[AdLib music plays]
[typing]
At long last, after a decade of waiting,
the next game in the main SimCity franchise is upon us.
So I figured it's as good a time as any to take a look back
at the previous games in the series.
From the flagship releases to the ports,
to the oddities that time has forgotten.
While I'm not covering every single version ever made,
I will be covering a ton that I find to be notable.
So let's go ahead and start with Raid on Bungeling Bay from 1984
for the Commodore 64.
But this isn't a SimCity game, you say.
Well, true, but it was the basis for the initial SimCity idea.
The designer of this game, Will Wright,
ended up having more fun with the level editor
than he was shooting things with the helicopter like you were supposed to.
Eventually, this idea was fleshed out a bit more,
and in 1985 he started trying to sell the game on the C64
to various publishers under the name "Micropolis."
Unfortunately, at the time,
there was already a disk drive manufacturer by the same name
and he had to change it.
And since it was a simulated city,
it ended up being shortened, to "SimCity."
But even more unfortunately,
he couldn't find any publishers willing to take a gamble on the game,
saying that it was just too different,
seeing as it had no win or lose state,
and obviously nobody would buy it.
Then in 1986, Wright hit it off with Jeff Braun,
an investor interested in getting started in the games industry.
In 1987, they formed Maxis in Orinda, California,
and after publishing a game through Brøderbund called Sky Chase,
work began on expanding SimCity
and porting it to more contemporary systems.
Then finally in 1989, the first version of SimCity was released to the public,
and on a plethora of home computers.
The Commodore Amiga was one of the first,
with both a basic 512K version and graphically-enhanced EHB 1MB version
that both played wonderfully.
There was also the Apple Macintosh version,
which ended up being very popular,
despite its monochrome graphics and simpler sound.
Then you had the MS-DOS port,
probably the most popular of them all.
It was technically inferior to the Amiga version,
as far as graphics and sound go,
but had the advantage of being on a system that was becoming far more prevalent
in homes and offices all the time.
Though there was a bit of a problem with SimCity, at least legally,
since the boxes for these featured a monster
that looked almost exactly like Godzilla.
And since the likeness wasn't licensed from Toho,
the owners of the Godzilla franchise,
they had to change the box art to show a different disaster
which ended up being the tornado.
But it was a minor issue, since the game was selling hand-over-fist anyway,
and it wasn't long before the first piece of extra content was released:
the SimCity Terrain Editor.
This was a program that you could order directly from Maxis
that allowed you to – go figure – edit the terrain of your cities.
which marked the first time the staple idea of terraforming entered the series.
Then in 1990, the first expansion packs were released for the major versions of the game,
known as Graphic Sets 1 and 2:
Ancient Cities and Future Cities.
These added entirely new sets of tiles to the game,
changing the appearance and names of certain buildings to fit a theme,
like Medieval Times, Wild West, and even a moon colony.
Then 1991 brought about the first console ports of the game,
which changed things around even more,
starting with the Super Nintendo version.
This was actually published and developed by Nintendo
for the SNES and Super Famicom.
So while it had the same basic gameplay,
it also had all new graphics, sounds, music,
a seasonal cycle that changed the landscape,
and token Nintendo characters like Mario appearing as a statue
and Bowser attacking your city instead of Godzilla.
There was also the Commodore Amiga CDTV version this year,
which featured similar graphics to the regular Amiga game,
though with a more zoomed-in look,
and interface designed for remote control usage,
as well as CD audio tracks,
marking the first time the SimCity games had music that wasn't synthesized.
1992 brought about SimCity for Windows,
which featured similar graphics to the DOS port,
but had an entirely new interface designed to work better with Windows 3.1.
Then in 1993, the Windows version was slightly tweaked
bundled with a DOS version of the terrain editor,
and renamed to SimCity Classic,
also getting some new box art to fit more in line
with the current Maxis Classic Collection games,
like SimEarth and SimAnt.
And since the graphics were technically different from the DOS port,
there was a SimCity Classic graphics set released as well,
which contained both of the original sets,
just updated for this new version.
Maxis had also started distributing educational versions of their games,
and SimCity Classic was one of these to get that treatment.
It was the same game, but it had a teacher's guide
and all sorts of supplemental material included
to help teach kids the basics of urban planning
...and smashing your city with earthquakes.
1993 also saw the release of SimCity Enhanced CD-ROM,
developed and published jointly with Interplay.
This not only featured higher-res graphics,
new music and sound effects, and city advisors,
but cheesy full motion video cutscenes
and news reports all throughout the game.
Thank you, Sheila, and you're right:
those clam donuts do look delicious.
LGR: It was 1993. That's what you did.
Have you heard of black holes?
That's what the city will become
if you don't build more transmission lines immediately.
LGR: There were also a couple ports of SimCity to Unix operating systems that year by DUX Software.
I bring this up because one of these was multiplayer SimCity for X11,
which was actually the first time a SimCity game
was playable with other people simultaneously.
But by the end of 1993,
the moment city builders the world over had been waiting for finally arrived:
the first true sequel to the game called SimCity 2000.
Co-developed with Fred Haslam, Will Wright had done it again.
SimCity 2000 was a massive hit,
improving the game formula while also adding new stuff,
like a full soundtrack,
an underground view for water and subways,
a new isometric viewpoint inspired by A-Train,
and tons of new buildings, options and more.
Of course, it was only natural that the game saw some add-ons
and the first one came in 1994's Urban Renewal Kit.
This not only allowed you to place buildings individually instead of zoning,
but it let you create entirely new tile sets on your own,
as well as coming with a large selection of pre-made sets from Maxis.
Then the first and only scenario expansion came:
Scenarios Volume 1: Great Disasters.
As the name implies, it included a dozen or so new scenarios
with disasters to deal with,
some fictitious and some based on real-world disasters.
These add-ons were then packaged with the vanilla game
and sold as the SimCity 2000 CD Collection before the year was out.
There was also the first official departure
of SimCity from computer and video games
in the form of SimCity: The Card Game
from Mayfair Games.
These collectible cards represented things like housing,
transportation, power, and office space,
and of course, each player tries to create the best city with their hand.
Then 1995 arrived,
bringing on a slew of SimCity experiences,
starting with a version for kids called SimTown,
also known as SimCity Jr.
It featured somewhat similar gameplay to SimCity,
but gave you a much smaller plot of land to work with
and focused more on resource management and helping neighbors thrive
than urban planning.
Then there was the Special Edition of SimCity 2000 for PCs
which was really the same package as the CD-ROM collection
with some added bonuses like a sweet silver box,
an awesome intro video,
some new scenarios,
and Will TV,
consisting of interviews with series creator Will Wright.
This year also brought about some new console ports,
the first being for the Sega Saturn.
It had some new features, like slightly different graphics,
the buildings changing styles at 1950 and 2050,
and some fun video sequences.
Also out that year was the SNES port,
which wasn't incredibly popular.
It's functional but runs much slower overall,
is missing some scenarios, disasters, and music.
It also still had no support for the SNES mouse, which was just lame.
In 1996, the Sony PlayStation got its version of SimCity 2000
and this was pretty cool.
It's based on the Saturn version, but there are some changes,
like the cities don't change the look throughout the years.
It does have more scenarios to choose from, though,
and a pretty awesome feature
allowing you to take a tour of your city from a car's perspective.
Looked kinda like crap,
but it was still the first time players could zoom down to this level.
An then a multiplayer version of the game from Maxis this time
came around for Windows only,
called SimCity 2000: Network Edition.
Here, players could connect to a host over a network or direct Internet connection
and manage a single plot of land simultaneously.
You end up having multiple districts within a single city
where each mayor takes care of their own plot of land
and then makes deals with the other players
for resources and expansion if needed.
1997 brought about a port of SimCity 2000
to the Nintendo 64 by Imagineer Company,
the same guys that did the FM Towns port of the original SimCity.
And like that one, it was exclusive to Japan.
Some unusual features were added for this one though,
like TV stations, a dating mini-game,
horse races, monster breeding and giant monster fights,
and other Japanese 3D mini-games.
The rest of the world got some interesting SimCity action too, though,
with SimCopter and Streets of SimCity.
Both of these allowed you to take your SimCity 2000 cities
and either fly or drive around them in 3D.
They were buggy and, some would argue, ugly games,
but, man, were they fun to play with.
However, things at Maxis were going pretty badly.
They were releasing a bunch of subpar games outside of SimCity stuff,
making small acquisitions left and right,
and had some upper management issues.
Due to this trouble, they ended up selling to Electronic Arts in July of 1997.
And while SimCity 3000 had been slated to release in 1998,
it was once an entirely different game than what was actually released.
Originally, it was going to be all 3D and such,
much like some of the console games and Streets of SimCity were.
This was thankfully scrapped and a new team of people were brought in to work on the project,
while Will Wright went on to work on what would become The Sims.
But SimCity 3000 was eventually released in 1999
for Windows and Macintosh PCs,
and it was fantastic.
Take SimCity 2000,
expand the gameplay, give it a phenomenal soundtrack,
all new graphics, more options than ever before,
and on and on.
It was followed up with SimCity 3000 Unlimited in the year 2000,
also known as SimCity 3000 Deutschland,
UK Edition and World Edition outside of America.
It added new disasters, scenarios, buildings,
and an improved version of the previously downloadable building architect tool,
allowing you to make your own buildings.
And back in Japan, more awesome things were happening
that nobody else got to enjoy,
this time with HAL Laboratories' SimCity 64,
released for the Nintendo 64 DD add-on.
This was actually a follow-up of sorts
to the original SimCity on the SNES,
though the gameplay was more like SimCity 2000.
It provided totally new graphics,
the ability to view cities at night,
and a pedestrian-level viewpoint,
allowing you to roam your cities at will.
Finally, the first official portable version of SimCity was released,
SimCity 2000 for the Nintendo Game Boy Advance by Zoo Digital.
It's strikingly similar to previous versions of SC2K
and is even quite playable on the smaller screen,
though it's missing music and any kind of water system to manage.
After a period of inactivity on the SimCity front,
finally in 2003 the next game of the series was released:
SimCity 4.
While this one was still fantastic,
it added a lot of stuff that led to a bit of "love it or hate it" kind of attitude for some.
For one thing, the game uses a fully 3D engine
with day and night cycles for the first time in the main series,
though it still has a fixed perspective.
It looked great, but it also led to some significant performance issues,
even on high-end systems.
SC4 also introduced region gameplay,
where you'd not only manage one city but several cities in a region,
trading resources between them.
You also got several new game functions,
like God mode and My Sim mode,
the former of which acts like a proper sandbox,
and the latter of which lets you create a Sim,
or import one from The Sims,
and watch them live out their life in your city.
Wasn't long before the Rush Hour expansion hit for the game,
and a Deluxe version including both it and the base game together.
This added new transportation management and facilities,
new buildings and disasters,
and You Drive It mode,
where players take control of vehicles in the game
and can either free roam or play different scenarios.
Several years passed, and then in 2007
came one of the most controversial titles in SimCity's history:
SimCity Societies
by Tilted Mill Entertainment.
Unlike practically every other SimCity game,
this one eschews zoning and urban planning
and replaces it with social engineering and ploppable buildings.
It played more like some of the later Caesar games than SimCity,
and the reaction to this one was pretty poor.
It also ran like crap before long,
making it nearly unplayable, even if you did enjoy the gameplay.
Somehow it ended up getting an expansion pack called Destinations,
which focused on the ability to create tourist traps
and develop your city as a holiday town.
Both were bundled together with SimCity 4 Deluxe
in a compilation called The SimCity Box the next year.
But also in 2007 came SimCity DS for the Nintendo DS.
While it looks pretty similar to SimCity 3000,
it made good use of the dual screen features of the DS,
as well as some gimmicks, like blowing in the microphone to put out fires and stuff.
It was followed up in 2008 by SimCity Creator
for the Nintendo DS and Wii,
which added even more building types,
the ability to fly around the city in planes and choppers,
some missions to play out, a seasonal cycle,
and even the ability to create proper curved roads.
It's worth noting that the DS version is actually *quite* lacking
compared to the Wii version, though.
Also that year was a bit of an odd one,
called The Sims Carnival: SnapCity.
It plays kind of like a mixture of SimCity and Tetris
and isn't all that bad, other than the fact that
its Story mode is incredibly short.
We also got one of the first decent mobile phone ports that year
with SimCity on Apple's iOS.
It was basically a modified version of SimCity 3000 for touch screen devices,
though it's missing several features from the original.
There were other ports of dubious quality for things like the BlackBerry,
but then in 2010 came SimCity Deluxe for iOS devices once again.
It also took cues from SimCity 3000,
but added higher-resolution textures
and a new interface for their current iPad.
And then in 2012, Playfish released SimCity Social on Facebook,
which was an incredibly simplified free-to-play online Flash game.
Much like the previously released Sims Social,
the gameplay here revolves around collecting resources
before you run out of an arbitrary energy source.
And if you wanted more, you either had to wait several hours,
bother your friends to play,
or whip out your credit card and pay up.
And now, it's time for the SimCity reboot from Maxis,
which is set to be released March 5, 2013.
Is it any good?
Does it live up to the SimCity name?
Well, shortly after it's out, I'll have my full review of it posted here,
so check back then.
But for now, I hope you enjoyed this look back
at SimCity and all of its ups and downs.
Thanks for watching.