed the craft of city simulation like you gents. It'd be neat to have a "guild" of all of us who are not only passionate about city building, but also those who are willing to group up. Thoughts?

Would I be hitting the nail on the head when I say, us fans all wanted SimCity 4 with 2013 technology and the steady improvements you'd expect to see in a next installment? I played the beta 3 times. I agree with OP. I think Duval was trying to say the Graphics in SC4 were fantastic, so why 10 years later aren't they better? If he's not saying that, I am. SC4 buildings were great. Regardless of what Maxis has said, they have NOT listened to their fan base. Think of it this way, do other games have such a split before release? Are their huge concerns with Black Ops 2 from Black Ops 1...are Halo 3 peeps concerned about the direction of Halo 4? No. What I mean is, the fact that there has been such an outcry pre-release of a game should be nothing less than a wake up call to EA/Maxis... Online always DRM, Marketplace, City Size, etc etc.

I spotted the Arcologies! Anyone else? Also, I'm fine with the "Simlish" By the way, where are the casinos??? I looked and didn't see them.

I just finished beta: 1) I was glad I pre-ordered because it was fun/addictive. 2) City size is smaller than I even imagined. It's closer to a mix between small & mid in SC4. Can't imagine seeing a need for Hwys. I filled 1/4 of the map in on hour without even trying. Seriously it is SMALL. 3) Seemed SUPER easy, like you had to try and screw up. By the end of the hour I had $200,000 in unspent money. 4) User Interface was fantastic, good graphical information pertaining to data. 5) I never thought the graphics looked cartoony UNTIL I was actually in game. They are too cartoony, but not enough to turn me off. 6) Bus stops for the school!! Great idea...increases the reach of your schools. 7) Building design looks great. Great looking parks, plaza, civic building, etc. Just wish graphics were a bit more mature (just mature not necessarily real or photorealism). In closing, one hour isn't nearly enough time to dig into the game. I purposefully avoided items I know I would take much much more time on, like parks, civic buiding placement, etc. In fact, since I felt rushed I really haphazardly put stuff down (part of the reason I'm surprised I did so well). City size is shockingly small. Because it's so small region play isn't an optional thing, it's a mandatory feature that you will need in order to fill unrestricted.

UPDATE: Finally is working now. Took awhile though. I got beta invite, but since Origin (aka the Devil) isn't working, I cannot install it!!!

FROM OCEAN'S BLOG/TWITTER: "City size. Yes, its smaller than I'd like. Please understand that we're at the beginning of a completely new system and give us some time." He knows people, he knows!!! Sounds like a Rush Hour Expansion improvement

Does it seem to anyone else like they are strong-arming people into a genre during gameplay. "After all, if you don't choose a genre, what role do you play within the region?" As I recall, all the news and screenshots and such seem centered around city themes. "Are you going to build a casino city?" "Are you going to accept trash from your neighbors?" "Are you going to be the industrial powerhouse for the region?" Etc, etc, etc. Whatever happened to build whatever city you want and watch it grow? I recall many people (myself included) wanting to build hamlets and car-less cities. It looks like there is no room for that in today's SimCity.

SIMTROPO GUILD: Anyone on here from "Simtropolis" officially? I'm asking because, is it possible to get Simtropolis to setup a Mumble for launch? That way we can coordinate and help each other. Perhaps we can share strategy for newbs or communicate a cool feature we found, etc. Also the aforementioned coordination of multi-player/region play. Thoughts?

Ocean put on his twitter just a few days ago that beta is NOT out and he's not sure when it will be.

I can't expand without Land Permits. I got a ton of Simoleons and no where to put them. I have to pester a bunch of grown adults on my Facebook page who don't give a rip about SimCity in order to get land permits. Fail.

I'm hugely disappointed. It's exactly like CityVille, why do we need a rehash of that garbage?

"Undo" button is an absolute must.

I'm not sure there is such a way now that I opened my mouth. However, we will just have to keep track of this thread and add user names manually when the game comes out. Mods a sticky perhaps?

I already talked about this in another thread (where I was warned about profane language). This was classic bait and switch and nothing we can do about it. They said "Come to our SIMCITY live event for a 25% of promo code". They never said it was for SimCity, but clearly it was implied by coming to said event. I also tried the code and found it not working. The list of acceptable games did not have it on there. What's worse is even after the promo, I've seen all those games cheaper at other times past. Doesn't this look implied?!? Join Maxis Senior Producer Kip Katsarelis for a live Q&A of SimCity Tuesday, June 5th. Starting at 12:00 p.m. PT, Katsarelis will be laying down all the newest details on PC’s ultimate city simulator, as well as taking all your burning questions. Want to make sure you remember? Sign up for a reminder by entering your e-mail in the “Cover It Live” box to your right. If that wasn’t enough, we’ll also be giving out a special 25% off promo code during the chat, so come back here the day of the event to find out what it is. And remember, SimCity releases next year, so pre-order the Limited Edition at no extra cost on Origin and receive the SimCity Heroes and Villains set.

I never said I don't want to play multi-player, I've just said I want the OPTION to play either single or multi.