Cities: Skyline

[Quackers]

 

Here's what you can make it look like.

[pcstru]

How do mods affect building unlocks?

 

Actual mods disable achievements. There is a mod to enable them again.

[CAM]

I'll have to try that then. Been playing vanilla CiM but avoided mods as I am trying to unlock all the buildings first.

[SovietRussia]

Anybody else downloaded the UK stores mods and created a retail park? I'm loving having an Argos, Toys R us, Homebase, Tesco, Asda, PC World etc in my city.

 

I had the Aldi one for a while till it burnt down

[newpersn]

bit of bump.. anyone still play this, I noticed there's been a update.

[jdoldridge]

bit of bump.. anyone still play this, I noticed there's been a update.

 

I do when I get a chance. I haven't really had much of a chance to use many of the features of the snowfall update just yet.

[pcstru]

bit of bump.. anyone still play this, I noticed there's been a update.

 

I think there have been several updates - After Dark (ooo, pretty lights) and Snowfall (ooo, pretty ... err, snow), neither of which add much to gameplay. On the other hand, I still sit down thinking I could just spend a few minutes trying out x,y or z and damn if the hours don't just disappear!

[CAM]

Yes, I still play it.

 

After Dark added a night cycle which lowers power usage and increases crime rates at night. Also, commercial premesis close overnight unless you make them night time leisure/tourism specialisation. They also added seafront buildings, waterside properties increasing land value (unless the water is filled with poo in which case you get the opposite effect), taxis and cyclists to the game.

 

Snowfall added a new map type of snow. This causes roads to get blocked meaning you have to use snowplows to clear them. A weather cycle was added in other maps where rain causes the temperature to fall requiring you to heat houses with New York style heating pipes or increase your electricity usage to compensate. Trams were also added as a new type of public transport and you can improve road conditions with maintenance trucks that increase road speeds.

 

A free update was recently published that added canals so you can make high value waterfront properties easier. Quaysides were also included along with flood defences and land adjustment tools. Tip: If you build a canal add temporary flood defences nearby. The water is fairly turbulent when the canal fills and it spills over into the surrounding area.

[newpersn]

http://youtu.be/zqukrQD9DiY]

 

Giving me ideas now

[Tirito]

About £8 on Instant Gaming.

 

I have used them before a few times and always been reliable.

 

The DLCs are about the same price also.

 

Link here

[localzuk]

I grumbled about the price of the DLCs for this, but still ended up buying them via Green Man Gaming. 20% off with a voucher code, and one of them was severely reduced already. So, not too bad in the end.

[CAM]

Having fun on this again. I love making little interconnected villages then watching them grow into neighbouring districts.

 

Also I've been looking into how the supply chain works. It's quite complex!

 

INDUSTRIAL

1) Raw resources (Farming, Ore, Oil, Wood specialties) are extracted from the ground by extractors. Unshipped resources are exported.

 

2) Resources are shipped from extractors to processors for their respective specialty and converted into supplies. The processors occur randomly in specialised zones so their goods traffic generally remains local to the extractor, but processors can be deliberately created by building a specialisation away from their raw resource (eg, farm spec on non-fertile ground). If Oil/Ore resource extractors run out of resources, they collapse and turn into a processor. Processors that cannot obtain raw resources in your supply chain will import them. Unshipped supplies are exported.

 

3) Supplies are shipped from the processor to the generic industrial factories. Here they create goods and will demand various supplies from the different resource types. If they can't acquire a resource, they will import it. Goods are then shipped to commercial zones in your city so it's important to include some generic industrial areas when planning your economy. Unshipped goods are exported.

 

4) Goods are sold to citizens and tourists in the city, who are happy and content until they go to work in your factories, processors and extractors to make more stuff to buy!

 

So the following are really important for keeping up your supply chain and minimise the amount of goods being imported and exported (which results in wasted tax money and your city connection being overwhelmed by goods traffic).

 

- Look at how much cargo is coming in and out of the city as this is an indicator of over/under-supply. If you have lots of wood being imported, expand the logging industry. If lots of wood is being exported, build more factories nearby to convert them into goods. If goods are being imported, your supply chain is failing to meet commercial demand.

 

- Ensure industries are as well connected as your commuters. Use cargo stations to provide rail connections between extractors/processors and factories to minimise heavy traffic on the roads. Then between the factories and your commercial areas so your city centre doesn't get clogged with vans and trucks.

 

- Oil and Ore eventually runs out. Make sure you build them with excellent highway and rail connections for importing the raw resources and keep your industry going. Farms and logging are renewable and don't need to worry about this.

 

- Offices are good for supplying industrial jobs for higher educated citizens in pollution sensitive areas, but they just generate tax money and exist outside the supply chain and literally do nothing but sweep problems under the carpet. If you lack jobs in supply chain, don't build more offices!

[CAM]

Big update last night! Natural disasters have been released in a new expansion. You get radio stations for free and I think some tweaks have been made to property value, but the expansion includes random disasters that require you to respond or watch your city fall apart.

 

Fires now spread and can start in the wilderness. Watch towers can detect fire and the fire service can put them out. Helicopters are also available for fire and Police to tackle crime and fires in inaccessible places. Apparently there is a bug where trees can set on fire but you need a helicopter to deal with them, ooops!

 

You can also get floods swelling the rivers/sea to cause small tsunamis, earthqueaks wrecking random havoc, tornadoes destroying anything they touch and lightning storms that start random fires if high buildings aren't grounded. You can also place detectors to get advanced warning and send people to their shelters plus set emergency evacuation routes for major disasters.

 

Meteor strikes also happen which leave craters and fires. All disasters have a magnitude from 0-10 which cause various damage (a 1 may cause little impact on the city, a 10 meteor would annihilate swathes of the city and require evac). Obviously depends on the disaster too, sending people to hide underground next to the coast may be problematic in a flood....

[GuyJD]

is it a free or paid update?

[CAM]

£14 DLC update to gain access to disasters and their mitigation services. Radios and the scenario editor are a free update along with a few simulation updates like spreading fire (but a bug means you can't put out trees, they need to stop them catching fire without the DLC).

 

I played a bit yesterday and found myself completely reconsidering certain aspects of my city. I cobbled together a disaster HQ in a fairly central location with helicopters and a giant radio mast. A lightning storm came along, struck the mast and I had a large pillar of fire in the middle of my city. It also hit a large cathedral and various office buildings but my disaster teams managed it.

 

I am thinking how vulnerable the city is to a flood though. I need to prepare some form of flood defence as one tsunami will utterly devastate the city. Trouble is I haven't actually tested my emergency plan yet and the city is only partially covered with shelters. ~30,000 shelter capacity for a city with a population of 55,000.

[localzuk]

Seems a bit more advanced than the old Sim City disasters. Where there's nothing special to do other than hope your fire stations survive!

[GuyJD]

Seems a bit more advanced than the old Sim City disasters. Where there's nothing special to do other than hope your fire stations survive!

Didn't Sim City have monster attack? I vaguely remember it but I might be wrong.

[CAM]

Yeah it was a staple of all the SimCity games, even the new one (which had zombie invasions too haha!).

 

Cities diasters are a bit more realistic.

 

Collapsed building - A building falls down and disaster teams have to get there and sift through the wreckage for survivors. That's it. Minor damage.

Fire - You deal with these anyway. Something sets on fire causing minor damage.

Forest Fire - Starts small but causes widespread damage if left unchecked. Outposts on your city perimeter alert the fire service to send helicopters to put it out.

Sinkhole - A big hole opens up in the ground swallowing multiple buildings and roads. Devastating but very local.

Meteor Strike - Makes a huge explosion causing a hole in the ground and setting fire to everything around it. Causes high local devastation which can become widespread if fires are left unchecked. Causes floods and mini-tsunamis if hitting water.

Lightning Storm - Lightning strikes random buildings and causes heavy rain. Can do anything from zero damage to setting multiple buildings on fire. Relatively low city-wide damage that can be mitigated with lightning rods policy.

Earthquake - Like a lightning storm but buildings also start collapsing and rents open up in the ground. Moderate city-wide damage.

Tornado - Appears on one side of the map and travels to the other, taking whatever detour it fancies on the way. Flattens everything it touches except roads and shelters and throws doomed citizens and cars in the air. Causes total devastation in a widespread area and described as a large middle-finger going on a jaunt through the city you spent hours/days/weeks building.

Tsunami - Water levels recede in a spooky way then suddenly, a giant wave slowly descends onto the city with unstoppable force. Causes total city-wide devastation. Magnitude 10 is practically a game over state. Good for making ponds with meteor craters. Flood water can be pumped away with the mobile pumping service.

Contaminated water - Not a disaster as such but your fault for pumping sewage into the water supply. Causes city-wide damage as citizens drink foul water and fall ill. Tsunamis can spread sewage to formerly fresh water areas and contaminate your supply.

Low temperatures - If you don't heat your homes on snow maps when the temperature drops, citizens get fed up and move out. Can drain power supply if using electricity to heat homes. Snow can also fall and clog roads. Introduced in Snowfall.

Edited December 1, 2016 by CAM

[arwen]

I've just started playing this for the first time. Last time I played a city sim it was Sin City 2000 when I was a kit!

 

Rather enjoying Cities Skylines. I first tried to create a normal city, but found myself running out of money quickly and have no idea what was needed and when. So I've started building a new city with unlimited money to try and get my head around it all :-)

[JJonas]

Out on Xbox One today. Should I buy it?

[pcstru]

Out on Xbox One today. Should I buy it?

If you like city builders, there is nothing to beat it IMO.

[GuyJD]

I'd imagine it'd be pretty fiddly to play on a gamepad. Is there a free trial?

[JJonas]

It only came out today so I don't know if there is a trial the moment. As for fiddly gamepad controls all of the reports I've seen so far of people playing it say they did a really good job of mapping the controls to the gamepad.