clif9710

I placed this question on another forum and was told it's normal. I'm hoping that's not the case. What's your experience? There is a Goth Industries plant that, when queried, tells me 13 out of a possible 19 jobs are filled, but when I do a route query I am told that "workers and freight" are zero and no travel paths are shown. I've also found that abandoned plants that a query shows have no workers can, when route query is used, show there are workers and the commute paths are indicated. I've let some game time pass to see if it is momentary thing, but the discrepancies remain. Since this information is so basic to the game, it's hard to believe it is normal. Is there a fix?

I've noticed that young sims accompany new res areas. These sims then age. Do sims eventually die to be replaced by young sims or is the placement of new res areas the only way to get youngsters? Also, do sims move or stay in place? In other words, when a res area gets richer, should I think of that as poor sims earning more, or poor sims leave and wealthy sims move in? Since the housing density goes down with wealth, what happens to the population that is displaced?

Thought I haven't played them, it's apparent from what I read that the successor simcity games haven't met expectations and as a result SC4 continues. I wonder what kind of information was gathered to drive the development of the later versions, such as Skylines. You'd think that the characteristics of SC4 (and NAM) that make it endure would at some point be put into a new version...

Being a newbie, NAM is overwhelming. I've watched tutorials and invariably the presenters will intend to do something, it won't work, and they will say something like "oops, that can't work here, so here's what you have to do" and then he works some magic to come up with a solution that will work. The detail is overwhelming. My favorite interface was in World of Warcraft, where one could decide on the things one wanted to use frequently and place the icons for immediate access. The not-wanted did not appear on screen, you could forget about them. When in battle, a sequence of icons could be hit and the results were as smooth as if it were all one action. Unless I am using it wrong, it appears the NAM always requires scrolling through what seems like a huge number of selections, most of which are not what one is after. The next time the item is needed, it's scrolling time again. I don't believe one can leave a menu in a scrolled position - you always have to start at the top. I found, for example, that the bus station had moved down the scroll list. Going through this scrolling over and over is tedious. None of this is to belittle the incredible amount of work that obviously went into NAM.

Well, I reached 500 years and sure enough, the game uninstalled and a window opened that said "a random 12 gB of your hard disk has been erased as punishment for waiting 12 years after we released this game before you purchased it" A.N.Moose - after reading your comment, I started up Process Hacker to view CPU and GPU use while SC4 is running. I also started FRAPS. The CPU usage goes between 10 and 15% and the GPU is running a about 5%, but I am nowhere near the 700k Sims you mentioned. The FPS is 15. My PC is an I7 and I have a add-on graphics board. The only problem I have is on rare occasions the game will quit, so I take care to back up from time to time.

If I am interpreting what I see correctly, 500 "years" is the limit. When that is reached the game stops?

I'm reading comments and notice people mention bugs, such as the "commuter bug" and I know about an I-HT bug. Is there a listing of all known bugs/fixes?

My city treasury is going up up up. I have over 5.5 million in funds and my city is small (22,000). All is going well, everything is under control and I'm wondering if I should start spending wildly on landmarks, none of which I have placed so far. BTW, the NAM installation really altered the traffic situation. If anything, it seems too tolerant of traffic now. I still have mostly streets with only a couple of avenues and congestion is nowhere near being a problem. With my big surplus, I'm thinking of calling Mayor Rahm Emmanuel in Chicago to see if I can give him some badly needed tips...but then again, there is no pension funding in SC!

That might be a reason to run at the cheetah speed, since the months would go by fast and updating would come sooner?

Ah, ok. So it is the quality of the situation in relation to the best that can be obtained that is revealed in the straight query. Thank you. There is one loose end, though. Abandoned buildings that show 0/15 employment, for example, should not have any workers because conditions are so bad none are allowed...yet the route query can still show active commuters to the site. But maybe that only means the number of them is dropping and will likely go to zero soon.

I guess I could bring in the aliens or a tornado to cause some expensive damage.

I've been watching a SC4 tutorial (by dwyrin) where he speaks of triggering an area. He does this by bulldozing one lot out of a side-by-side series of lots none of which have any development. As soon as he does this, the whole area of connected lots begins to grow. It acts like the game doesn't realize the area needs to pop until he reminds it by this single-lot bulldoze. What's the story on triggering?

The video that got me on this subject of triggering is at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c3Fyec9bWgk go to 16 minutes in and watch for a minute as he "triggers" residential development in several locations with bulldozing.

I have been looking over posts about marking things historical. Am I correct that this will freeze development of a lot and that is its only function?

I don't agree, abandoned historical buildings may not be redeveloped, but they can be rehabilitated. So it may be good to mark abandoned buildings historical, especially if they are buildings that you want to keep, or hard to get. Normally you don't want you your 2x3 CO$$$ office "redeveloped" as a CS$ shop with 80 CS$ jobs, you rather want to protect it from such a "redevelopment". It will be re-occupied when conditions improve. Thanks for that comment because it answers another question. I was wondering if lots could downscale into a lesser property. I'd been thinking that the only thing that could happen on the down-value side would be abandonment then the building would either sit there unoccupied or partially occupied or burn down but would never be replaced.

I realize this is Simtropolis, not SC4D, but I am at a dead end in trying to register at SC4D and thought maybe someone here might be able to help as I can't reach anyone there. I have repeatedly tried to register there and everything goes fine, but I never get a confirmation email so I can't complete the process. I've tried two different email addresses, I have tried using both Chrome and IE, I have requested re-sends of the confirmation email, I have checked my spam folder, I've tried emailing SC4D using the "contact us" link, all to no avail. I'd like to be able to access the file exchange there but perhaps it is not to be. : (

thanks very much, I'll do that

How critical is the placement of bus stations? Given a four way intersection with a single bus route already passing straight through, should I be careful to place the station on the corner along the route already in being, assuming that if I place it on the cross street it will not be integrated into the route in being? If I do place it 90 degrees off the existing route, will the game try to create a new route that will take in the new station? I've noticed that bus routes can be very popular only to become little used very quickly as neighborhoods change. Should I leave the stations I have in place for potential use in the future?

I know what you mean - those mansions spring up everywhere. Taxes to the rescue. The real-life rich have escaped taxes but, darn it, not in my virtual city!

that sounds good, I'll go digging for the turnaround... This brings up another issue. I notice that the mansions can show an unemployed zot indicating that the commute time is too long. That tells me I need to study the path taken to work to see where the problem is so I can address it. However, when the zot appears, the Route Query tool tells me that nobody is traveling from that mansion. Without being able to examine the route that has become too long, I'm at a loss what to do to correct the travel time. BTW, my traffic volume is less than 40% everywhere, much less in most places, so congestion couldn't be a problem (methinks).

I have a couple of residences where the rich have fled to be replaced by the poor. Since all these occupants are working, I'd think it would be a good idea to leave the mansion alone, presuming that it could at some future point be reoccupied by the wealthy. Is there ever a reason to demolish anything but dirty industrial sites? I know that in laying out new transportation routes, demolition may be unavoidable, but the rule is to let things alone to develop, right? If there is a fire, would that be a reason to demolish a property?

BINGO - that's the solution. Thanks. I think I can get on without many low $ residents as they are more than being replaced by $$ and $ residents. At least so far, so good.

I read in the Prima guide that ID is the only type that will not upgrade on its own, so must be demolished to be rid of it. In my current city, I put down several ID at the start for the low income residents, but now my city is thriving, the income is far beyond anything I've had in the past and I want to clear out the air polluting ID zones to make way for IM and IHT. The demolition idea comes from my thinking it is my only option for ID. Is there an alternative?

I've only been playing SC4 for a week now and I can see that the community has taken the ball and run with it to an impressive degree. I've installed the NAM for the puzzle pieces it will allow me to use, but I see that it also contains the TSCT. Is there any reason for me to concern myself with altering the traffic simulator at this point or can I assume that just installing the NAM will make corrections in the vanilla game that are all I need? I immediately noticed that all my traffic congestion problems are gone. I didn't see any reference on how to actually start up the TSCT. I assume it is run outside of SC4, possibly by command line?

Thanks, Eggman.