The new Sim City looks great. It's been far too long since we've been able to manage our sims from on high rather than micromanage their individual lives. The game showed well at E3, winning and being nominated for several gaming publication awards. The designers are doing incredible things with simulation.
As we look forward to a new Sim City game, it's interesting to remember where the franchise has come from. The first Sim Cities consisted of running utilities and roads, then zoning and waiting for buildings to get built and disasters to happen. Sure, it was great when your city grew to fill the whole map, but I recall a vague sense of the rules for why and how the city grew.
The new Sim City puts the rules up front leading to direct cause and effect between the player's decisions and what happens in the city, as well multiplayer modes in which other player's decisions in other cities affect your city. This results in city specialization and cooperative team play, but also leads to each city's needs leading to problems that can spread around in multiplayer.
The game looks complex and interesting and I'm looking forward to playing it. You can check out Maxis' website here or do a Google News search to find coverage.
Andrew
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