Any advice for someone new to this great game? I played a lot of Sim City 4 back in the day. Any advice is welcome.
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Hello,
I have a half a million population city with around 9000 people that use public transport.
My best suggestion is to plan ahead and take the game slow. You might even try to go vanilla way and unlock all progression milestones. This way you have an organic look on the city. My greatest suggestion is to build independent neighbourhoods connected through highways and not expand existing ones because doing this will wreck traffic flow in the future.
Also the whole progression milestones get your city to around 90k people. From that point onwards you can unlock the 25 tile mod.
I plan my new neighbourhoods ahead. I pick the spot, maybe from the main highway, through a roundabout, which I use as a connection point for the new neighbourhood. The thing here is to use the main highways as traffic collectors and distributions.
When building a new neighbourhood, I start from the center, build all services in a single point - fire, schools, police, medical and most importantly the center of the public transport. For a 20-30-40k people neighbourhood you might need 4-5 or more kindergartens, 2-3 schools and 1 university. I usually plan 30-50k neighbourhoods because this way I can fit all major services and still be on + when it comes to income. For smaller neighbourhoods it is enough for 2 kindergartens, 1 school, 1 small police and fire station.
Always have 2 transportation infrastructure in place. One for the neighbourhood with bus/trams and one outside connection line, maybe a metro to the city center, where usually the commercial and special buildings reside.
Most neighbourhoods I plan are somewhat concetrical, meaning I have that services in center with a bit of generic commercial zone, a ring or more of high density residential and office zones at the outer rings. Think of it like the Nine men morris game.
If you want to see some detailed neighbourhoods you can check my profile page.
I have my half a million population city CSL map in a post along with many videos of different zones in the city. https://www.reddit.com/r/CitiesSkyl...alf_a_million_population_city_still_got_some/
Also you can visit my YouTube page and find some inspiration there as well. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCeVA-2I_mDOg5DLmcviDIWA?view_as=subscriber
The biggest challenge was to keep traffic in check and most of the time I spent building the city was in improving existing conditions and plan new areas.
I have tried multiple ways to keep traffic flowing in very large industrial areas as well as keeping them properly connected to the city. The current traffic flow is 90%.
My half a million pop city has more than 20 or 30 distinct neighbourhoods which all work independently from each other and every new one I plan was better then the previous because I learned from them.
Here is a timelapse of one of busiest central transportation hubs of my city:
Also here is a video showing how I used many metro lines to animate a park with thousands of people:
In conclusion you can use public transport not only to carry people around but also to make some satisfying visual areas of the city.
Also, it's best just to stick to a city and grow it.
Try out new expansion zones differently every time and see how they work out. If you do not like a new area or it doesn't work, plan next one with what doesn't work in mind, but always keep what you have, the map is big enough for every experiment.
Also, try to keep industrial and specialized commercial areas as distict zones in the city and try to keep them well connected to the rest of the city. This way you can improve traffic flow.
Thanks!
I have a half a million population city with around 9000 people that use public transport.
My best suggestion is to plan ahead and take the game slow. You might even try to go vanilla way and unlock all progression milestones. This way you have an organic look on the city. My greatest suggestion is to build independent neighbourhoods connected through highways and not expand existing ones because doing this will wreck traffic flow in the future.
Also the whole progression milestones get your city to around 90k people. From that point onwards you can unlock the 25 tile mod.
I plan my new neighbourhoods ahead. I pick the spot, maybe from the main highway, through a roundabout, which I use as a connection point for the new neighbourhood. The thing here is to use the main highways as traffic collectors and distributions.
When building a new neighbourhood, I start from the center, build all services in a single point - fire, schools, police, medical and most importantly the center of the public transport. For a 20-30-40k people neighbourhood you might need 4-5 or more kindergartens, 2-3 schools and 1 university. I usually plan 30-50k neighbourhoods because this way I can fit all major services and still be on + when it comes to income. For smaller neighbourhoods it is enough for 2 kindergartens, 1 school, 1 small police and fire station.
Always have 2 transportation infrastructure in place. One for the neighbourhood with bus/trams and one outside connection line, maybe a metro to the city center, where usually the commercial and special buildings reside.
Most neighbourhoods I plan are somewhat concetrical, meaning I have that services in center with a bit of generic commercial zone, a ring or more of high density residential and office zones at the outer rings. Think of it like the Nine men morris game.
If you want to see some detailed neighbourhoods you can check my profile page.
I have my half a million population city CSL map in a post along with many videos of different zones in the city. https://www.reddit.com/r/CitiesSkyl...alf_a_million_population_city_still_got_some/
Also you can visit my YouTube page and find some inspiration there as well. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCeVA-2I_mDOg5DLmcviDIWA?view_as=subscriber
The biggest challenge was to keep traffic in check and most of the time I spent building the city was in improving existing conditions and plan new areas.
I have tried multiple ways to keep traffic flowing in very large industrial areas as well as keeping them properly connected to the city. The current traffic flow is 90%.
My half a million pop city has more than 20 or 30 distinct neighbourhoods which all work independently from each other and every new one I plan was better then the previous because I learned from them.
Here is a timelapse of one of busiest central transportation hubs of my city:
Also here is a video showing how I used many metro lines to animate a park with thousands of people:
In conclusion you can use public transport not only to carry people around but also to make some satisfying visual areas of the city.
Also, it's best just to stick to a city and grow it.
Try out new expansion zones differently every time and see how they work out. If you do not like a new area or it doesn't work, plan next one with what doesn't work in mind, but always keep what you have, the map is big enough for every experiment.
Also, try to keep industrial and specialized commercial areas as distict zones in the city and try to keep them well connected to the rest of the city. This way you can improve traffic flow.
Thanks!
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Hello Tommy!
I am a new player myself, and also played SC 4 a lot some 15 years ago. When playing vanilla it is quite possible to play quite like one did in SC, biggest difference is much better traffic behaviour - oh and that your citizens are "real", everyone going to work or school (for performance-reasons there is a bit less of them than IRL, 50% or so).
I am a new player myself, and also played SC 4 a lot some 15 years ago. When playing vanilla it is quite possible to play quite like one did in SC, biggest difference is much better traffic behaviour - oh and that your citizens are "real", everyone going to work or school (for performance-reasons there is a bit less of them than IRL, 50% or so).
Could someone tell me about mods and DLC's? There are some mods I find interesting, like Traffic Manager President Edition (TMPE) and Network Extensions (NExt). I'm interested in the university or campus DLC, but transit DLC's look good too.
Build your neighborhoods around a transit hub from the outset, otherwise sooner or later you will find yourself in traffic hell.
I have all DLCs but Campus and the latest Sunset Harbor. I can really recommend Mass Transit, Green Cities and Industries as they add a lot to the game mechanics.
Mods usually work without the DLCs (there might be exceptions).
Traffic Manager President Edition (TMPE) is really a big help to manage traffic.
Loading Screen Mod reduces loading time but is very importang to identify missing or changed assets which you downloaded from the workshop.
You can use "25 tiles mod" or "81 tiles" for more space to build.
Network extensions 2 brings some very nice roads.
"Watch It!" is a nice visuell addition.
@ quantumbeer:
I use the following myself:
Better performance or UI
Advanced toolbar - Better organized menues in game)
AutoLineColor Redux - Gives differens colors automaticly to all new public transport lines, instead of doing it manually
Less Steam - Reduces unnecessary network traffic with Steam
Loading Screen Mod - speeds up loading and improves memory-usage i.e. better use of computer power!
Mini FPS Booster - increases the frame rate in-game by 5-15%
Mod Compatibility Checker - Helps track down mod incompatibilities.
Game experience
TMPE V11 STABLE - Makes in possible to edit traffic AI and regulations like speed limits, lane usage etc.
Hide TMPE crosswalks V3.0 [BETA] - Hides crosswalks when disabled in TMPE
Network Extensions 2 (Updated for Sunset Harbor) - more road options than in vanilla
Lifecycle Rebalance Revisited 1.1.1 - Does away with "death waves" and makes the gameplay more realistic, including immigration to the city
Realistic Population Revisited 1.1 - This mod changes the numbers of households and jobs in buildings to more accurately reflect real-world values.
Extended game options - A Collection of small handy mods like resource depletion rate, 25 tiles mod or unlock milestones etc.
Top 3 DLC i recommend to start with
After Dark - leisure and Tourist specializations, and bicycles
Snowfall - Winter content, heating and trams
Green cities - better waste management and less pollution
I use the following myself:
Better performance or UI
Advanced toolbar - Better organized menues in game)
AutoLineColor Redux - Gives differens colors automaticly to all new public transport lines, instead of doing it manually
Less Steam - Reduces unnecessary network traffic with Steam
Loading Screen Mod - speeds up loading and improves memory-usage i.e. better use of computer power!
Mini FPS Booster - increases the frame rate in-game by 5-15%
Mod Compatibility Checker - Helps track down mod incompatibilities.
Game experience
TMPE V11 STABLE - Makes in possible to edit traffic AI and regulations like speed limits, lane usage etc.
Hide TMPE crosswalks V3.0 [BETA] - Hides crosswalks when disabled in TMPE
Network Extensions 2 (Updated for Sunset Harbor) - more road options than in vanilla
Lifecycle Rebalance Revisited 1.1.1 - Does away with "death waves" and makes the gameplay more realistic, including immigration to the city
Realistic Population Revisited 1.1 - This mod changes the numbers of households and jobs in buildings to more accurately reflect real-world values.
Extended game options - A Collection of small handy mods like resource depletion rate, 25 tiles mod or unlock milestones etc.
Top 3 DLC i recommend to start with
After Dark - leisure and Tourist specializations, and bicycles
Snowfall - Winter content, heating and trams
Green cities - better waste management and less pollution
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@Mattias Since the Sunset Harbor patch you don't actually need "Lifecycle Rebalance Revisited 1.1.1" anymore. This patch made extensive changes to the birth and death behaviour whilst introducing the eldercare system. I didn't have any death waves since then.
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Oh, i didn't know this. OTOH the mod does other nice things so i Think i will keep it anyway.
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