SimCity 3k in 4k (2025)

I love this game so much. One of the reasons I started to make a city builder* is because I don't like where the genre is going.

The focus on photorealism in modern city builders took away the apophenia, or "food for imagination" that was a core element since the first SimCity. As a matter of fact, Will Wright used to say that the real simulation runs in the player's minds (or something like that).

Sure, there's something great about Cities Skylines that (at least with very powerful hardware) can look and feel like reality. But at the same time the game engine, in order to make this photorealism of terrain elevations with infinite possible shapes of infrastructure, is so complex that the actual simulation is sloppy, and feels to me like a big downgrade from SC3000.

Traffic, economics, zoning, crime, pollution. are so much practical to simulate (both in the computer, and in our mind models) in this classic isometric style.

* https://microlandia.city

edit: spelling

This was one of my favourite games. City simulators took up an enormous amount of my childhood and I still dream about arcologies. When I see a modern development like Brentwood in Canada's BC or some older ones like along the river in Chicago it reminds me of the wonders we can build.

As an aside since it's in the article, what are other cultures' irreverent targets? e.g. Anglo-cultures seem to casually joke about disasters like he does here about 9/11. Somewhat diminished by the fact that he's British, not American, but Americans do it too, and the American-British interaction involves this and Irish Car Bombs taken rather lightly. I find that curious. Do the Quebecois joke about Opération Satanique and the French have likewise a thing they make fun of the Quebecois for? Or is this an Anglo-culture thing? Obviously, I principally read in English so this might be specific to my language.

SC3K had a masterfully executed advisor system that felt both classy and warm. Ditto its music and art.

Unfortunately for SC4, they proceeded to make all the advisors 3D-rendered Sims. For SC2K, well:

https://www.somethingawful.com/news/simcity-advisors/4/

(that was the least offensive page to link; for the canonical experience start at page 1)

> SimCity 3000 is the best SimCity

I disagree! SimCity 2K FTW. :)

Best balance of complexity IMO and ran pretty well on my old Mac. I'd love a retro-futuristic reboot.

Sim City 3k is my least played Sim City game, but this is inspiring me to take another look. I really like the sweaty micromanagement and bigger scope of 4, but maybe I will prefer 3k's simplicity in my old age.

The picture caption with a 9/11 joke is a little off-putting, but it's at least proof that this isn't AI generated content...

I must also admit to preferring Sim City 3000 over 4. I don't know if I can handle a 4K user interface without a magnifier, however.

SC3K’s art was not “crafted pixel by pixel.” It was rendered from 3DS Max. Maxis released a version of G-Max called the Building Architect Tool that included a template with the same lighting rig that they used for the in-game assets. This tool rendered and exported the various zoom levels and orientations.

Signs that you are old: I saw "in 4k" and thought that it was in 4 kilobytes, not 4k resolution

Call to Vinnie and build the mythical SIM Castle...

I was surprised to see SC3k described as isometric like 2k. I recall versions after 2k being "look anywhere" 3D, but I guess I missed some versions. So many games, like Railroad Tycoon post RRT2 and Worms went full 3D and gameplay was never the same.

I actually keep a Basilisk II System 7.5 Mac environment just so that I can play SC2k from time to time ...

Diablo 1 in 4k - https://i.imgur.com/4ResbPc.jpeg

Loved SimCity growing up.

Would it be possible to automate porting the windows version into a mac or web version? Like giving a long-running agent the task and some tools to check/play the game on both platforms?

Great, and how does that translate if we want to run it 4k in Linux?

Sweeet well done, especially with the audio. I like this patch method much more than the HD Patch I've been using the last few years.

We played SimCity in my shop class at school on olds macs and i like picking it back up every now and then. It still holds up better than most new games.

4K screen resolution, not a 4KB intro.

What A View! Sims Thrilled As Local Landscaping Artist Hosts DIY Expo

I'd love to see to see this game remade and released. I'd buy it in a second.

Another factor was that although both SimCity 3k and SimCity 4 both had a maximum of 256x256 tiles for their cities, the scale was different.

A SimCity 3000 tile edge was equivalent to 64m, whereas in SimCity 4 it was 16m. The scale of the city in SimCity 3000 was bigger as a result.

Hoping to test this principle of largest possible map sizes out soon.

what would be really cool is a first person world generated from simcity maps and you can walk around and go inside buildings etc

I hope GOG makes this all an easy to install mod/patch.

Man, I played the fuck out of this game in my teens, it's in my top 5 best games ever made.

[flagged]

Obnoxious author. Refusing to 'pay twice' for a game they care enough about to go through all this trouble + deeply obnoxious bit about Windows 11 at the end of of the post.