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[Orlandu84]

That's giving them too much credit. They made a game that ended up not being anything like they thought. Unlike an XCOM, etc., they ran with it and hid the flaws very very well.

Media previews and even an "open beta" in the hands of the public fooled most. The Civ V effect: Modern HD graphics on an aging franchise = instant millions. Why go back to the drawing board?

Note: I mentioned earlier in the thread: Firaxis fixed Civ V and its great now if you don't play multiplayer. That's not going to happen with SimShitty.

I agree with your post whole heartedly but would like to add the following thoughts.
I think the root problem for SimCity is that they build a simulator around very dumb AI's. "Dumb as rocks" comes to my mind when I see the sims in SimCIty going about their business. Yet, the developers thought that their AI's were intelligent! What many on this thread see as problems is actually the AI operating regularly. Their stupidity is a feature, not a bug! By keeping the AI simple, they kept their engine requirements modest. When we heard that they were not using multi-threading extensively, we should have concluded that the game could not be what they claimed it was. After all how could you simulate even tens of thousands of AI who do all that the sims in SimCity are supposed to do.

A good example of dumb AI ruining an otherwise good game is Empire Total War. The previous title, Medieval Total War II, functioned well because the AI for units knew what to do for melee combat - charge! In Empire Total War the AI for units had no clue what to do for ranged combat since it was also always trying to have individual units advance and not take defensive positions. To Creative Assembly's credit, they admitted their fault and had a good apology - their lead designer for AI had to quit midway through development. Unfortunately, it was not until Napoleon Total War that the engine was fixed. I fear a similar revamp is necessary to make SimCity viable.

 

[Rentahamster]

• Transit: Streetcar stops can now be placed directly on standalone streetcar tracks, and passengers can walk along the tracks to them.

I wasted so much time in the beginning trying to do this, and then later realizing that you can't.

Note: I mentioned earlier in the thread: Firaxis fixed Civ V and its great now if you don't play multiplayer. That's not going to happen with SimShitty.

I finally fired up my free copy of Civ 5 that I got with XCOM. Seems like an alright game. What were the complaints? That it was simplified too much?

I heard that the expansion fixed a lot of things, but I don't know what. Perhaps I should buy it and give it a whirl. Vanilla Civ 5 doesn't seem so bad.

 

[Psychoward]

I wasted so much time in the beginning trying to do this, and then later realizing that you can't.


I finally fired up my free copy of Civ 5 that I got with XCOM. Seems like an alright game. What were the complaints? That it was simplified too much?

I heard that the expansion fixed a lot of things, but I don't know what. Perhaps I should buy it and give it a whirl. Vanilla Civ 5 doesn't seem so bad.

That was the main general complaint about it yeah. But Gods and Kings usually goes on sale for $7.50-$15 so I'd wait for a sale for it. But it added religion, espionage, rebalancing, and like 8 new civs.

 

[Rentahamster]

That was the main general complaint about it yeah. But Gods and Kings usually goes on sale for $7.50-$15 so I'd wait for a sale for it. But it added religion, espionage, rebalancing, and like 8 new civs.

I'll probably just buy it for full price if I get the free time/urge to play. Firaxis has really impressed me with their offerings as of late. They knocked it out of the park with XCOM, in my opinion, and I say this as a lover of the old school hardcore XCOM game from 1994.

 

[boltz]

that sounds all well and good, but tbh, i've lost all interest in this game.
the only thing that can really revive my insterest is if they expand city borders, and not just by a few square blocks, i mean like 2x the current size.

I think a lot of people could be brought back to the game with expanded city sizes. The game has its fair share of issues, but it still manages to be fun until you use up all of your land and are forced into a high density city to increase your population.

 

[PotatoeMasher]

There's more in the interview about how Maxis is not currently looking to increase city size, yet are aware that's the number one complaint against the game.

That part killed me. The last thing I want to do is pack more into my city. I want the freedom to make sprawling podunk towns or have a dense city center that is surrounded by suburbs.

Seeing a gigantic region map dotted with a few dense squares of city is depressing.

 

[Chanser]

Got a nasty traffic jam at the start.

 

[storybook77]

Got a nasty traffic jam at the start.

?

The new update isn't out yet.

 

[Mengy]

I'll probably just buy it for full price if I get the free time/urge to play. Firaxis has really impressed me with their offerings as of late. They knocked it out of the park with XCOM, in my opinion, and I say this as a lover of the old school hardcore XCOM game from 1994.

I've been on a Civ V kick lately. Played like 20 hours in the past two weeks. With G&K the game has really shaped up nicely, and the next expansion looks to directly address the few areas where the game still needs some help, so IMHO Firaxis has done a great job with the game.

Hopefully Simcity 2013 gets the same treatment eventually, but so far the patches have been very underwhelming considering all the problems the game has.

 

[AnotherNils]

That part killed me. The last thing I want to do is pack more into my city. I want the freedom to make sprawling podunk towns or have a dense city center that is surrounded by suburbs.

I think they're screwed by technical limitations. At 80k my comp starts chugging. I'm sitting at 200k now and its getting worse.

I can't imagine them implementing a feature only a fraction of the userbase would be able to run.

 

[Lkr]

problems aside(i haven't really noticed any...yet), this game is pretty fun for all of the shortfalls. right now i am experiencing the issue where the town size limits are too small. my brother was telling me that i can't put industry in one town, suburb in another, etc like i used to do in simcity 4; is this true? game is beautiful, not gonna lie. i'm glad i waited until after the initial launch drama and found out my brother had it - now i just play through his origin account until it goes on sale

 

[Mengy]

I think they're screwed by technical limitations. At 80k my comp starts chugging. I'm sitting at 200k now and its getting worse.

I can't imagine them implementing a feature only a fraction of the userbase would be able to run.

They could use more than one core to run the game? How many people playing Simcity 2013 are not at least on a duo-core processor? That would certainly help.

 

[AnotherNils]

They could use more than one core to run the game? How many people playing Simcity 2013 are not at least on a duo-core processor? That would certainly help.

It would, I just suspect that the cost of doing that would dissuade EA; I don't know anything about programming, but it doesn't strike me as a light undertaking.

problems aside(i haven't really noticed any...yet), this game is pretty fun for all of the shortfalls. right now i am experiencing the issue where the town size limits are too small. my brother was telling me that i can't put industry in one town, suburb in another, etc like i used to do in simcity 4; is this true?

Yeah the commuting is a little rough. I think the 3.0 patch is supposed to make stuff like that more feasible.

 

[Lkr]

are you fucking kidding me? i get forced out of the game for maintenance?

 

[AnotherNils]

I hope that means 3.0 is dropping.

Edit: Yep - https://twitter.com/simcity/status/332154775045017601

 

[BigJonsson]

Yay patch

 

[Lkr]

I hope that means 3.0 is dropping.

Edit: Yep - https://twitter.com/simcity/status/332154775045017601

Yay patch

you guys can yay all you want. i haven't played the game for 24 hours yet and i am already witnessing why "always online" sucks

my sims are bitching about germs. how do i fix this?

 

[Mengy]

It would, I just suspect that the cost of doing that would dissuade EA; I don't know anything about programming, but it doesn't strike me as a light undertaking.

At this point yeah, it would be a terribly lot of work to make the game threaded. But in the beginning, if they had taken the time to make Glassbox run threaded from the beginning, well then we would already have larger cities in the game.

Again, poor design decisions all around.

 

[AnotherNils]

my sims are bitching about germs. how do i fix this?

Depends on the cause. There was the phantom air pollution bug which I swear was secretly tweaked in 2.1, but is supposed to be fully addressed in 3.0.
Just make sure they're no near any ground or air pollution, build residential upwind of industry. If you can afford it, build the hospital with the germ vans (I forget what they're called).

 

[BigJonsson]

you guys can yay all you want. i haven't played the game for 24 hours yet and i am already witnessing why "always online" sucks

my sims are bitching about germs. how do i fix this?

I have no idea, I usually ignore their bitching


The other pain in the ass are hazmat fires when you have no ability to build hazmat fire trucks until you increase population enough to upgrade city hall to have access to them =/

 

[Lkr]

Depends on the cause. There was the phantom air pollution bug which I swear was secretly tweaked in 2.1, but is supposed to be fully addressed in 3.0.
Just make sure they're no near any ground or air pollution, build residential upwind of industry. If you can afford it, build the hospital with the germ vans (I forget what they're called).

well if i have industry won't there always be some air pollution? i think i have enough of the underground shit tunnels going

 

[AnotherNils]

well if i have industry won't there always be some air pollution? i think i have enough of the underground shit tunnels going

It's impact is limited by checking the direction of wind flow. On one of my current cities I have all my industry on the edge of the map and the wind is carrying the pollution right out.

 

[storybook77]

you guys can yay all you want. i haven't played the game for 24 hours yet and i am already witnessing why "always online" sucks

my sims are bitching about germs. how do i fix this?

Clinics, Hospitals with Wellness Vans, and Education. Also, make sure garbage/sewage is being collected.

 

[Rentahamster]

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articl...&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=european-daily

When the discussion turned to the launch of Sim City Online, Wright was quick to declare his first thought. "I feel bad for the team," Wright said. Beyond that, Wright had some definite opinions about the launch. "I could have predicted - I kind of did predict there'd be a big backlash about the DRM stuff. It's a good game; I enjoy playing it a lot." Still, Wright understands the audience response. "It was kind of like, 'EA is the evil empire, there was a lot of 'Let's bash EA over it,'" Wright said. "That was basically inexcusable, that you charge somebody $60 for a game and they can't play it. I can understand the outrage. If I was a consumer buying the game and that happened to me, I'd feel the same."

The DRM issues that EA has had with Sim City Online, and the controversy over rumors about Microsoft's new console requiring it to be always connected because of DRM, do seem to have a foundation, according to Wright. "I think people care if it doesn't work," he said. "If you can't play it on planes, stuff like that... I think there are some very valid concerns about it. Also there's a perception; I don't expect to play World of Warcraft on the airplane, because my perception is it has to be on the 'Net. Sim City was in this very uncomfortable space, like the uncanny valley, almost; [it was caught] between was it a single player game or was it a multiplayer game?"

Wow, that's neat...I had described the game in terms of the uncanny valley before, albeit in regards to the gameplay, not the always online.

 

[Lkr]

Guys I found Will Wright's gaf account

 

[PotatoeMasher]

They could use more than one core to run the game? How many people playing Simcity 2013 are not at least on a duo-core processor? That would certainly help.

All I can figure is they must be dealing with exponential complexity in the simulation, so even assuming the sim engine could be made to be thread-safe and achieve some amount of linear performance gains, the complexity of the simulation itself is directly related to area which is obviously n^2. They might have architected themselves into a very tiny glass box.

I'm rusty on my computer science as I don't often implement my own high performance stuff algorithms these days, but given the latest comments from Maxis I just get the feeling it is what it is.

 

[AnotherNils]

All I can figure is they must be dealing with exponential complexity in the simulation, so even assuming the sim engine could be made to be thread-safe and achieve some amount of linear performance gains, the complexity of the simulation itself is directly related to area which is obviously n^2. They might have architected themselves into a very tiny glass box.

I see what you did there.

I wonder how much that complexity played into them needing to fake the number once you go high density.

 

[SRG01]

Woah I didn't know 3.0 was coming. Going to see if this improves one of my cities (doubtful)

 

[Chanser]

Residents keep complaining about the garbage, even though I have two garbage centers. Plus it doesn't help when some of the trucks are going around like a conga line.

 

[Koomaster]

Residents keep complaining about the garbage, even though I have two garbage centers. Plus it doesn't help when some of the trucks are going around like a conga line.

Had the same problem with my garbage trucks. Turns out in the center of my city is a circular road; all the garbage trucks at one point or another entered it and then proceeded to drive around and around the circle without picking up any garbage. I watched as all the garbage trucks got trapped there and proceeded to circle that road for days while all the garbage in my city overflowed. :/

Eventually they all finally decided they had enough fun and left. That is until the next day where they all ended up back on that circular road driving for eternity.

I really wish I had the ability to record that and upload it, as I couldn't even believe what I was seeing. And even worse is that there were homes and businesses on that road where garbage was piling up and the trucks STILL didn't pick up any of that garbage either. They just wanted to drive in a circle over and over again.

Shortly after all that my city became gnarled in traffic jams even tho I only have ~20k people living there. I turned the game off in disappointment after that. ~____~

 

[OchreHand]

I have been bulldozing like crazy since 2.0...patch 3.0 seems to have exasperated this problem with numerous "Out of money" complaints. At one point I had over 140houses to bulldoze lol.

I lowered the taxes to 8% for $ and $$ homes and that seems to have fixed it somewhat.

Edit: nope that didn't fix it.

 

[AnotherNils]

I swear each patch gives a new honeymoon. Things were pretty stable in one of my towns until my population jumped 20k and suddenly everyone started suffering from "Not enough workers." That's right, I gained 20k people and started having trouble filling jobs.

Then my university stopped teaching students and the tech went to hell and buildings started getting abandoned because they couldn't go to school. Its absurd.

 

[Acorn]

I swear each patch gives a new honeymoon. Things were pretty stable in one of my towns until my population jumped 20k and suddenly everyone started suffering from "Not enough workers." That's right, I gained 20k people and started having trouble filling jobs.

Then my university stopped teaching students and the tech went to hell and buildings started getting abandoned because they couldn't go to school. Its absurd.

I've came to accept the fact its beyond repair now. Worst money I've spent thus far this year.

 

[AnotherNils]

I've came to accept the fact its beyond repair now. Worst money I've spent thus far this year.

Its inspired me to try DOTA 2... if I can wrangle a key.

 

[Ikuu]

Its inspired me to try DOTA 2... if I can wrangle a key.

http://steamcommunity.com/id/dota2bot?l=english

 

[AnotherNils]

http://steamcommunity.com/id/dota2bot?l=english

Appreciate it, but I don't own any steam games (Can't add friends). With a few exceptions I'm a dedicated console gamer.

 

[Mengy]

I've came to accept the fact its beyond repair now. Worst money I've spent thus far this year.

So, are the patches not helping the game any? I don't own it, but I still read about it now and then hoping it someday makes it to a status that I will spend money on it, but all I read in every forum are complaints even still. Aren't the patches making the game better? Because it actually sounds like the patches made the game worse for some people....?

 

[Koomaster]

So, are the patches not helping the game any? I don't own it, but I still read about it now and then hoping it someday makes it to a status that I will spend money on it, but all I read in every forum are complaints even still. Aren't the patches making the game better? Because it actually sounds like the patches made the game worse for some people....?

The patches may be doing something, but there is a lot wrong fundamentally with the game and how the AI in it behaves. I'm not even sure that can be fixed with a patch. Between the 2.0 and now 3.0 patch I haven't noticed anything that made me go; 'Oh wow, thank god that got fixed.' It is really more of me squinting at the game trying to notice any positive change to come from the patches and so far not seeing any.

I know the 2.0 patch made things worse for people since they fixed a 'bug' which kept houses from going abandoned when they should. So people suddenly found the game more frustrating because of that. The game never adequately explains or is fast enough in describing a problem to you, so it's hard to course correct when the game thinks you are doing something wrong.

That is really what I notice most when I am playing. I will get things set up and going well, the city is running smoothly, then suddenly everything starts breaking down. Maybe not even through anything I've done, it's just the game decides fun time is over.

More people move in, new housing gets developed which takes up more water, which puts my water usage suddenly in the red. Now some buildings on the other side of town don't have water, and depending on what they are different frustrating things happen. Industrial; people get put out of work, no money, abandon homes. Commercial; people complain and are unhappy, industrial complains no place to ship freight, lost jobs. Residential; people complain of no water, abandon homes. And it gets worse if it's an essential building like the garbage dump or the nuclear power plant or fire or police station. If they don't get water, they shut off their services, completely close down.

Now; why not quickly fix the water you say. And this is where you learn that even the water has AI. So I will immediately place a new water pump, and it pumps out water-sims which have to travel along roads. Now water will get to the buildings next to the water pump first, but those buildings across town it can take hours or days to get there. And if the game doesn't like how your roads are laid out, it may never get there. You'll just watch a water blob pass by the road it needs to take in order to provide water to buildings without water. The game doesn't say; 'Hey we need water at the police station NOW!' The game just sends water out to stroll along the road, and hey if water blob passes a building without water, it will go inside.

This works the same for power as well. It's honestly the stupidest system I've ever seen that water and power have to have their own AI instead of being instantly delivered to buildings which need it.

So yeah that was just a long way of saying there are some frustrating things about the game that aren't fixable because the developers programmed the game that way and it's working the way they want.

I honestly believe that if we got larger city sizes, the game would just totally break down. It can't handle what we have going on now, there is no way the AI would know what to do with itself if it got more space.

 

[spirity]

Its inspired me to try DOTA 2... if I can wrangle a key.

I've played Anno 1404 (Dawn of Discovery in the US I think) and Tropico 4 so far, both great games. CitiesXL is ok too, though it lacks finesse. From those, I've kinda springboarded to Fallen Enchantress which has a city building element kinda, but is more an rpg/strategy game. Fun, and might be a stepping stone for my first Civ game.

Looking forward to Banished and Medieval Mayor. Hoping the latter doesn't turn out to be vapourware, there doesn't seem to be much in the way of announcements or progress if the website is anything to go by.

Its funny how the similarities between Diablo 3 and SimCity keep popping up. From the ashes of Diablo 3 came Path of Exile, Torchlight 2 and just round the corner, Grim Dawn. I can see same thing happening with SimCity.

 

[Pandemic]

I've came to accept the fact its beyond repair now. Worst money I've spent thus far this year.

I think I have to unfortunately agree here.. $120 on a game that I've played less than 48 hours on I think.. I definitely haven't spent as much time on it as I was expecting prior to pre ordering.

I just hate being limited, cause once you use all the land up, you sit there wondering what you have to demolish..

 

[Dinosaur Tamer]

So did these patches end up fixing the awful traffic system or does it still boil down to "take the shortest route, ignore everything else"?

 

[Mengy]

The patches may be doing something, but there is a lot wrong fundamentally with the game and how the AI in it behaves. I'm not even sure that can be fixed with a patch. Between the 2.0 and now 3.0 patch I haven't noticed anything that made me go; 'Oh wow, thank god that got fixed.' It is really more of me squinting at the game trying to notice any positive change to come from the patches and so far not seeing any.

I know the 2.0 patch made things worse for people since they fixed a 'bug' which kept houses from going abandoned when they should. So people suddenly found the game more frustrating because of that. The game never adequately explains or is fast enough in describing a problem to you, so it's hard to course correct when the game thinks you are doing something wrong.

That is really what I notice most when I am playing. I will get things set up and going well, the city is running smoothly, then suddenly everything starts breaking down. Maybe not even through anything I've done, it's just the game decides fun time is over.

More people move in, new housing gets developed which takes up more water, which puts my water usage suddenly in the red. Now some buildings on the other side of town don't have water, and depending on what they are different frustrating things happen. Industrial; people get put out of work, no money, abandon homes. Commercial; people complain and are unhappy, industrial complains no place to ship freight, lost jobs. Residential; people complain of no water, abandon homes. And it gets worse if it's an essential building like the garbage dump or the nuclear power plant or fire or police station. If they don't get water, they shut off their services, completely close down.

Now; why not quickly fix the water you say. And this is where you learn that even the water has AI. So I will immediately place a new water pump, and it pumps out water-sims which have to travel along roads. Now water will get to the buildings next to the water pump first, but those buildings across town it can take hours or days to get there. And if the game doesn't like how your roads are laid out, it may never get there. You'll just watch a water blob pass by the road it needs to take in order to provide water to buildings without water. The game doesn't say; 'Hey we need water at the police station NOW!' The game just sends water out to stroll along the road, and hey if water blob passes a building without water, it will go inside.

This works the same for power as well. It's honestly the stupidest system I've ever seen that water and power have to have their own AI instead of being instantly delivered to buildings which need it.

So yeah that was just a long way of saying there are some frustrating things about the game that aren't fixable because the developers programmed the game that way and it's working the way they want.

I honestly believe that if we got larger city sizes, the game would just totally break down. It can't handle what we have going on now, there is no way the AI would know what to do with itself if it got more space.

Wow, that sounds dreadful. So the utilities still have the same "traffic" issues they did at launch? That's really kind of ridiculous at this point. Doesn't sound like they have addressed very many of the really game breaking issues yet at all....

 

[AnotherNils]

So, are the patches not helping the game any? I don't own it, but I still read about it now and then hoping it someday makes it to a status that I will spend money on it, but all I read in every forum are complaints even still. Aren't the patches making the game better? Because it actually sounds like the patches made the game worse for some people....?

Its become a game of wack-a-mole. Every bug they fix, a new one emerges. Of course, they'll say some are gameplay features that players just don't understand – and I'll return they're gameplay features that were not well thought out or tested.

The patches may be doing something, but there is a lot wrong fundamentally with the game and how the AI in it behaves. I'm not even sure that can be fixed with a patch. Between the 2.0 and now 3.0 patch I haven't noticed anything that made me go; 'Oh wow, thank god that got fixed.' It is really more of me squinting at the game trying to notice any positive change to come from the patches and so far not seeing any.

The air pollution bug was the big one for me. No one complains about being sick and my health spending is way down.

I know the 2.0 patch made things worse for people since they fixed a 'bug' which kept houses from going abandoned when they should. So people suddenly found the game more frustrating because of that. The game never adequately explains or is fast enough in describing a problem to you, so it's hard to course correct when the game thinks you are doing something wrong.

Yep, I have a surplus of jobs, good public transportation, and still suffer overwhelming from it. I have no idea what I'm doing wrong.

Now; why not quickly fix the water you say. And this is where you learn that even the water has AI. So I will immediately place a new water pump, and it pumps out water-sims which have to travel along roads. Now water will get to the buildings next to the water pump first, but those buildings across town it can take hours or days to get there. And if the game doesn't like how your roads are laid out, it may never get there. You'll just watch a water blob pass by the road it needs to take in order to provide water to buildings without water. The game doesn't say; 'Hey we need water at the police station NOW!' The game just sends water out to stroll along the road, and hey if water blob passes a building without water, it will go inside.

This works the same for power as well. It's honestly the stupidest system I've ever seen that water and power have to have their own AI instead of being instantly delivered to buildings which need it.

Agreed.

 

[storybook77]

Yep, I have a surplus of jobs, good public transportation, and still suffer overwhelming from it. I have no idea what I'm doing wrong.

Have you clicked on the population # at the bottom and then the details tab. I have no idea how I've missed that table all of this time but it has helped me tremendously.

 

[AnotherNils]

Have you clicked on the population # at the bottom and then the details tab. I have no idea how I've missed that table all of this time but it has helped me tremendously.

That's how I know I have a surplus of jobs.

Edit: Considering there are "requested" workers and "Extra" workers, it'd be nice if the jobs tab broke the stats up in that manner. I have a feeling it'd show more buggy gameplay, however.

 

[storybook77]

That's how I know I have a surplus of jobs.

Edit: Considering there are "requested" workers and "Extra" workers, it'd be nice if the jobs tab broke the stats up in that manner. I have a feeling it'd show more buggy gameplay, however.

Maybe not enough shops, too much crime, germs, etc? I wish there were tables, like the one for population, along with the data layers we have.

 

[Pandemic]

Didn't know it was possible to mod for SimCity, but seems so,
http://community.simtropolis.com/files/category/17-simcity-2013/

 

[AnotherNils]

Maybe not enough shops, too much crime, germs, etc? I wish there were tables, like the one for population, along with the data layers we have.

If it was not enough shops, I'd get "Where's the shopping?" If it was too much crime, I'd get "Too much crime." Germs, "Died." And I think if it was commute I'd get "Couldn't get to work."

Nope, there's no clues as to what the hell is going on. At least for those of us who aren't savants at the game.

 

[storybook77]

If it was not enough shops, I'd get "Where's the shopping?" If it was too much crime, I'd get "Too much crime." Germs, "Died." And I think if it was commute I'd get "Couldn't get to work."

Nope, there's no clues as to what the hell is going on. At least for those of us who aren't savants at the game.

I wish we could click on individual buildings and get a breakdown of how many workers/shoppers/students/etc were housed/needed in each.

 

[AnotherNils]

My latest question is do tourists eat into the amount of goods available for locals at shop. What I mean is, lately I've seen residential building across the street from shops complain there is no shopping (Less regularly does the shop complain of no shoppers...).