SimCity was released in 1989, was originally called Micropolis and was designed by the infamous Will Wright. For those that don’t know Will Wright, its suffice to say he’s one of the most popular and influential game designers of our time. SimCity, TheSims, SimAnt, SimFarm and Spore are a few of his hits and TheSims has taken many records since its original release.
Wright had trouble finding a publisher for a game in which you couldn’t really “win or lose.” Turned down by Broderbund, Wright eventually pitched the idea to Jeff Braun of Maxis. Maxis agreed to publish Simcity as one of its first two games.
When near complete, Wright and Braun took the game back to Broderbund to clear the rights for the game. Broderbund executives Gary Carlston and Don Daglow saw how addicting the game could be and signed Maxis to a distribution deal. Four years after initial development, SimCity was released for the Amiga and Macintosh platforms, followed soon after by the IBM PC and Commodore 64. On January 10th 2008, the SimCity source code was released under the GPL license as… Micropolis!
The objective of the game is simple, build and design a city. Though the player could focus on building a highly efficient city with an ever growing populace, it was by no means required. In a sense, open ended, the player was free to design the city as they chose.
Included in the city building experience was the possibility of natural disasters such as flooding, tornadoes and more. Pre-designed scenarios were also included in the game such as the Boston 2010 nuclear meltdown, or mass coastal flooding of Rio de Janeiro of 2047 … even a Godzilla attack of Tokyo in 1961.
In the years to follow, the SimCity franchise would continue to expand with greater detail as SimCity 2000 (1993), SimCity 3000 (1999), SimCity 4 (2003) and a host of other “Sim” games and until the release of “The Sims” in 2000, the SimCity series was the best-selling line of games made by Maxis.
In Fall of 2008, EA will release the next child in the SimCity family, SimCity Creator for the Nintendo Wii and DS systems. And thus, history continues!
Actually, the DRM servers didn’t go down – they were attacked by hackers with a denial of service attack.
Actually, the DRM servers didn’t go down – they were attacked by hackers with a denial of service attack.
Derrick? Is Mario Kart a THIRD PARTY title? Name a successful third party title on the Wii.
Derrick? Is Mario Kart a THIRD PARTY title? Name a successful third party title on the Wii.
World of Goo appeared on WiiWare. And are you saying ALL third party developers are idiots? ALL of them?
World of Goo appeared on WiiWare. And are you saying ALL third party developers are idiots? ALL of them?
Portal is awesome, i extremely enjoyed my 6-8hrs of game play. (1hrs being simply entertain with a ceiling and floor portal going zoom zoom!.) portal taught me to never give up on life cuz there is cake @ the end.
Portal is awesome, i extremely enjoyed my 6-8hrs of game play. (1hrs being simply entertain with a ceiling and floor portal going zoom zoom!.) portal taught me to never give up on life cuz there is cake @ the end.
I never said Mario Kart is a third party title. I clearly kept this separate to avoid such a comment. Any developer that truly understands the audience can be successful.
Just because the label says “Nintendo” does not make it a hit. The game has to kick ass and be fun, addictive and great for the entire family. Nintendo knows this, that’s how they sell games.
Third parties that are publishing for it haven’t seem to figure it out. Will the? I dunno. Perhaps someday a company will come along and make a recipe that works as Nintendo clearly can do. It’s not a 100% successful smash hit (i.e. Zelda) but they know their target well for the most part, why is it ONLY they can do it? It’s not magic. It’s not ultimate He-Man powers….
I never said Mario Kart is a third party title. I clearly kept this separate to avoid such a comment. Any developer that truly understands the audience can be successful.
Just because the label says “Nintendo” does not make it a hit. The game has to kick ass and be fun, addictive and great for the entire family. Nintendo knows this, that’s how they sell games.
Third parties that are publishing for it haven’t seem to figure it out. Will the? I dunno. Perhaps someday a company will come along and make a recipe that works as Nintendo clearly can do. It’s not a 100% successful smash hit (i.e. Zelda) but they know their target well for the most part, why is it ONLY they can do it? It’s not magic. It’s not ultimate He-Man powers….
@Jonah, fyi, if the server is attacked by a DDOS and won’t service requests most of us call that “down.”
There are ways to get around this problem that could have rendered this moot in a matter of seconds, but they didn’t take action on that–stupid. If your entire DRM solution revolves around staying up and you didn’t think a hacker group or whatnot was going to “prove” the DRM solution is fallible by DDOSING then the person that made (or didn’t make) the decision should be fired.
@Jonah, fyi, if the server is attacked by a DDOS and won’t service requests most of us call that “down.”
There are ways to get around this problem that could have rendered this moot in a matter of seconds, but they didn’t take action on that–stupid. If your entire DRM solution revolves around staying up and you didn’t think a hacker group or whatnot was going to “prove” the DRM solution is fallible by DDOSING then the person that made (or didn’t make) the decision should be fired.
Also I would like to quote “i hate Itunes.”
Also I would like to quote “i hate Itunes.”
… Jennifer’s got a cold? She sure sounds like that …
@Ubisoft’s DRM
ZOMG! What a big surprise! I didn’t see this one coming! … NOT!!
If you have ONE server (or ONE GROUP of servers) that is supposed to keep a permanent connection to your customer, that’s the single point of failure. You can bet any of your body parts that somebody WILL attack it.
As for it being cracked, well, as an Eastern European, I didn’t see this one comming 😀
As for limitations … come on … a good crack will provide the full game experience. You can bet that the people that make them cracks make sure you can play the game to its full extent.
Now, if UBISOFT’s plan is to rack some money, they’re doing it wrong.
But … but … if their plan is to kill the PC gaming market, they’re doing it right.
@Steam for Macs:
Well, I think the mechanism there is that you pay for the game.
With Steam, you can install a game you payed for on any number of computers, and play it from any of them. However, you can’t play from two computers at the same time, with the same Steam account.
Now, as for having the game on both PC and Mac, I belive that’s just an extension of what I said above. You own the game, regardless of the OS the current computer is running.
And Valve comming for Macs, it was bound to happen, it’s an extra market segment.
And yes, people still play CS.
@MSFT and XBox 36a0 mobo:
I guess they want to make cheaper XBoxes, without the RROD issues. That may end up to a full re-design.
Sorry for leaving that sentence hanging last week, the one about the DICE guy doing games for Wii 🙂
What I wanted to say is that it’s hard to ask somebody who designs hardcore games to make casual or sport games. You’d end up with a baseball game that uses hand grenades for balls and M4 carbines for bats, military grade helmets and kevlar vests for protective equipment …
Wait… I should patent that …
@GOD
Well … you have a point. Selling the company does point out that they were in for the money. And that would mean that posing as ‘indie friendly’ was just to get the developers …
@Question of the week:
I’d like to see the next STALKER game focusing on the interface between The Zone and the rest of the world. Like the mechanism of sneaking into the zone, smuggling out artefacts, stuff like that.
… Jennifer’s got a cold? She sure sounds like that …
@Ubisoft’s DRM
ZOMG! What a big surprise! I didn’t see this one coming! … NOT!!
If you have ONE server (or ONE GROUP of servers) that is supposed to keep a permanent connection to your customer, that’s the single point of failure. You can bet any of your body parts that somebody WILL attack it.
As for it being cracked, well, as an Eastern European, I didn’t see this one comming 😀
As for limitations … come on … a good crack will provide the full game experience. You can bet that the people that make them cracks make sure you can play the game to its full extent.
Now, if UBISOFT’s plan is to rack some money, they’re doing it wrong.
But … but … if their plan is to kill the PC gaming market, they’re doing it right.
@Steam for Macs:
Well, I think the mechanism there is that you pay for the game.
With Steam, you can install a game you payed for on any number of computers, and play it from any of them. However, you can’t play from two computers at the same time, with the same Steam account.
Now, as for having the game on both PC and Mac, I belive that’s just an extension of what I said above. You own the game, regardless of the OS the current computer is running.
And Valve comming for Macs, it was bound to happen, it’s an extra market segment.
And yes, people still play CS.
@MSFT and XBox 36a0 mobo:
I guess they want to make cheaper XBoxes, without the RROD issues. That may end up to a full re-design.
Sorry for leaving that sentence hanging last week, the one about the DICE guy doing games for Wii 🙂
What I wanted to say is that it’s hard to ask somebody who designs hardcore games to make casual or sport games. You’d end up with a baseball game that uses hand grenades for balls and M4 carbines for bats, military grade helmets and kevlar vests for protective equipment …
Wait… I should patent that …
@GOD
Well … you have a point. Selling the company does point out that they were in for the money. And that would mean that posing as ‘indie friendly’ was just to get the developers …
@Question of the week:
I’d like to see the next STALKER game focusing on the interface between The Zone and the rest of the world. Like the mechanism of sneaking into the zone, smuggling out artefacts, stuff like that.