Gray_Lensman

well that completely blows So basically you're saying I would have to buy a digital copy off from Steam and then play it directly off from Steam for it to work...? and would I need both copies of the orginial SimCity 4 plus Rushour or just only Rushhour? No, you do not have to play SimCity4 or almost any other game purchased via Steam, directly off Steam for them to work (unless the particular game has a multiplayer mode and you WANT to play multiplayer). You can choose to play it (SimCity4) offline (and for that matter set Steam to offline mode) and only choose to go online on Steam when you WANT to.

https://community.simtropolis.com/files/file/28544-sc4-launcher/

@‌TekindusT Did you by chance try installing to a custom folder (NOT including .../Program Files or .../Program Files (x86))? In other words install directly into something like C:/SimCity 4 and NOT C:/Program Files (x86)/SimCity 4 This of course assumes that Windows 10 still uses the goofy .../Program Files sub-folders.

You can disable the steam overlay by right clicking your game in the steam library, properties and uncheck "Enable the Steam overlay while ingame" in the general tab. I've done that since the beginning and I am able to use the backward option. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. I've been trying to figure out how to disable that annoying overlay for several games, but it really irritated me with the SimCity4 NAM menus. Now, I can Shift-Tab backwards thru those long NAM menu choices when I fat-finger the TAB key.

What exactly did you mean? To be honest, I didn't come across any annoying restrictions there. But if you warn me like that, I'll rather consider to buy it somewhere else then My main objection to DRM sites is the privacy one. I don't want to log in to some site to play a game I own. Once I set Steam to Offline mode, this is what I get whenever I startup any of my games. I have gone well over a month choosing "Start in Offline Mode" to start my games without ever logging into Steam. The ONLY reason I ever log on to Steam is to check for updates and browse occasionally for a game that might be on one of their frequent 50% to 75% off sales. edit: (or play one of the grandsons head to head in Civ !V)

Under my STEAM installation, I have installed 1. SC4Bat 2. SC4Terraformer 3. SC4Mapper 4. SC4 Landscape Designer 5. ILives Reader 6. SC4PIM 7. Lot Editor All of them start up and work just fine except I'm not too proficient at using them yet. The ONLY alteration I have run across that gives me problems is STEAM taking over the Shift-Tab key combination. Once you get into heavy SC4 menu usage (mostly after installing the NAM), you miss the ability to go backwards in the menus.

What tipped the scales for me to start using Steam was the fact that I got tired of scratching up my CDs/DVDs because of the requirement that most of them had to be running (some of them quite noisily) in the drive to play the game that I paid for.

I've been off-line from Steam playing games for more than a month at a time with no issues. The only thing that you now miss out on are updates which at times can be a real nuisance since they are erratically automatic (you're supposed to be able to disable automatic updates from Steam, but it sometimes goes ahead and does so anyway, hence my setting it to offline mode until I deliberately decide to go online to check for updates at a more convenient time should they be available). I suspect others have more issues due to their usage of user account controls within Windoze. which can be mostly avoided by NOT installing Steam into the default ...\Program Files (x86)... folder. edit: I have close to 20 games purchased thru Steam in the last 5 years and all of them run just fine (offline in single player mode). I rarely play online except to placate a couple of grandsons who are occasionally up for a Civ IV Beyond the Sword game. I suppose those that like head-to-head online might not like the auto-update feature of Steam that much either especially IF it's an update for the game they are getting ready to play (because once that update starts, there is no playing of THAT game until the update has completed). If it's NOT the game they are getting ready to play, the auto update is not that much of a hindrance since Steam is defaulted to pause downloading while any game play of any game is proceeding.

Don't know about the Origin installation but you have a mistaken misconception about Steam DRM. You can now download any of their games and play any them ON or OFF line no complications at all and I don't have to worry about where the original disk went. I almost always start my games with Steam in Offline mode. SimCity 4 Deluxe works almost flawlessly with the installation in the /Steam/Steamapps... folder and the My Documents/SimCity4/plugin folder is identical in use to a non Steam installation. The ONLY negative I'm finding with a Steam installation is the diversion of Shift-Tab for Steam purposes interferes with reverse tabbing thru some long menu selection if you accidentally TAB thru the menu selection you were looking for. p.s. I'm an old timer that started with manual game installations under DOS 3.0 and was hesitant about Steam usage myself until they perfected the online/offline play choice.

Yes... It's called SimCity 4 Deluxe Edition: Prima's Official Strategy Guide available on Amazon. Don't confuse it with the Prima Strategy Guide for the original vanilla SimCity4 which is also available.

I keep reading various threads about the advisability of starting off zoning Low Wealth Residential for 2 x 1 lots. However, whenever I zone for those, I get zip, nada, nothing, no matter how long I wait (a game year and more). If I change to Low Wealth Residential 1 x 2, and/or 1 x 3 they fill up almost instantly. I took a look with ILive Reader and there aren't any Low Wealth 2 X 1 lots listed in the SimCity_1.dat file. Are the 2 x 1 Residential Lots being referred to available in some add-on mod somewhere or were there supposed to be some Maxis Low Wealth 2 x 1 in the base game installation (presumably within the SimCity_1.dat file)? I'm using the Steam installation of SimCity4 Deluxe v1.1.641.1

Thanks for the tip. I finally got it to work haphazardly. Wow, what a ridiculous pain.

I can delete text inside the quote box easily enough... the empty quote box... no, nada, zip... edit: FYI, I have used over a dozen or more gaming forums and never encountered this behavior.

Off-topic: timmie: I just tried to do as you suggested. Worked fine but would not delete the quote box... just the text.

Okay, issued resolved... It was indeed the population needing to be high enough to achieve Stage 2 for the 2x1 lots to appear. I can see that I'm going to be happily immersed in this city simulator with all its inner working challenges.

edit: this erratic reply quoting is driving me nuts. It seems I can't delete quoted statements once they are embedded in the topic and if I exit the browser entirely and come back to the site, it is persistent in saving what I have accidentally started... What gives with this behavior? Is there a setting to inhibit or stop this behavior?

First question is "Did you download your SimCity 4 Deluxe" from Steam? If so, then the Lot Editor and its manual are already embedded in the Steam installation folder(s) and you can just make desktop shortcuts to them on your desktop and you're good to go.

I've recently installed the SPAM/SPAR mods for more realistic rural settings. In the documentation it suggests removing any I-R Job Multipliers. This makes sense regarding the farm zone doubler .dat file. However, if someone was mixing outlying rural areas (using SPAM) with the development of moderately sized cities (40.000 or so pop.) in the same region, wouldn't it make sense to keep the I-R Job multiplier .dat files that are specifically applicable to Hi-Tech and Dirty Industry? On a side note... Can anyone provide me with a direct link to the SPIC mod files that might be located in another location other than SimPeg since that site has ceased operation, or would it be better to just use SG's Irrigation Ditch files (which I already have) with SPAM

Where can I find some 2x1 R$ Lots? The default game file (SimCity1.dat) seems to be short this particular size and I'd like to add some half dozen or so contemporary style 2 x 1 single family homes to my growable selection.(highly preferable with no dependencies)

No, it's not fixed yet ... for the Moose and I and probably others, we are seeing BBcode instead of working url links etc. (matter of fact... I'm seeing a lot of this on various tutorial pages. I'm assuming it has something to do with the site rework.) A section cut from the DEPENDENCIES hyperlinks of the Paeng's Park download page:

Okay, Thanks. I presume you were running SPAM without the SG set for a time. Did you have any problems with I-Ag demand cap dwindling that prompted you to use the SG set? Off-topic side comment... The original username Gray_Lensman was indeed prompted by the Kim Kinnison character in the Lensman series of books, but over time as I've grown older and retired (now 64), my appearance has "grayed" significantly and I now have to wear reading glasses (lenses) to do my web browsing and reading so the name has come to have more of a personal connotation.

A Nonny Moose: Are you also using SPAM Irrigation Canals (SPIC) and if so are you mixing usage with SG's Ditch Set on the same city tile (not connected together of course, that would really look tacky),

Regarding demand modifiers... Are the industry doubler/quadrupler's considered demand cap modifiers? I would think that all they do is change/modify the number of workers in those classes of industry buildings so that you don't need as many of those buildings to satisfy a specific demand cap level. Also, I specifically searched and found SimGoober's BSC Irrigation Ditch Set based on a post that you (@‌A Nonny Moose) made commenting that you were using it with no issues with your rural settings. For sure, the SG BSC Irrigation Ditch set is a mod based on lots containing demand modifiers specifically designed to counter SimCity's negative bias against Industry-Agriculture as the urban population grows. Are you still using it or did it skew (IR) demand too much? FYI, I have both the SPIC irrigation mod (which doesn't have demand modifier lots) and SimGoober's BSC Irrigation Ditch Set (which does have demand modifier lots). I'm not sure which to go with, but they seem to tolerate each other rather satisfactory in testing, but are rather redundant other than the difference in demand cap lots, My personal opinion is for the SPIC ditches preferring their looks vs SimGoober's, but I don't want my rural settings being affected by the negative bias mentioned above as I develop some moderately sized cities in the same city/regions. off-topic note: My apologies if this post contains what appears to be multiple quotes... For some reason, when I reply to this particular topic which I started, it wants to quote the whole thread in the reply box, necessitating a lot of deletions to eliminate the unwanted quotes. (Yes, I've toggled the multiple quote on/off several times to no avail). If I go to another thread/topic and click "Reply to this topic" it behaves normally, so I'm not sure if it's something I'm doing incorrectly or if the forum is behaving strangely while they rework it.

Thanks for the reply, but maybe I need to be a little more clear as to my original question... I am using the industry jobs-doubler1 files which contains 2 sets of 3 (.dat) files. One set compensates pollution, the other set doesn't. I opted for the pollution compensated set which contains the following files to be placed in the ...\MyDocuments\SimCity4\plugins folder. 1. dirty-doubler_includingPollution.dat 2. hitech-doubler_includingPollution.dat 3. farm-doubler_IncludingPollution.dat My question was in regards to removing just the farm_doubler_includingPollution.dat file and leaving the other two files in the \plugin folder to continue job doubling the hi-tech and dirty industries. I would have pursued this question/topic on the SimPeg site, but alas that's no longer possible.

Regarding neighbor connections... Do they have to match up exactly 'tile wise' with a corresponding type connection in the neighbor city to work properly or is that rather a more aesthetic thing to do for the region view to look good?