Sim-ply the best (SimCity (DS))

Member Name: Beth03

Product:	SimCity (DS)
Date:	09/08/09 (33 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Portable fun

Disadvantages: Can be a bit disappointing if you've played other versions

Sim City DS is a great portable version of the city building game that keeps gamers busy for hours on end.

In Sim City you become the mayor of a city which you name. By building zones for people to move into, your city can grow into a prosperous one with a high population. If you like games such as rollercoaster tycoon you'll love Sim City.
If you've played other versions of the game the DS version can be slightly offputting at first. The first thing I encountered that was jarring was the structure of adding water and power to your city. Your city is watered and powered by making sure zones touch. If there isn't enough power you'll see that certain properties go black and then bright again to indicate a blackout.
Water shortages tend to be indicated by a message that says even a great city needs water lets build a water system.

The fundamentals of this game remain the same, you begin by choosing a space to build your city in, which based on the ratio of land:water can be either of an easy, normal or hard level. You are also allocated a budget to begin building your city and an advisor whose job is telling you someone wants to see you and telling you if your city has made a loss or profit.
One problem of the advisor is that the game seems to only expect you to make about 10000 simolians (sim currency) as beyond that it just says well done mayor your budget is over 10000 simolians. Using the touch screen feature of the DS you can set out roads, zones and place power stations and civil buildings. The key is to make money, so the advice is to start small. As people move in, they will visit your office and ask for certain things, be it a hospital or a new marina for your city. You can then decide based on budget whether to grant their request and your advisor tells you the pros and cons. I've used 4 of the advisors I'm not sure if there are more but they give different advice but basically it comes down to finance and environment.

Certain things don't seem to make the difference they do in other versions of the game, for example whilst a school can increase the population increasing the budget of the school doesn't improve the state of education... not sure where that increased budget goes, but then thats quite realistic I suppose which is the point of the game to simulate reality.

One feature in this game which I love is that there are 8 levels where you have specific objectives, I love objectives in game play, no matter how hard they are because just building a city that's profitable can begin to get a bit dull as you try to maintain that level of profit. In those 8 bonus levels you play to save cities across the world within 10 years. Some you are rebuilding after realistic events such as typhoons and some which are literally out of this world. As a reward for completing each of these levels you get landmarks which you can place in your own cities for free.

As you play the game if you have been funding research, Professor Simtown will give you new buildings to use, sometimes powerplants or waste solutions, sometimes new zones and sometimes free features that will improve the quality of life for your residents.

This game also comes with a post office mode which you can use to send messages to other Sim City Players, however I am not linked up to this facility, and so far haven't noticed a lack of enjoyment.

To sum up; Sim City is great fun at times it is more realistic, but it is only a game so it doesn't need to be too real. I often play it on long journeys helping my city to grow. The objective modes give you something quick to do when you are in the mood to play but don't want to be playing for hours.

Summary: A realistic simulation game of mayoral life.