[theme music]
[fizz, sip]
Aahhh!
[typing]
I have a feeling this is going to be hard.
Along with SimAnt and SimCity 2000,
SimTower is easily my favorite classic Maxis Sim game.
So whenever I get requests for games like this, I always hesitate
because as I much as I love to review it, I know the chance is there that it won't be very neutral
since I love the game so much and have for almost 15 years.
But whatever. Here we go.
SimTower was released in 1996 by Maxis for Windows and Macintosh,
however, it wasn't developed in-house.
The game was originally known simply as "Tower" in its home country of Japan.
This is actually the second of three Japanese Maxis games,
along with A-Train and SimTunes.
Being created by the legendary Yoot Saito,
the guy behind such quirky classics as Seaman,
you know you're in for a unique experience.
[synth strings]
[knocking]
You begin the game by creating a new tower with nothing but a plot of land and some funds.
There are no scenarios, no quest to complete.
The only real goal is to create a tower that is... successful.
Now what constitutes success? Well,
that's pretty much up to you.
One way to quote-unquote "beat" the game
is to reach a five-star rating for your tower,
that being the pinnacle of recognition among other towers in the game.
But you really don't have to. You could just build a tower of condos,
an office building, or fill it with restaurants and garbage dumps.
These might not be as profitable as a balanced tower,
but you could really do whatever you want if you want... to do it.
As such, it really fits in well with the other Sim games,
where you don't have an exact goal but simply
use a set of tools to play with
and a system to simulate and see what happens.
Looking at the tools you are provided with
may give you the impression that the game is about physically building a tower structure and layout.
After all, you have tools for lobbies, elevators, floors and basement levels,
but you won't be seeing anything about actual tower fidelity or structure.
No girders or support beams to place.
This called SimTower, but it may as well be called
It's not a simulation of the building of a tower
with blueprints, corporate deals and engineering,
it's a simulation of the people in the building.
It's sort of a catch-22, if you think about it.
You need to build a tower to attract people,
but you need to attract people to build the tower.
Fortunately, Sims are excessively curious creatures,
so once you build a lobby and an office or two, the Sims will start wandering inside
and spending their hard-earned Simolians.
Once you have a lobby, you can start building upward.
Laying floors is the first step,
followed by populating those floors with rooms for the Sims to rent,
like condos, offices, cafes, hotels
and even movie theaters.
Of course, you'll need to provide a way for your Sims to get around,
so you have access different types of elevators and stairs.
Now how all of this actually works together is a pretty complex simulation
that happens to have a nice and approachable user interface.
Honestly, it's just a great example of genius in game design.
The best way to think of this is a vertical version of SimCity.
Your lobbies are your power plants,
elevators are roads,
and the type of tenants are the residential, commercial and industrial zones.
You even have emergency teams and waste management later in the game.
As a kid, this really opened my eyes to the ideas of
perspective and perceivable scale and contained universes.
The idea that a tower itself
is almost a living organism,
teeming with life and pathways, like it's own city within a city.
It's just mind-blowing when you finally realize what it is that you're looking at.
Maxis games just do a superb job with this
and SimTower is one of the better examples.
Your tower isn't just another building,
it's a reality within a greater reality.
It just happens to be filled with persnickety, pissed-off Sims.
Yes, that's right: your Sims have personalities.
See, you could build a tower any which way,
spending funds left and right with no real regard for human interaction.
But if you do this, you're screwed
and will have lots and lots of Sims red with anger.
The query tool is very useful in this regard.
Just click on a Sim to find out where they're going,
where they work or live,
and what they're angry about.
You can then use the same tool on the different tenants
to see if they're having trouble or causing the trouble.
For instance, a movie theater or an office next to a condo or hotel is bad news
because of the noise it causes.
Placing a café near a lobby or elevator
are great because of the traffic,
but placing a high-end suite next to the same place
might be bad for exactly the same reason.
It's all about balance and harmony,
finding that perfect pattern to model your tower after
to achieve maximum efficiency.
As long as the tenants and guests remain happy,
calm and provided for with a minimum of stress,
your tower will thrive.
Happy Sims are productive Sims.
And productively happy Sims pay their rent.
So as each day comes to a close and the next one begins,
you've got your cards placed right, then the rent starts rolling in,
accompanied by that awesome,
pleasing sound effect.
[ka-ching, ka-ching]
Doesn't that sunrise just look awesome?
I freakin' love the ambience on display here.
This is the kind of game that you wake up early in the morning to play
with a cup of joe in one hand
and a mouse in the other.
There are several things that can happen that affect your tower status,
like insect infestations,
finding buried treasure,
VIPs visiting and even bomb threats.
So as soon as you fall into a building pattern
that you think is gonna take you all the way to the top
with easy success,
something comes along and screws up your day
just enough to give you a little jolt back into reality.
SimTower is great.
If you like SimCity at all,
I would highly recommend giving SimTower a try.
Even if you don't, I'd still recommend trying it.
Unlike some other outside- developed Maxis games like A-Train,
SimTower is very easy to pick up and play with,
even if you really just don't know what you're doing.
It doesn't take very long to get a general feel for what's happening to your tower and how to improve it.
But it takes an absurd amount of playing to really get a massive,
100-storey five-star tower that is self-sufficient.
If I could list one flaw,
it would be that it could use just a bit more.
More businesses, more tenants, more random events,
and just a pinch more depth.
This was exactly what happened with its sequel, Yoot Tower,
and it's really the same game, just expanded.
Honestly, both games are exceptional,
so if you want a strategy sim with a little bit more of a different feel to it,
give the Tower games a try
and calm some angry Sims down.