Some parts of the future are stuck in the past, but it’s strikingly well-balanced, providing solutions for existing problems and new toys to tinker with that counteract each other nicely.
It may be overpriced, and while the advertising ****, plus no one asked for a future expansion but it is totally worth it. While you may not be able to build out, you now build up with megatowers. There may be a few bugs such as money fluctuations (Go from -$9000 an hour to +9000 and hour) and there only being one type of car, its nothing that cant be patched. But if you choose to get it, be sure to have 100's of kgal of water excess because megatowers are quite needy.
I've played Simcity since release through the ups and downs. Simcity got better over time, is playable, and fun to play. The expansion; Cities of Tomorrow adds a lot fo the game. First off the mega towers are awesome. You can add residents, offices, malls, parks, a school, and other things. Commuters come and go from the tower which is fun to watch. There are some bugs or confusion on different aspects of the towers, but nothing game breaking. The graphics got a nice upgrade. You can even carry the new monorail looking thing (train tracks above the ground) to non COT cities if you own the expansion by buying control net from your COT cities. They really did a good job with this expansion.
For all the ways in which aims to take SimCity into the future, it remains tethered firmly to its past. Due to the peculiarities of its simulation, Origin's temperamental connection, and ultimately its own mechanical shallowness, Cities of Tomorrow is unlikely to make converts of those already driven out of town.
The gorgeous sci-fi burgs in Cities of Tomorrow prove that beauty only runs skin-deep. Once you get bored with the neon-clad gimmicks of the MegaTowers and OmegaCo, you're left with pretty much the same flawed game that annoyed the city-building community last spring.
After putting 120 hours into the "Vanilla" Simcity, I must say this expansion is the fo sho. After a fascinating and informative cutscene that cleverly explains the new features clearly, (AND IS ALWAYS SKIPPABLE, not sure why GwionBach provides that misinformation) I was ingame creating "New Vegas" with zero server instability whatsover. NO VANILLA NIGHTMARES haha!
With a fresh city, you'll quickly discover the futuristic parks transform all nearby territory including buildings and roads, making them look neon and sweet. Maxis once again did a stellar job with the futuristic art concepts and graphics. Updates abound and traffic is less of a problem, your sims seem to sleep at night, leaving the roads available for whatever service trucks you having running around.
The expansion feels more mission and morality based this time around, greed is actually technologically advantageous and fuels your cities with profit, but at some insidious costs later on. Green technology is the other avenue you're invited to explore, but at the burdon of being expensive and timely to research. Play this Yin/Yang correctly and the possibility is there to create a sim Utopia. Worth mentioning is this expansions feels MORE DIFFICULT, I've failed my first few cities so far on the desert-schemed Desolation map, but am still hopeful because of regional benefits of the failed cities!
The mega-towers are sweet, you can customize them to suite your current sim needs. All the futuristic upgrades are satisfying always with that Maxis charm since playing SimCity on the Super Nintendo.
Awesome graphics, enhanced futuristic sound track, smart and applicable future concepts, stable servers, and a more cerebral experience overall, this game is worth the money, and forces you to think strategically, and resourcefully. Good luck.
Great for playing with my 8 year old daughter but I can see why the grown up simmers are disappointed its a sandbox just one for kids. Would be nice if they weren't trying to gouge so much on the DLC as well
I thought this was a good expansion that added some real depth to the simulation of the city and delivered some of that original SimCity trial-and-error experience. On the surface you would be forgiven for thinking the additions were just cosmetic, but in fact they add new dimensions to building up your city and are somewhat interdependent. Transitioning my vanilla city to megatowers was not as easy as I thought it would be and there were some precarious moments where my economy went into a freefall deathspiral requiring quick intervention. You have to carefully plan your towers because once you have built a level you cannot change it unless you demolish all the levels above it, and you are limited to 8 megatowers with 8 levels each on a given map. There are lots of choices as to what you can put in a megatower which gets you thinking in a new dimension other than planning zones.
At the same time you can convert your industry to OmegaCo, however this requires expensive Oil, Ore and Processors to keep running, and unless you have a strong industry a venture into this project can quickly sink your city but the potential profits make you want to try nonetheless.
The Academy gives you a good reason to have wealthy residents (which you could almost make do without before), as you need them to keep your ControlNet running and you can unlock lots of research projects that improve the things you can do with Omega and Megatowers.
The downside to all this is that before you really had to think about what the 'character' of your city was going to be. Was it going to be an industry-heavy city, or a research city or just a suburb for the wealthy, whereas now your city wants to be all those things. Sure you can have your cake and you can eat it, but the problem is that once you have built your first super-city of the future you are unlikely going to want to do it all over again just to get the same outcome.
Overall this does what an expansion pack should do, it will bring you back to the game for a while and breathe some new life into it. Unfortunately the patient is still frail, and I doubt I will still be playing this in two weeks.
I am sorry but E.A. has ruined one of my FAVORITE games of all time. I cannot believe they continue to get away with the sheer disregard for producing quality games. PLEASE people do not support this game. If had the pleasure of playing SimCity when Maxis and Will were in charge you will feel the same way too. I love all the simcites prior to Socieities and Simicty 5. They ruined the Sims. To them its more about money than it is having people enjoy a good quality game. We love simcity for the sheer enjoyment of allowing our imaginations and design run wild. Well they nerfed that in this game. I would play Cities XL over this and Cities XL is riddled with bugs!!
Looking at this on its own there are some interesting new additions to play with. The mega towers look very cool and a futuristic city adds some nice variety from the normal plain building aesthetics. However there is simply not enough new content or any real changes to the game to warrant a $30 price tag in my opinion. If they had increased city sizes or taken out the DRM then maybe it would be more worthwhile. As it stand this is just a glorified DLC pack that only highlights the problems with such small cites spaces. Save your cash and wait for a sale.
SummaryBrace yourself for an all-new type of disaster only fitting a technologically-advanced economy: a giant robot attack on your city. Unlock two new city specializations that allow you to build a resource-hungry mega corporation powered by a low-wealth workforce, or an urban utopia that develops clean technology and is controlled by the ric...