Product Details
 | The SimCity Box |
| List Price: | $19.99 |
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Product Description
Immerse yourself in creativity with this massive collection of SimCity games. Choose each individual structure from chicken coops to beauty salons to billboards as you create a truly unique city with SimCity Societies. Then add a thriving tourist industry with the SimCity Societies Destinations expansion pack. Strategically balance demand, construction, and your budget with SimCity 4 Deluxe (SimCity 4 and Rush Hour) to shape the development of your metropolis, small town, or industrial city. Then try your hand at SnapCity where you can play through the goals of 25 cities in Story Mode or indulge your city-building creativity in open-ended Sandbox mode. With so many ways to build the cities of your dreams, the sky is truly the limit!Product Details
- Amazon Sales Rank: #3549 in Video Games
- Brand: Electronic Arts
- Released on: 2008-06-23
- ESRB Rating: Teen
- Platforms: Windows 98, Windows 2000, Windows XP
- Format: DVD-ROM
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 1.25" h x 5.50" w x 7.50" l, .48 pounds
Features
- Five amazing games, countless incredible cities to build
- SimCity Societies and one Expansion
- SimCity 4 and one Expansion
- Snap City
- Bonus! Spore Creature Creator, Trial Version
Customer Reviews
Nice try but not good. I prefer Cities XL! It's what SimcitySocieties lacks.
Very interesting what EA has
done. For the first time that I recall, a expansion pack is not offered
on its own and in a separate box. EA would never do this with The SIMS2.
In this case, EA either lets you digitally download Simcity Socieities:
Destinations or you can buy it in the new Simcity Box. Now granted you
would think that The Simcity Box would include all the Simcity games
from the original to the present one; Simcity Socieites (along with the
expansion). This is not the case. Those people who already own Simcity
Societies will have to either digitally download Destinations or buy Th
Simcity Box. For those people who don't own Simcity 4000 and its
expansion, Rush Hour, this is a great deal. You got to wonder what EA
was thinking.
In the Simcity Box you get Simcity Societies, its
expansion Destinations, Simcity 4 and its expansion Rush Hour,
SimCarnival: SnapCity, and the trial version of Spore creator creator.
All for $[...]. As I said before, if you don't own Simcity 4 and Simcity
Socieites, this is a great deal. If you do, then it's best that you get
the digital download version of Simcity Societies: Destinations on EA's
website. Strangely it's $[...] which is a pretty hefty price for a
expansion ($[...] less than the Simcity Box). Those who don't trust the
digital download will buy this. So people will just pay the extra $[...]
and buy the Simcity Box. Still, not a lot of choices given by EA.
In
the Simcity Box, the highlight is Simcity Socieities: Destinations
which is the first expansion for the new series; Simcity Socieites.
Remember that Tilted Mill had thrown out everything that was built from
Simcity (the original) to Simcity 4 and its expansion Rush Hour. Very
bold move. Unfortunately, Simcity Societies angered a lot of people and
Simcity diehards were very ticked off. Casual gamers liked it as well as
others. In Destinations, it includes all of the updates (total of 5)
that tried to increase the playability and fix the bugs. The overall
meaning of Destinations was to create a vacation destinatation. This I
thought was very intriguing. It was unique and would certainly help
Simcity Societies to try to win back the Simcity Franchise diehards and
try something new. Tilted Mill certainly tried something new at the
beginning.
In Destinations more scenarios were added (although
not many) ranging in difficulty. You were charged to create either a
small vacation destination to a huge Las Vegas type of vacation
megaplex. If you choose not to play a scenario you can either play in a
sandbox mode where you are free to create and have everything unlocked,
to a strategy mode where you have to be mindful of your building costs,
maintenance, and unhappy sims which can create havoc on both your city
and funds. The strategy mode was an update after Simcity Socieites
shipped, so if you gave up on Simcity Socieities you missed the update.
However it is included on Destinations. As I stated before, all the
updates are included within the expansion Destinations. If you don't
want to play in strategic mode, you can choose the difficulty, what type
of land you want and how it might look (look at the preview screen). Do
you want a desert, tropical, tropical coast land area? You also can
pick up to three special landmarks that can have an effect on your
tourism which also would effect your city coffers. Cha-ching! Cha-ching!
Your main task in Destinations is to create a destination worthy that
will attract SimVacationers. Will you build a beach resort? Las Vegas
type of vacation spot? Will it have casinos? Minigolf? Motels? Shops?
Tents for camping grounds? If you have accomodations for your tourists,
you must have venues which are split up into adventure, dining,
entertainment, gaming, leisure, and worship. Which kind of tourist do
you want to attract? Can you satisfy all of them?The expansion adds
taxistops, bustops, subways, airports, and seaports. Remember, how are
your tourists going to get to your vacation spot? This is an exciting
new perspective within Simcity Societies and brings in some much needed
new content. Now for the bad:
Frustrating! Unfortunately, none of
the bugs were fixed. The different socitiet values can be too much and
it's very vague concerning their importance or why there are here in the
first place. I've mixed a few including, spiritual, authortarian, and
productivity; nothing happened either in a bad or good way. In other
words, what's the point? The graphics of the buildings were nice. Yes,
they produce that, or help this, but so what. Again what's the point. If
I placed a few buildings that put me in the red, then I just added
buildings that add value until I was in the green. In City Life, some of
the social values couldn't live near each other. The game gets very
slow when you build up your city. The graphics are very nice however,
when the sims cross the street, they turn into invisible lines and
reappear when they reach the other side....very wierd! The manual
included within the Simcity Box on Destinations is not good in
explaining all the new ideas and added goodies within it. The
frustration factor is still present even when you want to create a
vacation destination. A tutorial would of been nice for Destinations.
There is none. The only tutorial that is present is the one for Simcity
Socieites and even that one is very incomplete, vague, and not as
helpful as Simcity 4 and Simcty 4: Rush Hour was. I wish that there was a
type of helper that can guide you to help you move along and give you
pointers. **WHEN YOU START A NEW CITY, IT'S LIKE YOU'RE ON YOUR OWN AND
GOOD LUCK, which I think a lot of people will feel when playing this
game. In Simcity4 you had the advisors. While they weren't a great help,
they had decent advice. It would be nice to create parking lots,
parking structures, malls, shopping centers, putting in parking meters
(for revenue and the addition of a new character in your city- the
always warmly greeted ticket agent---cough cough :-) It would be nice to
walk or drive around your city either as a civilian, a police officer, a
fireman, a mailman, or a tourist. If you walk around as the mayor, will
you be greeted with handshakes or tomatoes? One thing I really miss is
what I enjoyed in Simcity 4: Rush Hour concerning building up your
transportation network. I would of loved to be able to have an effect on
traffic control either directing traffic if there was an accident,
power outage, or construction, and/or creating traffic flow using the
traffic signals. The one thing I hated in Simcity 4: Rush Hour was how
bland the traffic signals were and at times it looked like cars were
stopping at a red light while others didn't. Controlling traffic would
be an awesome feature. It would be nice to be able to place stop signs,
street signs, signs in general, traffic lights (single or multiple), and
turn signals. I also miss one-way streets as well as avenues. It would
be refreshing to see your police keeping the peace and pulling over cars
that are not following the traffic and parking rules. I would be nice
to see cars parking, and entering and exiting driveways and parking lots
and/or parking on the street. How about the possibility of you being
voted out as mayor? Will the city council loose faith in you? Does
Parliament give you the boot? Are you being investigated for taking
bribes and/or kickbacks? Will the people keep you in office? If you are
booted, you can become the new mayor but you have to change your
policies and try a different root. If you get booted again, game over!
How about a weather and natural disaster engine that is random.
Earthquakes, severe thunderstorms, hurricanes, and tornadoes that can
hurt and destroy; forcing you to send out the police to keep the peace,
fire engines to stop the fires, rescue vehicles to tend to the injured
or killed, and then set out to rebuild. I would of loved to have more
city policies (Simcity 4 had more).
There were some good things
within the new expansion but the game still is frustrating and still
needs quite a bit more content and bug fixes. Then, just maybe all will
be forgiven. I still haven't given up hope. Sadly, when I play
Destinations, I'm not on it that long because it's just too frustrating
and not as fun as Simcity 4. I get all happy thinking what kind of
destination am I going to create, then it fades.
SnapCity is bad
although it might be appealing for kids. Anyone who doesn't have Simcity
4 and Simcity Societies should get this, it's a good value. Simcity
Socieites has improved but there is still more room for improvement. If
it blended City Life, Simcity 4, and Simcity Societies together, then it
could of gotten the seal of approval of most Simcity diehards. I've
been playing Simcity since the original, and I still have hope that
Tilted Mill will improve it. For now, Simcity Societies is still a
letdown. While not as bad when it first was released in November, it
still needs some work. Maybe this is practice for Tilted Mill. I would
love to see this game go DirectX10 (or the new DX11). I would also love
to see a city management game that would blow even the Sims and
Civilization franchises away.
Something to look forward to is the
upcoming release of Cities XL. I've played the demo and so far it's way
better than Simcity Societies and mixes both City Life and SC4k with a
multiplayer (hybrid MMORPG) aspect to it. I've preordered it. If amazon
doesn't sell it, I'll somehow put a review of it on here. Im posting
this because city-building fans should watch Cities XL. It's got some
kinks but it has a great tutorial- something ScSocities was missing.
It's even more fun that it lol. No, I don't work for the company that
makes Cities XL. I'm just saying this to spread the word for people who
were disappointed in SimCity Socieities. Something to look forward to :)
Update:
While
Cities XL seems slightly unfinished, when I was in the forums adding
what I would like to see in it, the developers were mentioning that the
ideas I was listing are on the list for later updates and expansions.
The graphics are gorgeous on Cities XL. The system requirements are
steep. You need a pretty powerful video card also. I wish Cities XL was
offered on Amazon, I would write a review. Im playing it more than SC4k.
I would say that it's a small notch below SC4k however, any updates
and/or expansions would go above and beyond. Basically, if Cities XL
adds a "Rush Hour" type of expansion, it would be sooooo much better
than SC4k. Likewise, if SC4k had the graphics from Cities XL, oh how
beautiful it would be :) Email me if you'd like to know more about
Cities XL before you buy it. Oh and no, I don't work for anything
related to Cities XL lol. Im a big fan of city building
simulation/business sims and strategies.
A
great game collection!
The SimCity Box features:
SimCity
4: The best game in the collection, SimCity 4 is the 4th in a line of
city-building simulations (and a TRIAL of Spore Creature Creator) which
has amused fans for about a decade (I think). You simply zone
resedential, commercial, and industrial zones, Then connect them to
bring power, e.t.c. but you also need to balance your budget, gain
happiness, and improve your mayor rating!
SimCity 4: Rush Hour
Expansion Pack: An expansion pack that adds new roads, highways,
ferries, and such. It also adds U-Drive-It, where you can drive, fly,
and boat across town! Not much else to say.
SimCity Societies: A
different game than SC4, it isn't made by Maxis, but instead Tilted
Mills ( The In-game description of the windmill is "Some say this mill
is tilted.") Instead of all the stuff in SC4, in it you place buildings
individually, don't worry about power lines, or water pipes. As a side
effect of the missing features it can become bland and repetitive. It
does however add Social Values, which buildings consume or produce.
SimCity
Societies Destinations: The (as I write this) newest SimCity game. It
allows you to attract tourists to visit your city, introduces new
buildings and landmarks, and a couple of other things.
Spore
Creature Creator Trial Edition: It is not SimCity but it is also very
good. You can add Mouths, Sensory Organs, Limbs, Graspers, Feet,
Weapons, and Details. You can then size an morph parts for (almost)
Endless possibilities.
THIS IS A TRIAL! It only contains SOME pieces!
The Spore Creature Creator is available for U.S. $10.00.
Snap
City: I haven't actually downloaded this do to poor reviews, but I hear
it is part of The Sims franchise (also by Maxis) that spoofs SimCity and
it is also similiar to tetris. By, Beth Smiths Grandson CJ.
SIMply fun and entertaining.
Great game for whiling away
the hours- and I do mean that literally- I've lost track of time, and
stayed up till one in the morning building my cities.
Only complaints
are: the problems that come up with water pollution, and the inability
(at least, mine) to control the terra-forming tools accurately.
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