What is it?
In the first SimCity game released after The
Sims, your city really comes to life. There is day and night.
There are rush hours. There might be a riot occasionally. Will you
send in the police—or will you send the mayor to calm the people?
You can even import your families from The Sims and make them permanent
residents. GameRankings called this the most responsive, personal,
and satisfying SimCity yet.
SimCity 4 is the first SimCity game where you cannot import cities from previous versions. This is due mainly to different ways of zoning.
| The SimCity Games | ||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| SimCity |  |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
SNES | 89 | |
| SimCity 2000 | |
|
|
SNES | 93 | |||||
| SimCity Classic | |
|||||||||
| SimCity Enhanced | |
94 | ||||||||
| SimCity 2000 Network Edition | |
96 | ||||||||
| SimCopter | |
|||||||||
| SimCity 3000 | |
|
 |
99 | ||||||
| SimCity 4 | |
|
03 | |||||||
Reviews
- Think locally, act omnipotent, Karen Halloran recommends.
SimCity is one of the longest running and most beloved franchises in PC gaming and especially with its vast potential new market of The Sims players, this latest version should have been crafted and executed with a lot more care. SimCity 4 just isn't the crown jewel it should have been.
- SimCity 4's biggest flaw is that it's not a SimCity,
is Jakub Wojnarowicz's final verdict, but it's still an enjoyable
game:
Even after having given the game's fans the shaft and probably turned off the casual gamers looking for a quick city to build and unleash Godzilla in, the developers did a lot of things right. SC4 is still an enjoyable game, if you approach it from a new perspective. Sure we listed a lot of gripes, but many of those are merely disappointments about departures from previous games. Yes, SimCity and SimCity 2000 (and to some extent 3000) worked better and were more fun. That's why those are classic games, and that's why the oh-so-average SimCity 4 compares so poorly, for all its ambition.
- A must have for any
SimCity
fan, Courtney Marchelletta concludes.I've spent most of my free time playing
SimCity 4
in the last week. I can honestly say I have only just begun to scratch the surface of gameplay. It's an amazing game, with incredible graphics and all new challenges. Micromanagement is required with this game, which will displease some people, but I love the control. - No problems at all for deaf gamers, Deaf Gamers reports:
Wonderfully, SimCity 4 is fine for deaf gamers. All information is given either in text or by the clever use of informative icons. The game doesn't rely on sound to inform you of anything. The tutorials are given solely in text too and you can read the text in your own time, as a button press is needed to move the tutorial along. What is disappointing though is that the manual is very light on information. However, Sim City 4 is a game with a lot of depth and no manual that you could fit in a DVD style box could do it justice. Still the official website is full of useful tips and advice should you need it.
Links
- SimCity 4 homepage, very picky about the browser you visit it with. I had to tell Opera to identify itself as Internet Explorer to be admitted.
- Rush Hour Expansion Pack
- Aspyr's SimCity 4 Macintosh Homepage. Aspyr also made the Macintosh ports of The Sims and all its expansions, The Sims 2, and Return to Castle Wolfenstein.
- The Map is not the Terrain; the Sim is not the City is a short article about SimCity and city planning.
- Magnus Itland talks about SimCity 4 in his diary.
- SimCity 4 Network
- Simtropolis
