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Cities: Skylines II

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Re: Cities: Skylines II

#161

Post by omnibrain »

0x457 wrote: post #156
_mitterpach wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That was actually one of the announcements made! Seems to be a Sims clone, in the early stages of development. I'm honestly looking forwards to it, rather than spending 1,000$ on Sims 4 on Steam.

Their sims-like game is actually developed by Paradox, so it's guaranteed there will be endless paid DLCs.

On one hand, that’s absolutely true. On the other hand Paradox does a good job in maintaining the base game and constantly supplying it with free new features with every expansion.

Re: Cities: Skylines II

#162

Post by klardotsh »

Terretta wrote: post #94
toasteros wrote: post #20

I have a hard time with freeform city builders like Skylines or SimCity. The amount of unrestrained freedom makes me question why I'm even playing. I have the same issue with The Sims or something like Planet Zoo. That and Skylines giving me a blank canvas paralyses me. How does one plan a city? Where do the roads go? It's the sort of game I want to love, but I just get so overwhelmed by the sheer number of options a…

> The amount of unrestrained freedom makes me question why I'm even playing. After a while, grownups lose what to do with a plastic bucket and shovel at the beach.

Thinking about schools, the workplace, the economic systems we live under, and how many things constantly require action from our brains (vs. free space to imagine), the former three all frequently punishing significant deviation from a given norm, this isn't entirely surprising. Unfortunately I've found it impacts me, too.

Re: Cities: Skylines II

#163

Post by sfcarrot »

satvikpendem wrote: post #83

I find it hilarious that EA had the concept down and just blew their opportunity with Simcity 2013 (always online (which by the way was actually not true, people cracked the online requirement within the first day or so), had to contract with other users for basic services like sewage and electricity), paving the way for competitors like Cities: Skylines to take the lead instead. This reminds me of the same thing tha…

EA is supposed to be pretty happy with its SimCity BuildIt as it is a new way of generating lots of revenue through micro-transactions and makes the balance sheets look better. Meanwhile, players are pretty happy with Paradox's real passion about how to build a better city simulation game. For what it is worth, it is a win-win-win for EA, players, and Paradox Interactive.

Re: Cities: Skylines II

#165

Post by MrGilbert »

lamontcg wrote: post #140
doctor_eval wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s true that every building needs to be on a street but it is nevertheless possible to build substantial pedestrian architecture. I’ve spent many happy hours building pedestrian infrastructure and encouraging my peeps to walk and catch the subway.

And if you don't want your cities to die from traffic congestion you need to make it all walkable with good public transportation. I can get much further through the middle game by focusing from the start on not building all kinds of roads. I used to run a big highway down the middle of my city thinking that was the right way to do it, but you're vastly better off not doing that, because if you build that road, they'…

CPP is really great. Recently discovered, and I'm binge-watching through all his content. I love the stories he's telling, plus the insides he gives as being an actual city planner.

Re: Cities: Skylines II

#166

Post by MrGilbert »

Terretta wrote: post #94
toasteros wrote: post #20

I have a hard time with freeform city builders like Skylines or SimCity. The amount of unrestrained freedom makes me question why I'm even playing. I have the same issue with The Sims or something like Planet Zoo. That and Skylines giving me a blank canvas paralyses me. How does one plan a city? Where do the roads go? It's the sort of game I want to love, but I just get so overwhelmed by the sheer number of options a…

> The amount of unrestrained freedom makes me question why I'm even playing. After a while, grownups lose what to do with a plastic bucket and shovel at the beach.

That's why I love my job as a software engineer: I never unlearned to create something out of nothing.

Re: Cities: Skylines II

#167

Post by govg »

ajkjk wrote: post #113
izacus wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I also hope that they'll let us build more "european" cities that aren't so horribly car centric and are more diverse. Hopefully we also get a bit more diversity of gameplay - Skylines got pretty repetitive quickly with only challenge being traffic optimization. The new DLCs didn't really add that much to gameplay except different things to paint between roads. I hope things like universities, industry, agriculture,…

The game desperately needs a 'campaign', similar to (but hopefully richer than) what the Roller Coaster Tycoon series had, just to give some structure to repeated gameplay.

There are scenarios[1] in the game, from my experience that is very similar to what RCT used to have. You're given a map and a point in time where the map has certain issues, and you have to solve them. The issue is that they are gated by DLC, so not all players can experience it. Also they aren't really deep and don't have too much re-playability.

[1] : https://skylines.paradoxwikis.com/Scenarios

Re: Cities: Skylines II

#168

Post by potatolicious »

izacus wrote: post #34
dcchambers wrote: post #14

I have put many hours into Cities Skylines and I am really looking forward to this. The obvious thing people will want them to fix is traffic and vehicle pathfinding, put personally I hope they let us build more pedestrian-focused streets. I so desperately want to build walk and bike friendly cities with beautiful pedestrian malls and walking-only streets but the game kind of forces you to build out extensive car inf…

I also hope that they'll let us build more "european" cities that aren't so horribly car centric and are more diverse. Hopefully we also get a bit more diversity of gameplay - Skylines got pretty repetitive quickly with only challenge being traffic optimization. The new DLCs didn't really add that much to gameplay except different things to paint between roads. I hope things like universities, industry, agriculture,…

If they don't give us mixed-use zoning I'm going to tableflip, so here's hoping. I dislike how Western-centric the concept of zoning is - in most of the world having a grocery store at the bottom of a building is normal!

Likewise I wish they would model the amenity effect of businesses. Commercial zones in C:S are only about employment, but IMO having good amenities near residences is a huge influencer of QoL and should be modeled.

In fact I would love to see zoning become a more full-fledged game mechanic - balancing the amenity effects of mixing business with residential with the nuisance drawbacks.

Likewise the idea that you had to start every city with a huge freeway is a bit of a turnoff. Give me a start with a train station! I want to make a beach town that's primarily accessed by train!

Re: Cities: Skylines II

#169

Post by andybak »

potatolicious wrote: post #168
izacus wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I also hope that they'll let us build more "european" cities that aren't so horribly car centric and are more diverse. Hopefully we also get a bit more diversity of gameplay - Skylines got pretty repetitive quickly with only challenge being traffic optimization. The new DLCs didn't really add that much to gameplay except different things to paint between roads. I hope things like universities, industry, agriculture,…

If they don't give us mixed-use zoning I'm going to tableflip, so here's hoping. I dislike how Western-centric the concept of zoning is - in most of the world having a grocery store at the bottom of a building is normal! Likewise I wish they would model the amenity effect of businesses. Commercial zones in C:S are only about employment, but IMO having good amenities near residences is a huge influencer of QoL and sho…

> Western-centric

Don't you mean US-centric? I don't recall a UK city where there wasn't a grocery store within a 10 minute walk of everywhere and I don't recall visiting a city in Europe that wasn't pretty much the same.

Re: Cities: Skylines II

#170

Post by munk-a »

omnibrain wrote: post #161
0x457 wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Their sims-like game is actually developed by Paradox, so it's guaranteed there will be endless paid DLCs.

On one hand, that’s absolutely true. On the other hand Paradox does a good job in maintaining the base game and constantly supplying it with free new features with every expansion.

I am extremely optimistic looking at the CK3 DLCs though - they're closer to the early CK2 expansions that massively rehaul large portions of the game mechanics. I'm not certain if they're fully committed to that direction but it certainly feels better to look at those sorts of expansions than, say, HoI4 or some of the EU4 expansions which are generally just regional flavor packs.

I think they're not enamored of their reputation for crap shoveling and are making a concerted effort to deliver more value with their overhauls and that's why I've never really viewed them the same as skin-pushers like Roblox, CS:GO, The Sims or Fortnite.

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