Cities XL

[Ripskin]

Anyone who is a fan of the Sim City games would probably love this game.

I still play Sim City 4 with its expansion. Theres tons of great mods for it, however installing all of those takes forever and the game crashes too frequently to keep it fun.

Building a successful city without cheating required a lot of time and attention to micromanaging all of the different incomes and things.

I did it once but after that I put the game down for a year lol. After that when I came back I wanted to do some region building so I cheated to get a ton of money and built up a great city, that was profitable to a point and full of happy people. However it still took a lot of time and cheating to keep the money up to build in everything. Which kinda defeats the purpose.

SC4 is quite dated now and as Maxis is not really doing anything for the genre finding this game was a good surprise.

I was very skeptical as Sim City Societies is crap, and looked like crap from the start.

After watching all of the video's online for this one though I was sold.

The game is very very simple to just pick up and start. There is not quite as much depth in the micro managing as SC4, but it has depth of its own.

You can modify the tax rates in Cities, but not divided so much into the different zonings, its more one residence and structures and one for businesses and industry. However the default setting is perfect and I have not even touched it.

Theres a lot of sub menus and information for demand etc that I never really need to look at since you can get the basics up front which is mostly what you need.

There are 4 residential classes, each with 3 levels of zoning, (low medium & dense) Each type of business has the same 3 levels, and each one requires a different type of citizen to operate. Which is great, unqualified, qualified, executive, and elite. Each of these groups demands different things from the city to stay happy.

Its very easy to select a class and view whats pissing them off to try and fix it. Same thing goes for a business, if one is failing you can select that individual building and see why its having problems. If they are missing a type of worker, having problems finding goods etc. Not quite as much detail here but enough to get by.

The landscape actually works with you to a point, you are not constrained by a crappy grid that must be perfect to build roads and bridges etc as in SC4 which is very good. You also have natural resources to exploit which is wonderful. The natural resources are limited too which is cool And exploiting them can lead to pollution or other problems.

Tying in with this you truly are connected to your neighbors (in online mode, dunno about solo.) In online mode you are on a planet with your city which is full of other players and their cities. Everyone on the planet can buy and trade resources which is very awesome. SC4's regional mode was crap and did not work.

Last night I was getting close to having a deficit due to trying to make some people happy and garner more residence, so I went out and looked at what I had in excess, and ended up selling a ton of my factory usage to another city that was needing a lot. Ended up rolling in the income from the deal. It helped me buy fuel and fix up a few of my own resource gathering systems.

That trade system is very good. I hope its there in some form in solo play. I doubt I will pay the fee's to play online.

There are also different environments which have different needs and benefits which is also very amazing. You can go down to street view and wander around looking at billboards and people cruising around. makes for a unique experience.

If you like the Sim City style of game I think you will like this one.
Graphics are pretty scalable, I am running everything at max with 4xaa and a silky smooth experience on my system. Looks pretty good with the candy turned on.

CitiesXL (http://www.citiesxl.com/) - Media etc for some vids and info.

[Levi]

I want this game, but I've got 4 different games I'm trying playing right now, and with Borderlands coming out at the end of October it'll probably be up to 5.

[Ripskin]

Hehe, my second city I went with an agricultural society. So far its doing amazingly well. Using one way small avenues as the main roads and sectioning the cities so that I can put parks etc in the middle is keeping them happy.

I have put some textile and manufacturing industry far enough away that its noise / air pollution will not effect the city and creates lots of jobs.

My farmland is not quite half way tapped yet, barely getting into my water resources. Already though I am exporting quite a bit of food which is helping pay the bills hehe.

Very fun, I miss a few things from sim city, but only because I played that a lot. New players to the genera couldnt get into it unless they really tried and with this theres lots to do and keep track of but its not so hard that its annoying.

[Levi]

Dang it, quit tempting me Ripskin!


Maybe I'll pick it up when steam makes it a weekend special or something...

[Ripskin]

Dang it, quit tempting me Ripskin!

Maybe I'll pick it up when steam makes it a weekend special or something...

Lol sorry, I loved SimCity 4 but hated the crashes and other problems with it that took away from the fun.
So far this has sucked me in for a minimum of 2 hours before I notice time has passed and I need to stop playing lol.

Last night while they were doing server maintenance I played the solo mode. Its got the trade system, its not as nice as doing it with real people and inflation etc, but its there.

I started another agricultural city to work on zoning and layout and man, building massive tunnels and stuff is so fun :D I'll get some pictures in the next day or two and post them.

[coll9947]

I want this game so bad it hurts. I have a sick addiction to all things Sim City, but Societies was bullshit. I wanted Sim City to get HARDER after 4.

Now if only I had money..

[Ripskin]

I want this game so bad it hurts. I have a sick addiction to all things Sim City, but Societies was bullshit. I wanted Sim City to get HARDER after 4.

Now if only I had money..

Yes, I watched a lot of the stuff leading up to Societies and very quickly decided it was crap and passed on it, very glad that I did.

I liked how in depth Sim4 was, however I did not like how hard it could be from the get go when you dont know what is going on.

I do miss being able to build plumbing and all of that in depth stuff. However on the flip side it is also quite nice to be able to concentrate on the city itself as far as infrastructure and services that would keep the city flowing. I manage it more than keep it maintained which I like more.

If your people are not happy through services and such they WILL leave. And that directly impacts taxes much more and your monthly income.
In sim4 I liked goofing around once in a while by building all the jobs on one side and all the housing on the other. Then build a tiny road and stuff it with toll booths just for run. Traffic and such was horrible, yet people never left and didnt care even though they complained lol.

Building things is so much more improved and a pleasure. If in SC your game lagged while building you could end up miles of road that bankrupts you, in this (I have not had it lag out or crash) but when you demolish things you get some of the money back as your selling the resources which is nice.

Trading is just plain cool, it works. You build an agricultural city and thats what its for, you do not need to build anything but farms and some housing. You can trade for the other things, sell your goods and buy what you need. True regional game play.

There are some things I miss, but overall this game has so much more potential and is so much more fun for me. Its got a lot of depth to it that requires management decisions instead of staring at graphs and tweaking tax rates all day.

I didnt do much last night but sleep so tonight I will make it a point to get some pictures of some of my cities posted.

[Zervun]

I'm interested in this, don't have a beta obviously.

Man they are bashing it on the sites though like Hardocp.

Seems like everyone says it's basically like Sim3 vs. Sim2. They made it way more user friendly and made it idiot level.

From what you say makes sense. I'll probably check it out in some open beta.

My big grip is I like the obtusely anal retentive management and it seems they axed a bit of that out.

[Ripskin]

I'm interested in this, don't have a beta obviously.

Man they are bashing it on the sites though like Hardocp.

Seems like everyone says it's basically like Sim3 vs. Sim2. They made it way more user friendly and made it idiot level.

From what you say makes sense. I'll probably check it out in some open beta.

My big grip is I like the obtusely anal retentive management and it seems they axed a bit of that out.

They slam it since they dont really understand it. Aspects are user friendly now. You can just jump in and start building. But the natural resources and different regions add different challenges for you to cope with.

I have only played on the easy levels at the moment while I learn most of the nuances to the game.

As I said earlier, I do miss some of the micromanaged depth to the Sim4 style, but its hard and better in different ways. I think I'll go see how my computer can handle fraps while playing it...

Edit :

Fraps worked well, on half resolution. Although stupid me forgot to enable my wave input so you could hear me talking lol. I'll do a crappy voice over later and try to recapture it. Anyway I took about 15 - 20 minutes of video going over the layout and the basics of one of my cities. I will try to get that exported and shrunk in size soon, however I am busy with work and I will need to create a youtube account but whatever. I'll get it done.

[Zervun]

wtb link to video

[Ripskin]

wtb link to video

Soon, its about 18 gigs right now and 20 min long lol. I will redo it tonight, turn the wave input on as well so I dont waste time doing a voice over. I'll just make a quick 10 min intro and get into the details in another vid.

I will cover the interface and the basic differences between Sim4 and this.

[Ripskin]

Okay, remade the vid with audio, its very rushed and crapy. Rendering it now. Going to take a bit of time then I will compress and upload. Probably have to do it over VNC from work today as I need to go to bed.

[Ripskin]

Been a long time since I have encoded anything that was not going to DVD. I have it encoding to h.264 for youtube, We shall see what kind of quality I get out of it. Based on the file size I have a feeling I will be redoing it lol.

[Ripskin]

Okay, quick vid can be found here. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gOYI_iX_z3Q)

I am not going to finish that video as the overall quality sucked IMO. The next ones will be better.

[Ripskin]

I have a short video from the online play and recorded a few more of game play last night. Will render / encode them later and try to get them uploaded.

[Ripskin]

The last 2 minutes of the video for absolutely no reason stopped recording audio in a way that Premiere could view, very weird so I just did a quick voice over. Will post that one later this evening. Goes over more gameplay instead of just the interface etc.

Edit :

Video is now up, watch it here (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Km_iKTs7mtM&feature=player_profilepage) if you want.

Been a few minutes after it completed processing and it still says its processing. Quality had better improve because the file I uploaded looks better than the first video O_O.

Took them 45 minutes but quality is up. Not where it should be but oh well.

[coll9947]

GAAAAAAA!!!

I need a new system so damn bad!

Thanks for the vid Rip!

[Ripskin]

GAAAAAAA!!!

I need a new system so damn bad!

Thanks for the vid Rip!

:) Your welcome. I'm working on a 3rd video now.
Should be ready to record the last bits of it tonight if I have time. The 4th one I will showcase online play.

[Levi]

I broke down and bought it. :) Do you think the online play is worth the subscription?

[Ripskin]

Ehhhhhh not entirely. It has its pull but only if you keep at it. The dedication to play and building blue prints ETC with inflation can be fun. But overall I dont find it wholly worth the cost.

I got a week free when I got the game and played online only until that week ran out. I have not gone back online since and I have until the end of December to play online lol.

Granted I have been busy with mid terms and such so we shall see. Its fun to use the trade in a more free market, but you can trade in offline, its just more set in its ways and slow. Not to mention the free flowing online chat which is nice. I think after my next video I'll only play online to rate it better.

Congrats on buying it :D If you do play online let me know, I need to figure out how to come visit it with my avatar thing.

[Ripskin]

Had some audio issues, seems like if I stop the video with the hot key whenever I pull that last file into premiere the audio is dropped, but is still on the clip. Weird.

Anyway if I just keep recording for a few minutes until it moves to the next file the audio is intact.

Should start the render of the file tonight and I'll try to get it posted tomorrow. This will be the last of the offline ones for a while.

[Ripskin]

Okay, posted part one yesterday, the second part should go up tonight barring any problems.

Part 1 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jvQ3BfKngVM)
Part 2 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QJTuM0FHwjE)

[effonge09]

PPBoyington :

Ive updated the version properly via the launching system directly after installation. after the latest patch, the launch center of cities XL doesnt start anymore.

[Ripskin]

You have no clue what your talking about, and neither do I Mr. Bot sir.

[Laggy]

What happens after you have become successful? Is it like Spore?

[Ripskin]

I opted out of getting spore so I am not fully sure what happens when you become successful and go around the other planets in that game.

Cities is just a city builder, so if you have one good city you still have to maintain trade agreements and keep things in check. You can also then move onto a new location or region and build a completely different city with different requirements and needs.

You have a little avatar that you can use to go run around other peoples cities on foot which is kinda fun and can boots vacation ratings etc.

Some areas allow you to micromanage resorts and other things.

[Laggy]

After watching you videos I want to buy it but I really don't want to pay which sucks whatever, I have enough on my plate (l4d2 tf2 oddysey pack CS:s) Once I get tired of those I will try out citiesXL. Anyways on spore once you have pretty much gotten to omnipotent or whatever you just go around trying to destroy the grix that have like a gazillion planets near the center of the universe all you do is terraform planets to the first thing. It is very very boring.

[arnold.from.oregon]

I watched a bit of Ripskin's video. Seems like a real Sim City Elite. I want it and want to avoid it desperately. I'm too busy to really enjoy it properly. Really awesome.

[Ripskin]

You dont have to pay to play, you can play it off line and still have a ton of fun inter trading. I have 7 videos on youtube all about the game. I am working on the last online game play one but had to format.

It can be very addicting, its easy to not jump in and play, but once you are playing its hard to stop as you just keep wanting to build build build.

[arnold.from.oregon]

See its addicting. It really looks great.