You're lucky.
I got a major industrial cluster that pretty much keeps my city afloat (13% taxes ftw?), Com/Res intermixed everywhere else. Hospital and clinics covering the city, got police and fire covering the city too.
Yet I'm struggling. Maybe it's the fact I built my police station on a radioactive area (the ****....HOW is an area randomly radioactive and why didn't it tell em before the meteor shower?!), or maybe it's the fact that I can't seem to get a grasp on education (I got 3 schools maxed out fully, but nobody wants to go to high school >.<), or maybe it's EA sucking the fun out of it.
It's oddly compelling though, I'll admit that. I just wish I hadn't built my power plant over the only oil deposit in the city.
Oh and I GOT NO ROOM FOR BUILDING! Sims are whining at me to lower taxes, I can't because my city will go bankrupt, I can't demolish industry to zone res as that's the heart of my economy, I can't get rid of the sewage plant I put down....
That's a huge myth, people who bought a decent quad core back in 2007 and a decent card, can still play games fine, not on ultra/high but can still play them.
And what about that Xbox Live, how much is it annually, 50, 60$? So that's 5, 6 years times 60, plus the xbox itself, plus the games, plus hopefully that's your only xbox so far and you didn't have to replace it for the new one.. So yeah.
My PC is crap and I can still play Battlefield 3, and even with the lowest graphics options it still looks better than the console version. The only arguement I have when it comes to console VS PC, is that it's a level playing field, nobody is going to have an advantage because they have better hardware.
I thought that too, when I was mostly playing on PS3, but it's honestly yet another myth, like you wonder when you get killed, "did he have better mouse then me, that bastard?!", of course you don't, you just hit respawn..
One thing i hate my heart out right now is Origin though, that shit can't happen on consoles, just doesn't let me play BF3, says i don't have enough space for a patch (i have 30gb), tried every possible 'solution' i could find on the web..
No, great games don't have to look awesome (Minecraft anyone?) so even when I say PC games could look so much better, I can't blame consoles for bad games. Look what BF4 is going to be... a handful of maps (where they are all almost exact copies of BF3. For example there will be a Metro-ish map and the first DLC will be very similar to B2K so were did the $900 Million(!!!!! Not even including DLC's etc !!!!!!) go?!)
Making a living you say... I call making a living something I have to do in order to survive the next month or two. If I have SEVERAL franchises that make OVER A BILLION $ a year, I would say that EA etc. is as far from being poor as I am from buying VW with all it's daughter company's.
The main issues is money though, with the stupid idea that you HAVE to make more win than you did last year. Which is stupid and ridiculously impossible. This results in something like "we have to make it so accessible, that even your dog can play it". Here is a enemy! I marked it for you with a giant triangle above his head! What are you doing?! You are not allowed to go here! That way is only there so that the next script can be activated the next second This and This show it in a nutshell.
Games, where you have to turn on your brain to beat it or simply require some skill are not wanted. It all has to be aimed at everyone and everything, no mod support so that everone has to buy your great dlc stuff. Dedicated servers? No why?! Less profit and oh, the game is already a year old... let's close our servers so that you can't play anymore and bu our next great game.
If they actually try to make a great game, why would they take out every wonderful part and replace it with crap (literally in case of SC5 :razz
As I see it, the problem is that most big games are marketed to young demographics to create brand loyalty (Like cigarettes use to be!). Chances are you're going out get more money out of the 12 year old enjoying your game (their parents will buy the next 6 copies) compared to the old man enjoying your game (because he might actually start a family or something and not be able to play anymore).
There is an update available that utterly fails to fix pretty much anything. Jus tin case someone was A) still playing and B) at all interested.
I've still been spending a few random hours in the game, and it still amazes me . . . . . At just how much they have completly failed in making a suitable heir to the Simcity name.
I have been utterly devastated by the appalling way they have treated the Simcity Franchise. But I love the concept.
Is this Lincity any good?
If what EA has done to Simcity is the mark of the future as far as big name titles go, then I'm boycotting everything done by a main stream production house. I don't know what Valve are working on, as I've always been a fan (but then, I was a fan of Battlefield and Simcity) but I shall be waiting for a good while before purchasing anything released from a large publisher now.
Simcity is a blatent sellout in the most biblical of ways. Commercial pressures from a marketing led strategy that will ultimately see EA fail spectacularly. But which in the mean time will rake in millions from the die hard fans of titles that they hope against all experience will be the one that comes good.
Simcity had so much potential, and you can see that in the game. I feel for the programmers and developers (those that didn't sell out *cough cough* Quigly/lucy *cough cough*) as you can see that inside this mess is a glorious game just waiting to be let out. Maybe in six months we might see it patched to one such game, but I doubt it.
I would love to buy BF4. I might have done even though I knew it was just a rehash of BF3. But not anymore.
So yea. I'm looking for a good city sim. I've pondered Cities in motion, but it doesn't really do it for me. And Cities XL . . . . . Well. Lets not go there shall we.
