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Cities: Skylines II

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Re: Cities: Skylines II

#221

Post by eps »

rishav_sharan wrote: post #211
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…

> He's made over $300 million in revenue so far and might be the first solo game dev (or even regular software dev) to hit $1 billion in the course of the game's existence. That would be Notch, who made Minecraft

As of May last year Stardew Valley sold over 20 mil copies, so 300 mil sounds about right. As staggerring as it is.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stardew_Valley#Sales

Re: Cities: Skylines II

#222

Post by pavlov »

calsy wrote: post #208
jhanschoo wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The post you are responding to isn't claiming that > the entire industry up until this point has been going about it wrong? but it sometimes goes about it wrong. > Capitalism on its own isn’t __always enough__ to ensure that successful products get built. You are building up a strawman and attacking it with very hostile language. I would also disagree with your assumption that governments are inefficient, as there ar…

Yes it does say exactly that. EA is not an isolated company afflicted with capitalism. When you say a companies failures are due to capitalist greed, that means something. You are blaming the fundamental economic principles that the majority of publishers (and western businesses) operate on. Words like greed imply there is an inherent evil or 'sin' in capitalism that corrupts, and EA has somehow become its victim. In…

That’s a completely incorrect interpretation of what I wrote.

EA destroyed a valuable brand by managerial greed. That’s a fact. Another company got funded by public means when capitalist institutions didn’t want to give them the time of day, and is now a successful business. That’s another fact.

I didn’t say anything about an inherent evil or sin. If you believe capitalism always executes perfectly and is beyond criticism, that’s your ideological position. You may be projecting this expectation of ideology onto others.

Re: Cities: Skylines II

#223

Post by pavlov »

fy20 wrote: post #215
pavlov wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I posted this earlier [1] but it’s an interesting little twist to this story… While EA was busy destroying the SimCity brand with unadulterated capitalist greed, Cities: Skylines was created with public funding from the Finnish government. No VCs wanted to invest in such a niche company. They were only able to get off the ground thanks to money from Finland’s public startup funding and arts grants. Capitalism on its…

This is somewhat out of context. Colosal Order developed two niche games before C:S; a transport simulator series called Cities in Motion. They received government funding before the first game was released. Many European countries have grants, tax cuts or loans for new businesses, so it's not anything unusual. CiM 2 is a really good game, and very beautiful (which I guess is how they got the idea to build C:S). The…

> “…it's not anything unusual.”

I would argue it’s actually unusual on HN to hear such an origin story for a successful business. Everybody has heard a hundred versions of the VC-funded twenty-something boy genius and also the bootstrapped hustler… But the story where your seed funding comes from government grants in a small European country doesn’t align with that kind of hero founder narratives.

Personally I got started in the software business with a Finnish government loan too, and I’m grateful for it. So I wanted to highlight that this actually happens and leads to products that people want.

Re: Cities: Skylines II

#225

Post by brailsafe »

Oh shit, it's real this time. If they expect me to get a 4090 for those reflections though, pass.

All joking a salad, probably all the very common constraints should be addressed, but I'd be stoked on an online component like SimCity 2000 Network edition. I'm not so into the idea of a pure sandbox anymore. They've had one of the longest beta testing cycles ever with that first version though, I'm hopeful.

One thing I was never fully able to explore, was the idea of taking a kind of broken city, and exploring ways to improve it given real constraints. I think a lot of people hate their hometowns, and would love to just start with that somehow.

Fwiw I do know about importing terrain maps and so on, which is cool, but it's still a sandbox. I like the idea of starting like 100 years into a city that's just been broke and struggling, with terrible infrastructure and lott of complaints.

Re: Cities: Skylines II

#226

Post by mcv »

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…

It would be great if a game like that was such an accurate city simulation that you could use it to experiment with different kinds of infrastructure and draw conclusions from that. I'm probably asking way too much, but it would be awesome if possible.

Re: Cities: Skylines II

#227

Post by mcv »

andybak wrote: post #169
potatolicious wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

It's very common for Dutch shops to have apartments above them. Sometimes it's where the shop owner lives, sometimes not. Many modern shopping malls include a lot of residential space of some sort. Many neighbourhoods have corner shops.

Another interesting thing that these games don't support is reusing existing buildings for a different purpose. Former industrial or dock areas are always popular places to turn into expensive housing or shopping areas.

Re: Cities: Skylines II

#228

Post by jokoon »

I don't really this game because there is no real granularity: the amount of citizens is simulated up to a certain amount, and above that amount, the game just increment numbers that don't mean anything.

I prefer games like factorio or microtown for example, where every object exist in the game, and is not just a statistic.

Re: Cities: Skylines II

#229

Post by mcv »

throw0101c wrote: post #149
samtp wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is using your legs in an urban area political?

> How is using your legs in an urban area political? Since you asked, "Conspiracy Theorists Think Walkable Cities Are Really Open-Air Prison Dystopias Now": * https://www.vice.com/en/article/m7g898/walkable-15-minute-ci... "Conspiracy Theorists Are Coming for the 15-Minute City" * https://www.wired.co.uk/article/15-minute-cities-conspiracy-...

Yeah, after all the insane conspiracy theories of the past couple of years, I thought conspiracies had peaked. But no, this one takes the cake. Apparently everything that helps people and makes life a bit nicer is inherently suspect and evil. Only if we suffer in mindless dystopia can we be truly free, or something.

Re: Cities: Skylines II

#230

Post by rags2riches »

fy20 wrote: post #215
pavlov wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I posted this earlier [1] but it’s an interesting little twist to this story… While EA was busy destroying the SimCity brand with unadulterated capitalist greed, Cities: Skylines was created with public funding from the Finnish government. No VCs wanted to invest in such a niche company. They were only able to get off the ground thanks to money from Finland’s public startup funding and arts grants. Capitalism on its…

This is somewhat out of context. Colosal Order developed two niche games before C:S; a transport simulator series called Cities in Motion. They received government funding before the first game was released. Many European countries have grants, tax cuts or loans for new businesses, so it's not anything unusual. CiM 2 is a really good game, and very beautiful (which I guess is how they got the idea to build C:S). The…

I liked Cities in Motion. But like many other games like it, the joy dies when the UI can't keep up with the growing complexity as I build. Things that were easy in the beginning become a chore later on. That's when I give up and move on.
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