Sim City 4

[irwincur]

Comes out next Friday. Can't wait.

Lost my job so it looks like I may lose a few weeks of good job searching while tyring to be a mayor again. For years the only reason I would get a new computer was to run the new SC.

[mcarag]

Ditto here. Initial reviews have been a lil on the lukewarm side, though...biggest complaint seems to be the hefty system requirements and difficulty (compared to previous sc games):

http://www.simcitycentral.net/forums/viewtopic.php?t=904&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=40

But overall, good...Glad I'll still have a week before school starts to tinker around in it.

[Hans Moleman]

Originally posted by mcarag
Ditto here. Initial reviews have been a lil on the lukewarm side, though...biggest complaint seems to be the hefty system requirements and difficulty (compared to previous sc games):

http://www.simcitycentral.net/forums/viewtopic.php?t=904&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=40

But overall, good...Glad I'll still have a week before school starts to tinker around in it.

I hear you... wish this thing would have come out before Christmas so I'd have time to play...

[mcarag]

My holidays would have been vastly different if it had! :)

[number1sixerfan]

Originally posted by mcarag
Ditto here. Initial reviews have been a lil on the lukewarm side, though...biggest complaint seems to be the hefty system requirements and difficulty (compared to previous sc games):

http://www.simcitycentral.net/forums/viewtopic.php?t=904&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=40

But overall, good...Glad I'll still have a week before school starts to tinker around in it.

The review said that Simcity 4 requires a lot of computer power and is tougher than Simcity 3000. Makes me woner? Although they said it was still a good game. Did any of you play Simcity 3000 with cheats? I know I did.;)

[ViRuS]

Originally posted by number1sixerfan


The review said that Simcity 4 requires a lot of computer power and is tougher than Simcity 3000. Makes me woner? Although they said it was still a good game. Did any of you play Simcity 3000 with cheats? I know I did.;)

Of course! How can you make a city without using cheats? :p maybe I should try... :)

[mcarag]

Only cheat I could get myself to do with any regularity was the one for the castle. Though that was a pretty big cheat, considering how important land values are to the game.

But getting metropolises in SC3k isn't hard so long as you have the patience and restraint in spending.

I'm most worried about what the reviews have to say about system requirements. Glad I finally upgraded to 512MB...

[ViRuS]

Originally posted by mcarag
Only cheat I could get myself to do with any regularity was the one for the castle. Though that was a pretty big cheat, considering how important land values are to the game.

But getting metropolises in SC3k isn't hard so long as you have the patience and restraint in spending.

I'm most worried about what the reviews have to say about system requirements. Glad I finally upgraded to 512MB...

I only used the money cheat when I played :) but at my friends house I tried the other cheats :p

[ewitte]

Originally posted by number1sixerfan


The review said that Simcity 4 requires a lot of computer power and is tougher than Simcity 3000. Makes me woner? Although they said it was still a good game. Did any of you play Simcity 3000 with cheats? I know I did.;)

I keep hearing that. Does anyone know if it is MP or HT enabled?

[GeForce]

Originally posted by ewitte


I keep hearing that. Does anyone know if it is MP or HT enabled? My system better run the game good, or I'll have to go by a hammer and have a little "talk" with it :-D

[ewitte]

Originally posted by GeForce
My system better run the game good, or I'll have to go by a hammer and have a little "talk" with it :-D

Your running a Celeron. Lets not keep the good games away for the rest of us :)

[Colossus]

The game actually runs pretty well, The only time you might run into problem is a) when you first load up an area, because it will generate the area even in samed games. Even at 3.06Ghz it takes about 5 seconds to load with a RAID 0 setup.

The only other part is moving around in your town, you might experience slowness. But other then that it runs damn smooth :)

I had posted some pics in the General Game forum.

[quote]a clip from the readme file[/b]
Version: 1.0
Last Updated: 11-12-02
-------------------------------------------------------

Welcome to SimCity 4.

This README.txt file contains information on issues not covered by the manual and installation guide.

- Supported 3D Accelerator Hardware
SimCity 4 requires a 16MB 3D Direct3D chipset, and a display that is at least 800x600 in size, and supports 16 or 32-bit color.

Cards with these chipsets are officially supported
by the SimCity 4 hardware graphics driver:
-------------------------------------------------------

- nVidia RIVA TNT, TNT2, TNT2 M64, & TNT2 Ultra

http://www.nvidia.com

- nVidia GeForce SDR, GeForce DDR, GeForce Quadro, GeForce2 GTS, GeForce2 MX, GeForce2 GTS, GeForce3, GeForce4 MX, and GeForce4 Ti 4200/4400/4600
http://www.nvidia.com


- ATI Radeon 7000, 7200, 7500, 8500, 9000, 9700
http://www.ati.com

*NOTE*:
+ Due to hardware limitations with the ATI Radeon series, some
buildings and graphic effects will be temporarily turned off while
scrolling.
+ There is a known ATI driver defect that results in SimCity advisor
animations dropping polygons. To fix this, please download ATI
driver 7.79 or later (also referred to as CATALYST 02.4) from
http://www.ati.com on the Internet.

- Matrox G400, G450, G550, Parhelia
http://www.matrox.com

*NOTE*:Some cards have problems displaying a color hardware cursor.
If cursor flickering occurs while playing the game, try updating the
graphics drivers, and, failing that, deselecting Color Cursor in the
Graphic Options panel.

SimCity 4 also contains a software-based graphics driver which will
work with most video cards. 16MB of video memory is recommended. Which driver is used can be selected from the Graphics Options panel.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ ++++++++++

- Minimum System Specs
CPU: PIII 500 or equivalent
RAM: 128MB
Video: 16MB supported Direct3D capable video card with DirectX 7.0
compatible driver
Disk Space: 1GB
CD-ROM: 8X or faster

- Recommended System Specs
CPU: P4 1GHz or equivalent
RAM: 256MB
Video: 32MB supported Direct3D capable video card with DirectX 7.0
compatible driver
Disk Space: 1GB
CD-ROM: 8X or faster

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ ++++++++++

The SimCity 4 CD is required to be in the CD-ROM drive in order to be
able to start and play the game.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ ++++++++++

Thank you for your purchase of SimCity 4!

For the latest news and updates, visit http://www.simcity.com/

EA GAMES ™ and Maxis ™ are Electronic Arts ™ brands
Copyright 2003 Electronic Arts Inc. All rights reserved.

MPEG Layer-3 audio coding technology licensed from Fraunhofer IIS
and THOMSON multimedia.

[Schmunkel98]

So basically those minimum specs are totally bogus.

[Kamakazie]

Originally posted by Schmunkel98
So basically those minimum specs are totally bogus.

Not if you run the thing at 800x600 with all settings turned down

[Schmunkel98]

They should put a label next to the minimum specs that says "Warning: Game will be barely playable and extremely frustrating with this hardware."

[Terry]

When they mean minimum, it means minimum.
It's doesn't say it's the mimimum to run the game at decent details and resolutions.

[Schmunkel98]

I think they need to stop fooling people into thinking they can play the game and still experience all it has to offer at those speeds. It's the same thing with the boxes not telling you that you need a high-speed connection to play the online games and have them run halfway decent. That's why you see so many morons playing Battlefield 1942 with their modems getting 300 and 400 pings.

[Last Man Standing]

I am one of those 56k morons who plays BF 1942, my ping is 160-200. Battlefield 1942 is playable with 56k. There should be a warning on those boxes that the chances are very high that you are kicked due to your slow connection speed.

[Kamakazie]

Originally posted by Schmunkel98
They should put a label next to the minimum specs that says "Warning: Game will be barely playable and extremely frustrating with this hardware."

I really dont see where your reasoning comes from, I'm sure people with that kind of hardware are used to games looking bad in exchange for it playing well.

[ewitte]

Originally posted by Kamakazie


I really dont see where your reasoning comes from, I'm sure people with that kind of hardware are used to games looking bad in exchange for it playing well.

Yes but people with 128MB video cards, 2+Ghz Cpus and 1GB of ram are also running slow with this one.

Eric

[number1sixerfan]

Originally posted by ewitte


Yes but people with 128MB video cards, 2+Ghz Cpus and 1GB of ram are also running slow with this one.

Eric

Sadly that's true. I have a 2400+ and a ti4600 at 320/760, and it doesn't run as well as I'd expect.

[BoneThug$4Life]

Originally posted by number1sixerfan


Sadly that's true. I have a 2400+ and a ti4600 at 320/760, and it doesn't run as well as I'd expect.

You are supposed to give me a copy fool! Where is it?! :) No but for real, the game looks pretty good and I havent played it yet but I plan to pretty soon. Just a soon as I get a COPY! :cool:

[Colossus]

Just take your butt to the store and buy a copy :D

[number1sixerfan]

Originally posted by BoneThug$4Life


You are supposed to give me a copy fool! Where is it?! :) No but for real, the game looks pretty good and I havent played it yet but I plan to pretty soon. Just a soon as I get a COPY! :cool:

heh, I have no idea what you are talking about. I don't even know you.;) :D

[ewitte]

Originally posted by number1sixerfan


Sadly that's true. I have a 2400+ and a ti4600 at 320/760, and it doesn't run as well as I'd expect.

There *may* be a slight memory leak. I have a map now with a population of around 86K. I notice the game uses about 200MB of ram when I open the map. The longer I'm playing the higher it goes. I've seen it over 360MB. My system was using 506MB total. However if I close the game and come back in it drops back to 200MB. Its a good thing I have 1GB now :) I tried to get it higher but it seems to be locking up my PC now after about 1 hour! I lowered my CPU Overclock but it did not help. I doubt it is the new memory as I use over 800MB when running .NET in vmware and I have no problems.

Eric

[number1sixerfan]

Originally posted by ewitte


There *may* be a slight memory leak. I have a map now with a population of around 86K. I notice the game uses about 200MB of ram when I open the map. The longer I'm playing the higher it goes. I've seen it over 360MB. My system was using 506MB total. However if I close the game and come back in it drops back to 200MB. Its a good thing I have 1GB now :) I tried to get it higher but it seems to be locking up my PC now after about 1 hour! I lowered my CPU Overclock but it did not help. I doubt it is the new memory as I use over 800MB when running .NET in vmware and I have no problems.

Eric

So did the 1gig help? If the performance issues and level of diffulty can be taken care of, then it would be a superb game. Is there a patch for SC4?

[ewitte]

Originally posted by number1sixerfan


So did the 1gig help? If the performance issues and level of diffulty can be taken care of, then it would be a superb game. Is there a patch for SC4?

I have not seen complete system usage go over 506MB yet. The game locks the system up now before I've been in long enough for it to get much higher. I wonder what it takes on citys around 100-200k? I've only got it up to 86K. Right now though it does not take long to drop back to about 75k! The large apartments are starting to get abandoned. I get it up another 10K or so and it drops back to the 70's. Traffic is OK (very extensive subway), health, education and pretty much everything else is maxed out. My satisfaction level is 1 notch from the highest. They want more industrial but everytime I change a zone to industrial it kills the residential or business :mad: If business dies residental follows. There is no free space on the map to add anything.

Eric