A Whinge About SimCity

Honestly I find SimCity too frustrating to write a review about. At first I was so excited about the game and once I finally managed to get onto a server I found it quite fun. There are great concepts in SimCity but ultimately it falls flat. Rather than a review I'd like to talk about what happens in game and how I would like to see it improved.

Shut up Sims

My power advisor constantly tells me I need more coal in my coal power plant. The deliveries always take ages and by the time I get them I pretty much need more coal again anyway. Some people would say that I need to place my coal power plant next to the highway connection but I think that is a little unfair. I need to place it in such a way that it is not going to pump air pollution all over my town. Which brings me to another thing, why can't I make another connection to the "region"? Traffic is going to become a huge problem in any successful town and with only one way in and out of your city by car, it is going to be a nightmare. Traffic is even still a problem when using trains, trams, buses, airplanes, boats and goats, in an attempt to alleviate the congestion. I do understand that a game should be a challenge and I do embrace that but there needs to be an element of fun too and I think SimCity has forgotten this.

 

I think for most people videogames are an escape from reality and a big factor in that, is fun. Why isn't SimCity fun? It feels like nobody ever play tested it, it was instead purely debugged and they did a poor job of that anyway. Starting a new city is so exciting and you have so many plans but the game quickly grinds you down with tedium. Not enough water, not enough sewage, I swear the game wants you to cover the map in water and sewage pumps with a handful of houses around them which brings us to the worst part of the game, space.

 

The maps simply aren't big enough. SimCity 2000 gave you so much space to expand. You could do all kinds of things. Want to start a new region of your town, completely cut of from the rest? You could. Want to build your mayors house on an island? Plenty of space for that. Plus buildings didn't have add-ons as they do now. In the modern SimCity almost all buildings that you "plop" have extensions that will be required for later on in the game and this takes up an inordinate amount of space. This ruins the fun as suddenly you realise your favourite zoned building has to be demolished in order to "plop" another bloody fire brigade garage. It has double the effect because nice buildings grow next to your nice facilities, so they eat up the space where nice buildings could possibly exist.

Floating cars are a "feature"

The thing I regret the most about SimCity is taking the free game from EA. Not only did I find it immensely tedious (because it doesn't like my Logitech controller) but because I believe that the only way Maxis truly could have made up for it is by releasing some major content for free. First off is the large maps expansion. It sounds like they want to make this paid for content but it should have been included from the start. I have modest hardware on my computer and I can easily run SimCity on high so I don't think technology is the issue here. Honestly I think it comes down to laziness and long development times, that misjudge the advances in hardware. I sincerely hope no-one buys DLC for this product, as Maxis really don't deserve another dollar.

Feature

Another big issue that this has raised for me is the nature of video game reviews/previews and pre-ordering games. The media was overwhelmingly positive before the launch, despite the issues that they encountered. The thing is on first blush it is an enjoyable game but the mid to longterm is a nightmare. To add to this you get "bonus" content for pre-ordering and it seems so important. Honestly I hate the Maxis hero and villain content that I received as a bonus and it actually makes the game worse by constantly bugging you to install mediocre buildings that take up your precious space. I really want to pre-order Company of Heroes 2 as I am a huge fan but after SimCity I am too scared and I want to see the smoke clear first.

I know this review has taken some time but once I heard about "the big patch" coming out for it, I thought I would give it a chance to redeem itself. As of the patch coming in I cannot access one of my cities. This sums up the entire experience. I give SimCity a rating of Maximum Whinges out of Heaps.