As you are zoomed in on a particular street corner, you may notice a thief grabbing a woman's purse-and, depending on your police coverage, he may or may not be stopped. Rather than being used as a random distraction or minigame within a city management frame, they are instead intended to be fun, visual indicators of how your city is progressing. Though the game is clearly designed around culture and society, the Sim citizens themselves aren't focused on those games as much as one might expect. Creating buildings came off as straightforward enough to not intimidate newcomers to the series, while maximizing their attributes seemed to provide enough depth for efficiency experts to play with. A pawn shop has a 5% chance to create a criminal, whereas an indie label or a cinemaplex might attract or create celebrities. A strip mall can be upgraded to sell cell phones, which make Sims happy for six days. For instance, the "Think Tank" building boosts the "societal energy" of corporate buildings within a certain radius, increasing their productivity.
#Simtown demo full
The cityscape was large enough for a couple hundred buildings, and after zooming out to view the full countryside, it seemed more like a normal SimCity title than I had expected.īuildings have attributes which both affect other buildings and directly impact the Sim citizens. Each structure sits on a fairly large plot of land, which gives the game a slightly more intimate feel, though not in a simplistic SimTown way. A menu of hundreds of individual buildings takes its place. Gone is the zoning and building evolution therein. Make no mistake, however-Societies makes a few significant changes to the established SimCity formula. A news ticker scrolls across the bottom of the screen updating you on urban developments, and disasters will be back causing frustratingly random-or intentionally hilarious-destruction, although none are in the game at this point. City logistics return, and dozens of power plants and other such mechanics are still required. As it turns out, the game is not so much evolutionarily stunted as it is more accessible the city management isn't less detailed than in previous SimCity games-just less traditional.Ĭity building is still the name of the game here, literally and figuratively. With that image in mind, I still managed to walk away from my Societies demonstration in an optimistic mood.
![simtown demo simtown demo](https://i.redd.it/9m9xrqm7o3531.jpg)
After all, I reported on the nightmare that was SimCity Societies' announcement- a story that stirred a bowl of shit to the point of puree, with die-hard City fans calling for blood in a matter of minutes.
![simtown demo simtown demo](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/Xld0sioJU14/maxresdefault.jpg)
Walking up to the guys from Societies developer Tilted Mill, I felt a little guilty.