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Add new page. Main page Contents Featured content. Got bored, decided to test some long term recording methods and recorded the building of a city in SimCity4.
SimCity 4 is a city-building simulation computer game developed by Maxis, a subsidiary of Electronic Arts. It was released on January 14, 2003.
It is the fourth major installment in the SimCity series. SimCity 4 has a single expansion pack called Rush Hour which adds features to the game. SimCity 4: Deluxe Edition contained the original game and Rush Hour combined as a single product.The game allows players to create a region of land by terraforming, and then to design and build a settlement which can grow into a city.
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Players can zone different areas of land as commercial, industrial, or residential development, as well as build and maintain public services, transport and utilities. For the success of a city, players must manage its finances, environment, and quality of life for its residents.
SimCity 4 introduces night and day cycles and other special effects for the first time in the SimCity series. External tools such as the Building Architect Tool (BAT) allow custom third-party buildings and content to be added to the gameplay.SimCity 4 was praised for being the second game in the SimCity series to primarily use a 3D engine to render its graphics, the first being SimCity 64 for the discontinued Nintendo 64DD. It received widespread acclaim, won several awards, and was one of the top ten selling PC games of 2003. However, it was criticized for its difficulty and its demands on computer performance.GameplayRegional gameplayAs with previous SimCity titles, SimCity 4 places players in the role of a mayor, tasked with populating and developing tracts of lands into cities, while fulfilling the needs of fellow Sims that live in the cities. Cities are now located in regions that are divided into segments, each of which can be developed. The player has the option of starting the city in a segment of any of three area sizes.
In real measurements, the smallest has a length of one kilometer on a side, and the largest has a length of four kilometers on a side.dead link The size of a region and its layout of segments can be changed in a bitmap file provided for each region. Neighbor cities play a larger role than in the previous versions of the game. For example, neighbor deals can be established, where a city can exchange resources such as water, electricity and garbage disposal with other cities for money. Players may develop several inter-dependent cities at the same time, eventually populating the entire region.Game modesUpon selecting a specific segment in a region, gameplay is divided into three 'modes': god mode, mayor mode, and MySim mode. Mayor and MySim modes become available after establishing a city. The god mode is available before establishing a city, as well as after, but with fewer functions. The unavailable functions can be re-activated by obliterating the city.God modeThe first mode is god mode, which allows players to design or terraform a selected tract of land where the city will be built.
God mode also allows players to trigger disasters, including tornadoes and earthquakes among several others. Players can select an area where a disaster will occur and even control the direction of certain disasters. Most terraforming tools are disabled after the city is named and founded. The player still has some terraforming tools made available in mayor mode, although they become very limited and expensive, and they can still trigger disasters at will.In addition to these abilities, god mode also gives the player tools to reconcile the borders of the cities, so as to fix any discrepancies created during the terraforming process, and a day/night cycle adjustment, so that one can make it always day, always night, or alternate between day or night in accordance with the in-universe game clock.
Both the ability to reconcile the city edges and the ability to modify the day/night cycle are available even once the city has been established.Mayor modeThe second of the modes is the mayor mode, where the actual city building is conducted. Several advisors may give advice to the player on how to best manage a city. Players can build transportation networks, which include roads, streets, avenues, highways, railways, subway lines, and bus stations. Players can also terraform and plant trees in this mode, but in a much smaller scale than in god mode. Terraforming in this mode costs money.
Zones are conducted building plots that are empty at first but then controlled buildings pop up in these spaces depending on the density of the zone type.Areas of land in this mode can be zoned as residential, commercial or industrial areas in various densities where the city will begin to grow. Agriculture is now a separate industrial zone-type, unlike previous versions of SimCity, enabling farms to grow regardless of high land value, so long as demand exists for agriculture and agricultural zones have been provided. Zones are now automatically aligned towards roads and most buildings must be adjacent to a road in order to function properly; streets are automatically created when zoning on large tracts of land.Buildings are now classified into several wealth levels, zone types, and building size stages, which are affected by the region's population and the city's condition. The game simulates urban decay and gentrification with buildings deteriorating and refurbished accordingly.
Buildings originally constructed for occupation by higher wealth tenants can now support lower wealth tenants in the event surrounding factors forces the current tenants to vacate the building; this allows certain buildings to remain in use despite lacking its initial occupants. Buildings and lots can now be constructed on slopes.Other activities that players can do in mayor mode include building civic buildings that need constant funding to work properly, such as schools, hospitals, parks, police stations, jails, and fire stations. These buildings now come in two or more sizes compared to the single, universal types that were used in previous games. Settlements also need public utilities such as electricity with more or less polluting and more or less expensive types of power stations, water pumps, water purification plants, and waste management services. Facilities that had previously provided citywide coverage, such as educational facilities and medical facilities, have now been modified to provide a more limited coverage, as it has been with police stations and fire stations in previous SimCity titles.Funding can now be adjusted for individual buildings rather than having to change the funding to all buildings, allowing users to specify how much money should be spent to supply a service in accordance to the local population. Maintenance expenses for public utility facilities will increase as they age.
The maximum output of facilities also decreases as they get older. The rate at which facilities age is dependent on the percentage of its capacity being used and the level of funding being given to it.MySim modeThe final mode is the MySim mode which enables players to create user-defined Sims, which will live and work in the city the player has created. When moving a Sim into a city, the player can choose from a selection of characters or import others from The Sims. Sims can be killed by certain disasters or catastrophic events, leave the city if conditions are unfavorable, or die of old age. After they die, their 'child' sometimes takes over for them by taking their name, house, and job.Building designsBuildings in SimCity 4 borrow heavily from early 20th century architectural styles, particularly Art Deco and Romanesque Revival, while houses can appear in a traditional American Craftsman style. However, there is an additional, more modern, architectural style similar to Houston's architectural style, and a European style that is based on the skyline of Frankfurt, Germany.
The construction of new buildings on zoned areas is now animated. There are a number of buildings based on those found in San Francisco, including the Shell Building (appearing as 'Wren Insurance'), 450 Sutter Street (appearing as 'Vu Financial'), and the Pacific Telephone & Telegraph Building also known as 140 New Montgomery Street (as 'The Galvin Corp'). The May Company store in Los Angeles, now LACMA West, also appears as 'Dennis Department Store.' The game also includes famous landmarks from various cities, such as the Empire State Building from New York City. Video Review and Screenshots.
SeriesSimCity 4 is a 2003 city-building simulation computer game; the fourth installment in the series. It was published by and developed by series creator Maxis, a wholly owned subsidiary of EA.Although had hinted to further development on SimCity 4, at the end, only 1 expansion pack ( ) was released in 2003, before the company moved on to developing. Later on, was released, but it was simply the main game and the Rush Hour expansion bundled into one.To this day, SimCity 4 has the largest fanbase out of all the SimCity titles, with devoted players turning out mods and fixes that Maxis no longer creates.
As of 2013, the game is still available in many retailers, as well as for download on sites such as Steam and Origin due to the high demand of this game over other SimCity titles, even. Contents GameplaySimCity 4 TrailerThe trailer for the gameAs with previous installments, much of the previous game's gameplay was retained in SimCity 4. The biggest change was the addition of a regional gameplay. Not only does the player get to negotiate deals with neighboring cities, but the player is also able to build the neighboring cities. Since the player can populate the entire region and is able to rely on other cities, small towns become a viable possibility.
The player now has several modes to use, each mode serving its purpose in creating and handling cities.Civic buildings were also altered. Rather than affecting the town citywide, civic buildings affect only a nearby area. The player can adjust each buildings' individual funding and each building also has a maintenance cost.Modes God modeIn, the player can modify the terrain with near complete freedom, unlike mayor mode. God mode offers advanced terraforming tools, as well as brushes for trees and wild animals. Players can also perform operations that alter the entire tile, such as erosion. God mode is unavailable once the player has established their city, except with the help of.Mayor modeis the main focus of the game.
In mayor mode, the player's goal is to construct a city while keeping their budget stable. Players have the power to add zones, roads, and ploppable buildings in this mode.
They can unlock extra reward buildings by fulfilling special requirements.My Sim modelets the player create or import a Sim from and place them into their city to get feedback. If the Rush Hour expansion is installed, players can also access the U-Drive-It Mode from here.VisualsSim City 4 Opening SceneGraphically, the game also improved. Rather than sprite-based graphics, SimCity 4 and its Rush Hour expansion pack employ improved 3D capabilities. The main example is traffic simulation, which entirely uses 3D visuals to render vehicles. However, lights and shadows are not generated real-time and only some buildings automatically orient themselves with 3D positioning. The decaying of buildings is done more realistically, but most graphical details remain pre-rendered.Compatibility with other games. The Sims: Players can import their Sims they created in The Sims, another game from Maxis.
The Sims 2: Players can export their city layouts and use them in The Sims 2 as neighborhood terrain.Versions SimCity 4. PC - Released in January 14, 2003. Macintosh - Released in June 20, 2003.Rush Hour is an expansion for SimCity 4 released in September 2003. This expansion adds several things, mostly transportation related, such as, ground,. Rush Hour also adds some European inspired buildings and.The Deluxe Edition was released in September 2003. It is a release of both SimCity 4 and the Rush Hour expansion bundled together with numerous particle effects added and fixed. There were no major bug fixes as part of this release.RegionsSimCity 4 contains 6 pre-made regions, two of which have pre-made cities.
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New, unterraformed regions can also be created from the region menu and regions can also be imported. (Tutorial region).Add-ons. Terrain Generator - Allows players to create maps based on any of the forty-eight states of the continental United States and Portugal. The maps are based on maps from the United States Geological Survey. Allows players to design lots using available props. BAT included an updated version of the Lot Editor, rendering the original obsolete.
Allows users to create custom buildings. The program is based on Gmax, a simplified version of 3D Studio Max. Any programing or files added to the game that change its behavior of play. For example, the Demand Mod allows the mayor to control the amount of demand the city has and there are simpler mods like the suburban realism mod that simply enhances the pattern in which residential neighborhoods developed.Legacystated in 2003 that there would be more expansions for SimCity 4, but that no longer seems likely.
In 2004, Will Wright stated that SimCity has gotten too complex and the franchise was going to go in a new direction. To that end, Maxis ended up departing the SimCity franchise and went to develop other games for Electronic Arts such as The Sims: Bustin Out, The Urbz: Sims in the City, The Sims 2 and Spore. In 2008, the controversial wasn't developed by Maxis, but rather a different developer, marking the first time a major SimCity title was developed by someone other than Maxis, which was received with mixed opinions.Maxis finally returned to the franchise almost 10 years later and released, a reboot of the series in 2013, ending the string of other developers developing the series. SimCity (2013) has been met with negative reviews, stemming from server issues at the games launch. SimCity (2013) has also been criticized for numerous reasons including limited city map size and online-only play, the latter of which has been made to allow offline singleplayer play by updating the game.Main series( ) ( ) SimCity 4 ( ) ( )Console games ( )Spin-offs ( ) ( ).
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