Adressing the problems of CiM1

[Eich]

Greetings,

I enjoyed CiM1 very much. It was a good game but there were many strange glitches and problems. I want to sum those problems up in hope that they will be fixed in CiM2.


(1) Subways

Subways somewhat destroyed the game. Instead of building your empire from bottom up you could easily start out by building a vast subway network after taking on a huge loan. I never failed with this approach and it made busses and trams redundant. This is somewhat sad. There are of course easy fixes like limited loans or something along that line.

(2) Bus and Tramlines did not work out

I found it to be impossible to make profit with busses or trams. Maybe there was some way to do just that but I never had to bother to look because the subway "exploit" rendered bus and tramlines useless.

(3) Lines

Whatever the reason typical "Lines" did not work out. If you let your subway or bus travel in a A - B - C - D - E pattern, you could be sure to suffer huge losses. If this was due to devastating break downs or traffic does not concern my point. Because there was a simple workaround. I simply let my subways commute from A to B all the time. Between B and C another vehicle would commute. I think you get the point. This was somewhat unrealistic and unsatisfying.

(4) Hardware hunger

For whatever reason the game craved resources. I will be frank. The game did not look good enough to have such a high demand of ressources. Even "The Witcher 2" did not put that much strain on my hardware.

___

I'm really excited for CiM2, otherwise I would not bother to post these problems. I truly hope that CiM2 will become a game which can fill a long lasting hole in my heart. Since Sid Meier's Railroads and Railroads 3 no game could live up to my hopes and expectations I wish you the best of luck!

 

[co_martsu]

Thanks Eich for the feedback. We have learned a lot from CIM1 and the sequel will have massive improvements and cool new features. We're working hard to make it as good as we can and it's really nice to hear you're looking forward to Cities in Motion 2

 

[Alex_brunius]

(1) Subways

Subways somewhat destroyed the game. Instead of building your empire from bottom up you could easily start out by building a vast subway network after taking on a huge loan. I never failed with this approach and it made busses and trams redundant. This is somewhat sad. There are of course easy fixes like limited loans or something along that line.

(2) Bus and Tramlines did not work out

I found it to be impossible to make profit with busses or trams. Maybe there was some way to do just that but I never had to bother to look because the subway "exploit" rendered bus and tramlines useless.

This is important.

I think that buses and trams should provide a slow but steady and reliable income.

And you should almost have to start out with bus or perhaps gambling all your starting money on a small tram line so that you get a feeling off progression as your network grows together with the city.

Bus -> Tram -> Metro

 

[slornie]

(1) Subways

Subways somewhat destroyed the game. Instead of building your empire from bottom up you could easily start out by building a vast subway network after taking on a huge loan. I never failed with this approach and it made busses and trams redundant. This is somewhat sad. There are of course easy fixes like limited loans or something along that line.

One way of diluting the advantage of the metro would be to add maintenance costs for the track as well as for the stations. The same would naturally have to be true for the tram (and if implemented, trolley bus), but at a far less punitive rate per metre of track.

(2) Bus and Tramlines did not work out

I found it to be impossible to make profit with busses or trams. Maybe there was some way to do just that but I never had to bother to look because the subway "exploit" rendered bus and tramlines useless.

I think much of it depends on the map in question, and the layout of the network. I found the Vienna map to be quite well suited for bus and tram networks before expanding to metro.

(3) Lines

Whatever the reason typical "Lines" did not work out. If you let your subway or bus travel in a A - B - C - D - E pattern, you could be sure to suffer huge losses. If this was due to devastating break downs or traffic does not concern my point. Because there was a simple workaround. I simply let my subways commute from A to B all the time. Between B and C another vehicle would commute. I think you get the point. This was somewhat unrealistic and unsatisfying.

I disagree entirely on this point, typical lines can be highly effective and very reliable. Alright, there can be certain cases where a particular stop of stretch of line can become overcrowded, but that doesn't mean that it is impossible to have a smoothly operating loop or spine. I tend to only resort to A>B shuttle lines for connecting major out-of-city locations with the main network (tram or metro), such as airports or the town in the top left of Amsterdam, or to provide a shortcut between two busy but unconnected stations (metro).

 

[Gogomaester]

I think you are little bit noob if you cant build simple metro line with more than two stops and profiting TRAM network, with the buses its little more harder because the cims use only 1 door. But I disagree with everything but 4. And with 1 its true, that you can have only subway profiting system, but i played some games that i started with trams and buses and worked up to subways (with quicker time) simply when I saw that one line is overcrowded a did a subway line and reduced the tram line, the cims wer using subway because it was faster. So I think you just need to know how to plan your network, you should start from points, where lots of people are going (Malls, Train Stations) and connect them togehter with residental areas. But I am sorry to say you are probably a noob if you build only A -> B -> Subways and B-> C -> B Subways. THIS is cheating, not using the subway

 

[Bel_Alex]

Just subway must be more expensive. 25-50k for station and 500-800 for segment of tunnel - it's normal for CiM. In real life building of metro is VERY expensive. It justified only with huge amount of passengers and pays off for many years.

 

[unmerged(424960)]

I think you are little bit noob if you cant build simple metro line with more than two stops and profiting TRAM network, with the buses its little more harder because the cims use only 1 door. But I disagree with everything but 4. And with 1 its true, that you can have only subway profiting system, but i played some games that i started with trams and buses and worked up to subways (with quicker time) simply when I saw that one line is overcrowded a did a subway line and reduced the tram line, the cims wer using subway because it was faster. So I think you just need to know how to plan your network, you should start from points, where lots of people are going (Malls, Train Stations) and connect them togehter with residental areas. But I am sorry to say you are probably a noob if you build only A -> B -> Subways and B-> C -> B Subways. THIS is cheating, not using the subway

I don't know how can you do that, when a metro train has only 100 pax capacity and at the station you have 3-400 passengers. Even if with plenty of trains, it's difficult to have a working metro system with more then 4-5 stations. Yes, the metro can be profitable, but you will always have angry passengers waiting on stops.

 

[GE90-115B]

Just subway must be more expensive. 25-50k for station and 500-800 for segment of tunnel - it's normal for CiM. In real life building of metro is VERY expensive. It justified only with huge amount of passengers and pays off for many years.

I actually find the model in CiM 1 to be fairly balanced. If it was any harder to earn money for expansion of the network, it could be irritating since the process of starting up to be profitable with a couple of lines isn't very difficult. So that would mean for me more waiting to earn money. And we don't like waiting, do we?

O/c, if it was a more complex way to be profitable, the whole picture would turn around.

 

[TH1]

I don't know how can you do that, when a metro train has only 100 pax capacity and at the station you have 3-400 passengers.

Well, the thing is that with a good network, you won't have overcrowded stations.

 

[unmerged(273319)]

Well, the thing is that with a good network, you won't have overcrowded stations.

Yeah... doesn't work that way. With the most connected network, you will have a ton of people at key intersections of routes... just like you would at any interchange station in real life. When there are 4 streetcar routes, 4 bus routes and 2 subway lines intersecting, there will be 100+ people at each platform. And the game doesn't provide you with enough tools to deal with them.

Why should we adjust our gameplay and make bad decisions to spread out our lines and make non-profitable lines just so that the game doesn't overcrowd itself? Subway lines must inter-connect.

 

[TH1]

oh, come on, we'll never agree on that. I can show you plenty of maps where i have two metro lines meeting with bus and tram lines and there isn't a huge crowd at the stops. And yes, i know that the simulation is not 100% realistic...and so what? In real life there's one metro line in Helsinki plus around 10 tram lines and some bus lines. If that would be enough for the city in the game, would it not be a bit boring?

 

[Gogomaester]

It depends on the map, so this is called balancing again. For example on Berlin map (or Tokyo map (the XL ones)) you will have always lots of passengers because the citiy popullation is very high.

 

[unmerged(235471)]

to many buses or trams on a line could slow it down and you will lose money in the long run

 

[Drag0nflamez]

Well, the thing is that with a good network, you won't have overcrowded stations.

Actually, having overcrowded stations means that your network works well.. Perhaps too well.

 

[Rodrico Stak]

No, it just means that your system is attractive and goes to the right places. That's a component of working well, but not its entirety.

 

[ZuluBravo]

Thanks Eich for the feedback. We have learned a lot from CIM1 and the sequel will have massive improvements and cool new features. We're working hard to make it as good as we can and it's really nice to hear you're looking forward to Cities in Motion 2

Thank you very much and keep up the outstanding work developers! Wishing you all the very best!

 

[unmerged(387152)]

You can easily make money of Buses and Trams. At the moment I'm mostly using Trams as main transport, while using the buses as the feeders. I charge between $2.50-$3.00 bus and Between $6.00-$8.00 for Tram. Gaining money is a bit slower than building a subway, but with out a doubt you can make massive amount of money.

The downside with a popular integrated Tram Network, is bottle necking. And sometimes depending on how many trams there are and how big the interchange is. Trams will block each other, a stalemate occurs and everyone is going nowhere fast. And yet I have unused tracks at the interchange that will fix the problem but I can not designate the Trams or bus route. Which I hope will be fixed

Another downside of using Tram Network/Interchanges is when the Cims love to walk down the Tram Track, stopping the Tram. Allowing trams on the same route to catch up, but also making the route less efficient.

 

[vonhaubitz]

Well, the thing is that with a good network, you won't have overcrowded stations.

Repeating it a 1000 times doesn't mean it's true. And I am sure I am not stupid and I do build good networks. However, the original capacity of CiM1 would never meet the needs in a map like Berlin and the more vehicles you would deploy on a line the more traffic jams it would cause, because one or the other vehicle would wait ages at a stop just to let one additional passenger in. But, I am convinced there will be modding available for anyone who would love to tune the capacities to real world numbers. The odd thing about crowded stations really is that it would drag down the performance of the game cause it would consume a lot of the hardware ressources to simulate all the little indians at the stop.

Another annoying thing with CiM1 is that if one vehicle after another would pile up at the stations (because the first one stays too long at the stop), the passenger can not cross the road anymore and so even more indians would pile up at the stop, just wanting to cross the road to get to the stop across the road.

And all that is true even for a good network. So, I stopped advertising not to attract so many little indians. But it does not perfectly help, if the network gets too attractive escpecially in large maps, there is no chance not to have overcrowded stations and stops and if I wouldn't have modded the original capacity with real world values, it would not be under control. But even then in Berlin e.g. there will be some overcrowded stops and stations.

And due to the weird habit to fill up the vehicles quite fast but then waiting ages for just one or two passengers especially the metro vehicles will all line up one after another which will torpedize every intervall thus creating overcrowded stations again. So, for CiM2 I hope there will be a lot of balancing be done, and I hope vehicles will not wait forever for just one passenger.

 

[TH1]

Repeating it a 1000 times doesn't mean it's true.

So you want me to send you my saved games as proof or what?