[jazz music] [typing]
Back when I first played and reviewed Cities: Skylines,
one of the first items on my wish list for future features
was a set of disasters to play with.
Because while the game had events like localized fires, floods and sickness,
there was a lack of any catastrophic hurdles to overcome.
Well, finally these desires have been addressed
with Colossal Order and Paradox Interactive's release
of the third expansion to Cities: Skylines,
Natural Disasters.
Predictably, the main attraction here is the inclusion of seven disasters
of the natural variety.
Each of these can be triggered manually at any time,
or you can set disasters to occur at random
and adjust their frequency in the options.
And being that this is a natural disasters pack,
you won't be seeing any alien invasions or kaiju attacks
like SimCity famously provided and
somehow made us expect it a city builder,
But while that is a bit of a bummer,
what IS provided is quite the spectacle indeed.
Tornadoes are appropriately terrifying,
especially combined with thunderstorms.
I was quite impressed with the effect here,
although I think the havoc they wreak is a bit much
when it comes to city centers,
with them dropping skyscrapers like dominoes
instead of doing major damage to the buildings,
as seen in real-life urban tornadoes
like the Fort Worth disaster in 2000.
Same goes for tsunamis,
which play out more like a scene from the movie "2012"
rather than anything you'd reasonably expect to witness in reality.
Even simple fires will now spread to a ridiculous degree
in what seems like no time at all,
especially if there are any trees or bushes nearby.
Still, it makes for some awesome and horrifying moments in Cities: Skylines,
and to that effect, these disasters perform their job admirably.
On a more personal level, though,
the timing of this pack is a bit strange,
since I've been seeing first-hand the aftermath
of several local forest fires for weeks now.
And one of my favorite nearby cities to visit, Gatlinburg, Tennessee,
was devastated by a forest fire the very day this expansion launched.
So many people tragically lost their homes, businesses and lives there,
so I found myself mentally disconnected
when seeing even virtual cities burn down
right at the moment I played this.
Yet I also found immense and unexpected pleasure
in being able to take control and quickly extinguish these virtual fires,
enjoying a sort of cathartic relief
when I was able to do what proved impossible
in recent real-world events.
And speaking of difficult scenarios, that's another inclusion to Cities: Skylines,
which launched alongside this expansion as a free patch.
You can now play through several pre-built scenarios
and even create your own using the included scenario editor.
I think this is a great addition to the game
because while the traditional open-world city-building mode is still fun,
having a set of objectives to complete when you need a break from that
is a welcome thing indeed.
And players were already making their own pseudo scenarios
with things like the flood challenge maps on the Steam Workshop,
so having a method of more precisely tuning these events
is fantastic!
And another free update that launched here
is the addition of radio stations,
and, man, I did not know how much I wanted this until now.
Comedic commercials,
ditsy DJs and tip-top tunes
litter the airwaves at your demand,
adding a welcome extra degree of charm to Skylines.
FEMALE ANNOUNCER: From birthday noodles to wedding noodles,
all the way to those most final of noodles...
[bell tolls]
Yakisoba!
It literally means
"fried noodles."
[relaxing music]
MALE ANNOUNCER: The Relaxation Station.
Songs for when you just...
wanna chill.
[jazz music]
LGR: Well, that's not the only use for radio, though.
Colossal Order didn't just cram in a bunch of disasters
without providing prevention measures,
of which radio plays a key part.
You can place radio towers around your city,
which will let your citizens know of imminent disasters
and broadcast evacuation orders.
Emergency shelters of various sizes have been provided as well,
and as long as they're placed somewhere safe with enough food,
they'll give thousands of citizens refuge
while the apocalypse of the day runs its course.
There are also a slew of buildings, objects and services
that can help predict and prevent disasters
and rebuild afterward if the need arises.
For instance, it is not only YOU that can prevent forest fires.
Fire watch towers can help with that as well.
Radars and sensors of various types
can also be placed on land and in the water
to detect things like storms, earthquakes and tsunamis.
Helicopter depots can help emergency workers travel to hard-to-reach areas
to do things like extinguish flames
and address medical and criminal concerns.
Disaster response units, complete with canine companions,
can be sent in after each disaster
to search the rubble for bodies and survivors,
which is a vital step to take
before you bulldoze and rebuild.
And there are now reservoirs and pumping stations
to deal with standing water after post-storm floods
and post-tsunami tsunamis,
which pair together nicely with the already-included keys and canals.
And of course, there are a handful of new policies
that help throw the people's money at your problems
and hope for the best by pure bureaucracy.
Take into account the new unique buildings and ploppable monuments,
and altogether you've got a nifty expansion pack here.
So is Natural Disasters worth the asking price?
Well, I would say that's very much up to your play style,
even more so than the previous packs.
It's selling for just shy of $15 USD,
which is a couple bucks more than Snowfall,
which was the last pack we got.
For me, this price was well worth paying,
since I loved the added challenge provided by the new disasters and services.
And going through the process of rebuilding has been surprisingly fun,
especially when a disaster gave me an excuse
to start a district from scratch
that needed a good traffic system overhaul anyway.
But when it comes down to it,
this pack is also not adding a whole lot
that you couldn't already theoretically do
with a few minutes of slapdash usage of the bulldozer.
This pack certainly makes it more complex
and unpredictable to recover from lost buildings and such,
but you may or may not be the type of player
that even wants to DEAL with that kind of extra stuff getting in the way
of creating your dream city.
And you might have noticed, but a lot of this footage
isn't running at a very high frame rate at all.
The game has some performance issues in really large cities as it is,
but when you throw in these disasters and all these effects,
it slows to less than one frame per second in some cases.
It's pretty bad.
So I would not say that this pack is necessary to everyone.
But, dang it if it's not a lot of fun if you're like me
and are looking for some new stuff to deal with.
And if you've witnessed your own natural disaster or two as of late,
it might just be worth checking out
to see if you could handle things better yourself,
albeit in a virtual setting, free of any real consequences.
[jazz music]
And if you enjoyed this video of mine on Cities: Skylines: Natural Disasters,
perhaps you would like to see these other videos on previous stuff for the game.
And there's always videos coming out every Monday and Friday here on LGR,
so pay attention if you want to.
And as always, thank you very much for watching.