alt Hacker NewsI love this game so much. One of the reasons I started to make a city builder* is because I don't like where the genre is going.
The focus on photorealism in modern city builders took away the apophenia, or "food for imagination" that was a core element since the first SimCity. As a matter of fact, Will Wright used to say that the real simulation runs in the player's minds (or something like that).
Sure, there's something great about Cities Skylines that (at least with very powerful hardware) can look and feel like reality. But at the same time the game engine, in order to make this photorealism of terrain elevations with infinite possible shapes of infrastructure, is so complex that the actual simulation is sloppy, and feels to me like a big downgrade from SC3000.
Traffic, economics, zoning, crime, pollution. are so much practical to simulate (both in the computer, and in our mind models) in this classic isometric style.
edit: spelling
Replies
Awesome! I am going to try this when I have some time next week. Fantasizing about how to make a better SimCity 25 years ago is what inspired me to pursue a computer science degree. I got sidetracked by a PhD and never returned to making games. Maybe your version is the one I always wanted!
This looks great, I just bought a copy. While it's downloading I'm perusing the listing, and I'm curious if this supports generating a large image/print of your finished city, like you could in SCURK (SimCity Urban Renewal Kit, which shipped with SC2K).
One thing I particularly loved was printing out very large maps of my city to go on the wall :)
Edit: I like the music a lot, and the little tutorial guy is endearing. One question, how do I move the viewport around? I tried scroll click drag, mouse button drag, arrow keys.
> The focus on photorealism in modern city builders took away the apophenia
That would be a real challenge to achieve simply because most of us are constantly surrounded by cities, but it is something that we should strive for.
For instance, game designer Fumito Ueda (Ico, Shadow of the Colossus, Last Guardian) said that I never wants to visit any old castles or ruins for fear that it would ruin his imagination on how game worlds should be built. It is a fair point, none of his games have had any focus on reality in terms of scale and that is what makes them so special.
Also looking at your game... can I get a copy of Microslop Excellence? ;)
Your simulation sounds incredible!
How big can cities get, though? One of the things I love about Cities Skylines is how massive the land plots are, and the tiny plots of SimCity 2013 was a bigger turnoff than anything else in its disastrous launch.
I think the simulation in Cities Skylines is also quite advanced, or not? The simulation is much more the reason why it requires powerful hardware to run on, much less the graphics.
thanks for sharing that. i'm a big city builder fan, but this one slipped by me. looks cool, and i'll be picking it up!
This sounds super interesting, but I'd much rather buy it on GOG than on Steam or itch.io. Any chance on releasing it there?
> I don't like where the genre is going.
Got an opinion on Timberborn? I think it's a great city builder, plus a fluid dynamics simulator where if you guess wrong everyone dies.
I've commented this many times, but I definitely want to see more isometric grid games like SC3k, RC2 or TTD.
They were less-realistic, yes, but is so pleasant how everything ties together and you can neatly fill out the whole map.
Meanwhile, while I like Cities Skylines or Planet Zoo, it is always incredibly awkward to build roads and paths to the point where I find it frustrating.
Looks great. For accuracy, when you build something, occasionally construction should stop half way through. You're then told that costs have doubled, and you'll need to pay again to complete the construction.
This is fabulous and I'm going to buy a copy to play on my SteamDeck. Will be sure to leave a review after I've put some hours into it!
On Steam Deck, I am having a rough time with the road that the paperclip wants me to place. Holding down the physical A button (of the ABXY group) and wiggling around the left joystick (as well as every other control I can think of), both pressed and not pressed. Sometimes I'll see the green highlight appear, and I can stretch it out into a road path, but when I release A, it just vanishes.
You got me , enjoy your 8,99 €
I'll buy it if you add crypto payment + a tip.
The thing is, I’d actually rather play a game that is basically a virtual modeling hobby than a deep city simulation.
I think Cities Skylines scratched that itch for a lot of people.
whoa that game looks very cool— love it. also loved SC3k… the soundtrack was amazing. game was kinda lowkey hard, though. or maybe it was because i was just a kid haha.
Incredible. Since you’re the dev, please please please isometric camera.
Although I don't have the same focus, I also came to the same conclusion: the actual game and gameplay itself got worse over the years. Same with civilization and many other games. Modern game designers don't understand this or don't care. But I spoke to some of them, and while I initially thought they understand but don't care, most of them really do not UNDERSTAND the problem domain. In particular younger ones; many of them have not played old games.
Do you have water and ports on the roadmap. I'd love some boats :)
I wish someone would do this for a modern TTD but with railroad tycoon stock market/economy dynamics
[flagged]
Looks pretty cool. Reminds me also of Metropolis 1998, which is also going for the isometric style - with a lot more detail, i.e. you can design individual homes and see the lives of "sims" too, something like if SimCity and The Sims were merged.
https://yesboxstudios.com/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ZHI2bCCpl0
It has a demo on Steam now: https://store.steampowered.com/app/2287430/Metropolis_1998/ It's quite playable already, and it's a very small 100Mb download.