Akeem J Lenoir

I believe UrbanLegend is referring to 100% zoning, where even civic services are zoned as opposed to plopped. Regarding the Sims, that's most likely in reference to what SimCity 2013 tried to accomplish.

Considering both Cities XXL and Cities Skylines, developed by different entities, utilize the same "Unity" engine, therefore will look alike in comparison, which game will win in the competition for consumers, assuming they both don't lose to Simcity? Will you want to buy either... or both? Where will your money go? Also, with the limited information we have on these projects, do you sense any similarities between the two? My curiosity has gotten the best of me, at the moment. LOL.

I have a few cities where I have 100% attendance but those are the exceptions rather than the rule. Majority don't, with 4 to 4.5 hats as you've described. I've noticed this for a long time now, the incomplete education of a city's students despite low traffic and presence of vacant desks (and as always I attribute it to some bug which seem to abound in SC2013). However I don't regard this phenomenon as "education has gone down the toilet," as originally described by the threadstarter because it isn't severe enough to cripple the city. As long as the education doesn't dip too low, say, 3 hats the industries don't complain of the lack of skilled workers which given long enough causes them to abandon. It would be nice if this bug is fixed though. I believe the reason you're not running into crippling issues with education is because you're not utilizing the university, nor are you using nuclear power plants. The education bug became most prominent when I plopped a nuclear power plant, which was exasperated when it was fully upgraded. Despite having high tech and education levels, my city would fail over time, causing disruptions in industry and commerce. The failures were attributed to either the nuclear power plant blowing, due to lack of educated workers, or high tech industry collapsing for the same reason. I found that while educated workers arrived to the nuclear power plant for work, they would no longer be educated upon heading home. Of course, if they left the city, they never came back. Because of this, it became harder and harder for the university to produce educated sims to satisfy the needs of both the high tech sector and the nuclear power plant, which required thousands of educated workers. All these buildings would compete for educated workers, while other cities demanded the workers as well. Nonetheless, I feel it's more an issue with the agent system, rather than a bug, per se. In SC4, for example, if Joe Sim was an educated worker, working at the plant, Joe worked at the plant every day, while living in the same home. In SC2013, Joe may live in city A on day 1, working at some random place, then on day 2, somehow make it to the plant for work, while heading to some random home in city B. I don't even want to bring up bugs associated with traffic, causing working being late to work which causes them to instantly unemployed. That's another crippler, which actually may of may not be caused by traffic.

Good! I'm not the only person thinking about that water. Glad to know I'm not. LOL. Sure, the water thing looks cool, but if the rest of the game doesn't look good, or better yet, work well, then what's the point. And, the lack of free-forming zoning is a feature I really enjoyed in SC2013. It's actually a bizarre circumstance, because Cities XL has free-forming parks. Surely, they could throw in free-forming zones.

The official Simcity page about Universities seems to suggest otherwise: "Dorms provide students to the university without the need to build up more residential. They also allow many students to get to class without adding to traffic near the beginning of classes." I wonder how common this education bug is because I've never encountered it despite plopping the whole range of schools (excluding universities) in most of my cities. Even those with universities have escaped the bug so far. I'm also on the side of never encountering this education bug. Maybe it's just the way I play. Hmm. This topic was asked, and addressed, on EA's website, though it was never answered, or fixed. However, I don't believe it's widespread, and may only be contained to specific regions, servers, or gameplay types. Perhaps, there are a certain mixture of conditions at must exist, like a "perfect storm" of sorts, that's causing this bug.

I'd have to disagree with this statement. Project Orion may a progression of a sort, but to proclaim that it's a resolution of any kind isn't appropriate. Larger cities are possible, as confirmed by EA; though, since EA feels it would be counter-productive to their target market, which are casual gamers who've never played SimCity prior to the reboot, because their bare-basic computers, tablets, and even phones, simply can't handle the game, they've abandoned the option. What's more, EA is purposely blocking the modding community from achieving these goals. Now, I'm not saying that hackers conduct unlawful acts to improve a broken game, with EA disavowing modding efforts, this game may have already reached its maturity. Perhaps SimCity Buildit will produce enough profits to interest EA to further support SC2013, or at least fully abandon the game, offering its developing package to the community. Progression? Have you seen what people have done with Orion? Okay, it's not an end-all be-all solution, but it's a pretty good one for what we have right now. Wait. I thought Maxis denied bigger city tiles being possible for small computers, not EA. I'm also in their so called "target audience" with a 2012 computer which can't run SimCity with 120 fps or more. I don't think they're purposely blocking the modding community. Maxis, in fact, has given many resources to kick-start SimCity modding with transactions involving modding tools to early information about the game. They helped SUGC lots to get UDoNs made and other mods created. It's just a matter of transferring the knowledge from the veterans of modding to some who know lots about coding or modifications and letting them go wild. The modding community isn't growing because the knowledge isn't out there. Considering Maxis, the developer, is owned by EA, the distributor, they're one in the same at this point. Nevertheless, as EA has touted in quite of few shareholder meetings for this franchise, along with others in their catalog. Actually, they've recently gone on the record as saying that mobile games, including SimCity Buildit, is the next best thing. Basically, if you're not fully committed to SC Buildit, playing such games on a tablet or smartphone, you're not their target audience. You're simply not. EA wants profit, as as of right now, SC Buildit, not SC2013, is providing such potential. That said, I'm sure it's common knowledge Maxis has the ability to provide all the resources to allow the modding community progress further; alas, they simply don't want to. We can speculate the particulars as to why, but that fact is the knowledge isn't available because of preference.

That was fast! This thing must have been in development long before being announced. Or else like some concerns of slapping a new wrapper on an old game. Considering the deep discounts they're offering, I'd venture to say it's the same old game with new packaging. It's sad really. How many times do they think selling the same game, however slightly improved, is going to go well with the gaming community? And, why would they even pull such a stunt with a more promising Cities: Skyline title on the horizon? Let's hope Cities XXL surprises us.

I totally agree with this. Just for clarity, though, I'd like to tie it to your previous response. - I should have around 7K attending school ​Bulldoze, or turn off, any and all competing buildings. -School bus stop Bulldoze all school bus stops. The short reason for this is that your students may be leaving your city and never returning. The long answer: You're playing the region 1 of 3 ways. Either you're playing offline, playing online in a private region whereas every city is owned by you, or playing online with others. In either case, unless every city is being played in sync... meaning they're being played at the same time or all caught up... i.e, if your particular city is in year 7, every other city is also in year 7... unless this is happening, you're having sync issues causing the bug. If you thing about it though, it's really not a bug at all, but a issue being caused by syncing. -No competing buildings. I only built the uni after I decided to demolish the HS. It's important to be certain no buildings are on, such as bus stops and libraries, as rmjohnson144 mentioned. -We're talking about HS students Yea.... Unfortunately, you have to make a choice as to which type of student you want in your town. Aside from all the things mentioned above, the game's mechanics are faulted when competing buildings exists. I plop all the educational buildings in my cities, just for realism, but always keep them off. This game just doesn't work like SimCity 4 I'm afraid. -It'd been upgraded with full dorms and 2 extentions. Simply, finish upgrading... of course... once we get to the root cause of this anyway. -If I don't they'll abandon the building soon after due to the lack of education. rmjohnson144 explained this perfectly, so I'll leave it at that.

I'd have to disagree with this statement. Project Orion may a progression of a sort, but to proclaim that it's a resolution of any kind isn't appropriate. Larger cities are possible, as confirmed by EA; though, since EA feels it would be counter-productive to their target market, which are casual gamers who've never played SimCity prior to the reboot, because their bare-basic computers, tablets, and even phones, simply can't handle the game, they've abandoned the option. What's more, EA is purposely blocking the modding community from achieving these goals. Now, I'm not saying that hackers conduct unlawful acts to improve a broken game, with EA disavowing modding efforts, this game may have already reached its maturity. Perhaps SimCity Buildit will produce enough profits to interest EA to further support SC2013, or at least fully abandon the game, offering its developing package to the community.

Sadly, as EA is profit-driven, SimCity Buildit may become a more supported platform than SimCity 2013, simply because profit potential is greater. Looking at this from a pure business standpoint, the only way EA would possibly support games like SC2013 is if they're able to make it profitable. At this point, the only way to do that, other than SC Buildit, is to change their model in favor of subscription-based gaming. So, let's say some new installment of SimCity were to be released. Instead of charging an average, one-time price of $20... already accounting for the cost of units sold... to presumably 2 million gamers, which is about $60 million in profit, they may option to require an ongoing, $5 monthly subscription. In theory, the lower price tag would entice many more gamers. Even at, say, 4 million gamers at $5 per month, they'd make on average $20 million per month, surpassing the previous profit potential in just 3 months. That must be their angle with SC Buildit. At already 20 million downloads, if they could get gamers to spend just $1 on a monthly basis, they'd make more money on that game than SC2013. Why wouldn't they follow the money? It just makes perfect business sense. As they always say, "money makes the world go round'" ... well... at least it dictates the gaming world.

I have a 200k pop city and recently its education has gone down the toilet. - The total population isn't indicative of the amount of students in the city. Check your data views to, first, confirm how many students you actually have in your city and to, second, confirm how many students aren't being educated. I had an upgraded high school running for the longest time with bus stops in all R areas. -You'll need to specify which type of bus stop you're using, because school bus stops are needed for non-college schools. Then my pop decided to stop going to school even though there was no traffic issue. - Yes, you're right. Certain regions have issues with students, while traffic is usually a cause. However, if you're certain traffic isn't an issue, you need to ensure no other competing buildings aren't turned on. It sounds as if you have competing buildings and, or colleges competing for students. Nevertheless, you need to be more specific as to which type of schools in which you're having issues. I did some research online, and problems seem to range from a non-fixable game bug, to losing students into another city because they never come back. People suggest to turn off all mass transit but that would cripple my city. I currently have a few park and ride plopped at the entrance of the city and in the R area, a double-decker bus terminal, and no bus stop signs. I also have maglev running around the city and that's about all the mass transit I have. -Again, you need to specify which bus stops you're referring to, as non-college students don't take public transportation. That said, if there are other non-college schools in the region, turn yours off, as they aren't needed. Keep your colleges on, though, as college students... because of a bug... don't travel regionally. I've demolished my high school in favor of a university and attendance averages around 2.5k per day. If I rebuild my high school, then it starts stealing students from the university. -Yes, keep the high school off, or demolished. No other schools, including the community college, is needed once the university is plopped. Also, it doesn't sound as if your university has been upgraded. Plop the dormitories. Dorms are great because instead of students going home at night, they go to the dorms, erasing traffic issues altogether. Upgrade it all the way. I've pretty much resorted to demolishing uneducated residential buildings every few minutes at this point... -Simply, stop demolishing buildings. You interfere with the game's mechanics when you do that. By the way, the university is plopped in the middle of the R and C area. It's not near the industrial area which is on the other side of the map. Students don't have to traffic a long way to get to school. -This isn't helping or hurting the situation, at this point, but is good practice. Hope this helps. Keep us in tune of your progress, and reach out if you have further questions or concerns.

Unfortunately, the space center great works doesn't work in every region in multiplayer mode, due to a bug of some sort. To date, EA has done nothing to correct the issue... other than enable offline mode, of course. At this time, I don't believe there's any fix, other than playing offline, as you've already successfully done. Is there a reason you're deciding to play SimCity online? Unless you'd prefer to play with friends, I would continue playing offline.

If you're comparing in-game terraforming options to that of SC4, the answer to "will there be terraforming..." will be no, as of now. However, recent interviews posted on SkylinesCity and SimNation offer these details: SkylinesCity SimNation Based on my interpretation, players will be able to edit their maps before gameplay begins; however, once gameplay begins, the terraforming ability ends.

What does using the same engine has to do with it? Are Mirrors Edge, Bioshock, Mass effect and Gears of War any similar? They use the same engine... You're comparing games with robust storylines, however open world, with "true" sandbox games. As the titles you've mentioned use the same engine, the story indeed erased certain similarities due to the story itself. There's no "story" with city builders, or simulations, or whatever one identifies with these titles. The truth of the matter as that as people play these games, especially as they play these games for 100+ hours, and longer, subtle differences won't make much of a difference to gameplay. What we need is a moderate gaming advancement, and not titles competing against one another while offering minor, yet different, features.

Maybe you have a special version. anyways if anyone is interested on how much more interconnected Simcity 4 cities, can read these threads. http://gaming.stackexchange.com/questions/58542/whats-the-exact-population-limit-at-which-demand-for-agriculture-disappears You cannot reach the higher stages of development in Simcity 4 without developing the region as a whole. Simcity 2013 on the other hand does not require regional development to reach the highest level of development. NAM was created to fix the traffic pathfinding problem present in Simcity 4. Quite a few issues were resolved with the Rush Hour expansion, without the modding community. Yes, there were still issues with SC4, but the Rush Hour expansion was essentially the game's evolve, much as the Cities to Tomorrow expansion is to SC2013. I do agree that we're comparing apples to oranges; however, this is only because loyalist wanted SC5, and not some reboot. Perhaps, it'll all be moot in a few years, when either the modding transforms this game into our wildest dreams, or Maxis and EA decides they want to run the makers of Cities XXL and Cities Skylines out of business. As they always say, time heals all wounds. LOL.

Considering Cities XXL and Cities Skylines are using the same engine, which is why they look similar, I can't see how the 2 games are going to be different from one another. Yes, I agree that Skylines may be feature-rich, compared to previous XL versions, but the city builder and simulation would most likely be the same, as they're using an identical platform.

I'd have to disagree that the cities rely more on one another in SC2013 than in SC4. In fact, I'd venture to say the exact opposite. A major issue plaguing SC2013 is the inflated population. The simulation in SC2013 works like SC4 it comes to the inflated population, while the actual agents, the part of the simulation that was supposed to make SC2013 superior to SC4, is only representative to about 20% of the total population. The proof is in the data, or the data view specifically. You ever notice how in a city of 100,000, only about 10% are actually working, while less than 10% are going to schools, visiting parks and landmarks? That's because those numbers represent the actual agents in the city. On the contrary, anything having to do with city specialization, referring to visitors, shoppers, and more so casino patrons, seems to show an that inflated number, though it's all based on an SC4-style calculation, rather than actual agents. Not to mention schools, colleges and universities specifically... as regional agents ignore these altogether. Moreover, I've tried quite a few times to build a commercial only city, only for it to crash despite having 300,000 sims in the region. In the commercial city, I'd always get the infamous "not enough shoppers" message. Likewise, in the industrial only city, I get the "not enough places to ship freight" message. In the residential only cities, I always faced an unemployment crisis, despite having tons of jobs in neighboring cities. This is because the inflated population doesn't commute to other cities in the region. In order to have successful cities, you'd have to all RCI. Nevertheless, applying the SC4 simulation concept to the SC2013 region, which is already being done on the city level, may solve the issue. Because of this, though, SC4 offers the option... key word... option... to allow your cities rely on one another, more or less, in my opinion.

One resource not yet mentioned is water. Water, like the aforementioned resources, is finite, and does diminish over time. Though, unlike other resources, water is replenished by rain. Nevertheless, as cities become large, requiring more water and, or water begins being sold to other connected cities in the region, the diminishing of the resource may outpace its replenishment. There's a workaround, mentioned throughout the forum, but if you'd like a challenge, I'd recommend keeping a close eye to water, especially as cities, and the region, age. Also, I'd recommend you search the forum in regards to Great Works, if you haven't already. Not all Great Works "work" in all regions. It's better to arm yourself with this information the easy way, as opposed to the hard way.

...Play the game a little longer, and get back to us. LOL. Not to say to game is bad, but after over 300 hours of gameplay, any and every limitation of the game will be discovered, and your tone shall be modified. I say this from experience. Simply, things will stop making logical sense, after awhile....

I'd like to see a free-forming zoning tool. SimCity 2013 almost got this right... almost... as we were able to zone an area without placing rectangular lots, like in SC4, or squared lots, like in Cities XL. In real life, not all buildings are uniformly close to main road, nor are they always squared. I want to form my zones to my liking.

I just hope they get away from those box lots. In the real world, though land is appropriated to developers, land is hardly permitted in square-like sections. Zoning should be free-formed.

The best thing is to store all of your raw ore, while importing metals, until your have stored about $2,000,000 worth of stock in your depot. Don't export anything until you've done this. Once this is accomplished, at 12am the next day, export all of your metals, all at once. This will unlock all of the upgrades in a single day. Now, if you don't have such funds at the moment, the best thing to do is to export all of your raw ore until you've reached a significant savings, or stockpile your ore, without importing anything. Though, it's wise not to have a negative cash flow during this process. You can do this by placing multiple ore mines, while upgrading them all to maximum output. It's also important to fully upgrade the trade port, maximizing all 12 delivery trucks, while ensuring there are no traffic issues. You mentioned you have already placed the commerce division. I usually place the smelting decision first, so I can start producing metals, thus, making good profit early. It's just a preference, but you may find benefit in using such a strategy.

The developers are likely hoping new buildings are created from the modding community, as the most unique creations have come from the players themselves, as seen with Simcity 4. I would rather see the developer focus on improving the game machanics, while the modding community focuses on brilliantly created buildings.

SimCity 2013 is NOT a successor to SimCity 4. Instead, it's more like a reboot of the entire series, whereas it's been taken back to square one. Therefore, if you're anticipating a "SimCity 5," you'd be terribly disappointed. I'd recommend looking at this game as if it's an entirely new game, and playing it with an open mind. Yes, most of us on this forum have a negative opinion of the game, but have also put in hundreds of hours of gameplay. So, if you can buy it for a discounted price, I'd say go for it. You will be entertained, nonetheless. I don't regret my purchase at all, despite the fact I bought it on day one.

I would have to agree with hyno111 on this, considering EA specifically explained they wouldn't allow porting because "we want to keep the competitive aspects of the Online game intact." Also, as porting is one-way, meaning you can't port an offline city to the server, it's clear EA wants to slowly get cities off their servers. It's a shame, because if they would have, in a sense, made a SimCity 5 like everyone wanted, instead of an entire reboot, the game would've been wildly popular. In either case, as I've invested hundreds of hours into SC2013, so it served its entertaining purpose. I can't complain. I just wish I didn't outgrow it so fast.