Sim City 4: the Micromicromanagement game from hell

Hello Gamers!

I’m sure we’ve all at least heard of The Sims games, and today is the day I talk about one of the best and worst games ever: Sim City 4

I absolutely love this game for about an hour, and when my city becomes too big, I hate it.

It is a game for those of us who have never played it where you plot out areas for residential development, industrial parks, and business sectors. You then can plot out utilities, hospitals, fire and police stations, schools, libraries, basically everything your city needs to be a city.

You then wait for people to build houses, get jobs, go to work, and finally complain about absolutely everything.

I used to plot out everything before people got started building, but I’ve learned a trick: Don’t give them anything until they ask for it.

This way you avoid prematurely planning out every detail about your city, and you look like a decent mayor for it.

You can also create airports and seaports although it never seems like they bring in that much business.

It only takes about four or five in game months before your city is thriving and flourishing on its own.  I usually get around 1,000 people in my city before they begin to complain about things.

If you do follow my strategy of waiting, then you should be able to compensate for the demands of the people before they get too aufgepissed.

Once you have your city developed, you need to start planning cities in other plots of land to connect to your city of choice; otherwise you will fail…utterly.

This part of the game I found very realistic, and as a realist I liked it, but as the idiot I am I could not find a way to correctly hook up two cities. Sure I knew how to extend roads and railways, but nobody ever used them… I was really sad.

Once in a while I will pick the game back up, and try to perfect my strategy, but realistically it’s a crap shoot. I get on, play for about a day (irl) and then I leave from boredom.

So, when you’re mayor I recommend you listen to your council of advisors as best you can, otherwise your city… does something, I just don’t know what.

In fact, I don’t think the city does anything except lower your popularity, which might get you thrown out I don’t know.

Anyways it’s still a really good game, and I suggest that if your life needs some more micromicromanagement (you read me right), than this is the game for you!

See ya next time Gamers!

Resistance is Futile

Word Count: 451

Sandbox 2

Hello Gamers!

I have to tell you all something fantastic!

Universe Sandbox2 (written as Sandbox squared) has a teaser trailer out on its homepage!!!!!

If you haven’t seen it yet watch it now! Are you back? Awesome, right?

The graphics are magnificent in my opinion, the music (if it will be in the game, which I think would be a great improvement on the first game) is gorgeous, and I know I will be buying it whenever I get on Steam next. 

It looks like we will be getting new planets to tinker around with, new planetary features to play with, namely the asteroids hitting earth AND THE Earth exploding!? This game looks well worth the wait and I am psyched out for it!

It looks like in the video, at the end we get to see the moon being formed around the Earth, which brings up questions in my head like “Is it a simulation that you can just watch, or is it that you can create planets a WAY cooler way now?” That of course is just one of many questions I have about the game, and I’m sure you have some too.

On its homepage it also has some brief examples of what’s new about it.

Some new items include the ability to smash bodies together at various speeds (I assume this is just an upgrade to the old system, as you could do this before as well). It also is introducing a Climate factor to planets, as seen in the video I assume you can now adjust temperatures of planets on your own, without moving the planet’s orbit distance. Terraforming is also new, and perhaps my favorite addition to your toolbox of awesome. Terraforming means changing the atmosphere of a planet, and it’s surface, and if Man of Steel taught us anything, it can be cool and dangerous at the same time- what more can we ask for?

You can also throw asteroids at planets (again, it’s not anything new), but the damage system appears to be new.  

There are many new features to Sandbox 2, and when I get the game and play through it a bit I’ll report back with my review.

Resistance is Futile

Word Count: 374

GTA V IS HERE!!!!!

Hello Gamers!

Today I’d like to announce something that I've been waiting for, for a long time now.

Steam is now offering GTA: V for pre- order, for $59.99 that includes one million in game cash, and three hundred dollars in online community gameplay. This will be available through the first of February, and I’d suggest if you haven’t already gotten it for various other console, and that is, you like the idea of a computer playing GTA: V.

I’m seriously considering buying the game, as I like to mess around in games like that. I’ve always found those games had a sense of freedom I couldn’t get from other games. I think that sense of freedom comes from the game’s sandbox quality – you can do anything you can imagine.

 Now, I know you might be wondering “Leif, why don’t you just play more Minecraft, or UniverseSandbox?” Well, the truth is those games are very fun, and are jam packed with freedom (so much so they could be the next symbols of freedom if we ever tire of the Bald Eagle), but they don’t have the kind of silly freedom I like. Silly freedom to me is like (how Nerdcubed describes jumping in front of cars) Carkour, or jumping out of a helicopter into another one, or stealing a plane just to smash it into other planes and so on and so on.

Games like Universe Sandbox and Minecraft are great, but with GTA: V there is so many other things to do. For example, you can’t do much in Minecraft except build, mine, destroy, hunt, kill, and hike. And in Sandbox, all you can really do is smash planets together, which I tell you does get old if not left alone for a while.

GTA five will allow me to do all of those things (except mine and build) but do them with weapons and have chases. And it will let me escape from the monotony of car chases with no real thrill of being killed (as in Need for Speed your driver is a God).

Need for Speed: Most wanted showed me the thrill of a good chase, cop cars coming after ya, but there was always a sense of restriction in those chases. I think adding weapons might just solve the problem I had.

I’m not sure if I want the game yet, but at least I have some time to think it over, and I hope that I’ve informed those of you who have not been on steam, or simply not heard of it from your friends.

Enjoy GTA: V for the computer

Resistance is Futile

Word Count: 444