SimCity 3000
Company: Maxis/Electronic Arts
Estimated Price: $49.95
http://www.simcity.com

SimCity, first released in 1989, is believed by many to be the greatest simulation game of all time. Revised as SimCity 2000 in 1993, sales eventually exceeded an incredible 5 million copies to devoted fans worldwide. With a customer base like that, it's easy to see how 1998's announcement of an even better version was anticipated by some of its fans with jubilation; the game that gave them complete charge of the fate of a virtual city was going to get a healthy boost of realism, detail, and control.

Unfortunately, for almost a year now, the only people cheering about SimCity 3000 have been PC users. Now, with the release of the Mac version, Maxis has shown a renewed commitment to Macintosh development, and Mac users have been introduced to the new king of simulation games, SimCity 3000.

Background
The third incarnation of SimCity is still based around the same principles and fundamentals as the original SimCity. You are the mayor of a city, and your job is to make the city grow and flourish. The ride is not an easy one, however. Along the road you will have to keep up with the demands of your sims, in categories such as education, transportation, and utilities, all while maintaining a balanced budget.

Improvements
What makes SimCity 3000 different from its predecessor is the interesting way it draws players into the game. The user interface has been completely redesigned to be more intuitive and now features buttons that group options together, thus making it much easier to build what you want. For example, under the transportation button, you can build roads, highways, rail, subways, and more (see following screenshot).

It's now also easier to monitor what is happening within your city. The newspaper has been replaced by a news ticker, and new advisors and petitioners give a whole new meaning to "hot under the collar." If you're not doing something right, they'll let you know! You can now select a building map up to four times as large as SimCity 2000, and new zoning options, business deals, and disasters make the gameplay all the more involved. Additionally, one of my favorite improvements is the ability to fully interact with your neighboring cities, connecting water and power as well as roads and rail to them. Once connections are made, you can buy and/or sell water, power, or even garbage to neighboring cities. As I quickly found, it's a great way to make some extra money!

Undoubtedly the most significant improvements, however, are the new close-in zoom levels and awesome graphics and sound effects. All of the buildings are 3-D rendered, and the map now offers full rotation (unlike SimCity 2000 where this was "faked"). SimCity 3000 includes 5 zooming levels, allowing you to see individual sims and their vehicles traveling around the city. As you can see in the screenshot below, the detail of the zooms is incredible!

The new 3-D sound engine is equally impressive. It reflects the type and condition of the part of the city you're viewing. For example, if you're in a residential zone, you'll hear birds singing and children playing, while in industrial zones you may hear the sounds of chemical manufacturing and other types of blue-collar jobs.

Making the transition
Switching from an earlier incarnation to the updated version is hard with any computer program. Fortunately, Maxis has done everything they can to make the switch to SimCity 3000 as seamless as possible. They have included a great tutorial especially for SimCity 2000 players, noting the differences and improvements. They have also given players the ability to import their SimCity 2000 cities into the new version, all while retaining the majority of its infrastructure. The imports of a few of my SimCity 2000 cities went well, yet all of them still needed some touching up and adjusting to life in 3000.

Ported
My one and only complaint with SimCity 3000 is that it was ported directly from the Windows 9x platform, with no thought given to adjustments that need to be made for the Macintosh. From the very start the crudeness of the port shows because of the Windows mouse pointer! That's right: it's a big, all white pointer, not the black pointer we have all grown to love. All of the game's dialog and information boxes take on a very Windows 9x feel, and pressing the Return key for the default option does not work in most of the windows. Even scrolling around your city without the keyboard is now only accomplished by depressing the Control key while holding down the mouse button, the equivalent of a Windows 9x "right-click." Fortunately, Maxis has included a host of hot key combinations which make navigating around SimCity 3000's new interface much easier.

Requirements/Availability
SimCity 3000 includes dramatic improvements, and with those improvements come steep system requirements. The list of minimum requirements requested a 200MHz PowerPC (G3 recommended), 32MB RAM (64MB recommended), 128MB RAM with Virtual Memory enabled, and 260MB of hard disk drive space.

My system exceeds the recommended requirements, so I figured it would stack up nicely. I have a 250MHz PowerPC G3 processor, 192MB real RAM, and a 10GB hard disk. The city pictured in the screenshots, called "Second to None," is the city I created for this review. It is now almost halfway developed, and has a population of just under 500,000 sims. While the gameplay is not sluggish, it could be much better, especially considering my system configuration exceeds the recommended requirements. A bit of advice: If you really want to upgrade to SimCity 3000, make sure you have the system to handle it!

SimCity 3000 is available immediately at the price of $49.95, and can be ordered direct from the EA store, at http://www.eastore.ea.com. Additionally, the SimCity web site, at http://www.simcity.com includes tips, tricks, and other features to maximize your SimCity 3000 experience, and features a city exchange section, amongst others.

The Summary
SimCity 3000 is a vast improvement over its predecessor. Its new zooming levels, advisors, and simulation elements give you a whole new sense of reality, and its interface and navigation improvements make managing your masterpiece a whole lot easer. Unfortunately, with these vast improvements come steep system requirements, and if your system is not up to par, the game will cause you more headaches than fun.

However, if you have a G3 and a good chunk of RAM, the upgrade to SimCity 3000 is a must. Despite the less-than-stellar port from the PC platform, new users and old veterans alike will agree: nothing matches the reality and detail that SimCity 3000 brings. Now, thanks to Maxis, SimCity 3000 brings this reality to your Macintosh. The thrill that such an in-depth simulation game provides is the reason I Recommend SimCity 3000 for Macintosh users with adequate systems.

MacMice Rating: 3

Adam Karneboge
webmaster@mymac.com