SIM CITY 3000 UK EDITION-NOITIDE KU 0003 YTIC MIS (Sim City 3000 UK Edition (PC))

Member Name: Jaguar1000

Product:	Sim City 3000 UK Edition (PC)
Date:	23/04/05 (2174 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: New European ('UK') and Asian buildings sets, landscapce editor, building editor, scenarios .

Disadvantages: No graphical update, no difference in gameplay, not all of the buildings have changed .

--- OVERVIEW ---

Like the rest of the Sim City series the aim is to build a city and control every aspect of it from transport to sewage to the police. There's no missions as such, although though there is the scenarios. The game allows for great creativity generally, create a city big or small, clean or polluted, grid plan or random sprawl the choice is very much yours.

--- GAMEPLAY ---

The gameplay hasn't changed at all in the UK edition (from the original Sim City 3000) except in the scenarios where you have missions to fulfill. These are not of great depth and work within the exisiting gameplay structure. So the fire of London scenario will involve using the fire icons to put out the blaze, not any different to if you had a fire in one of your own cities. The gameplay was pretty solid anyway, but UK/European/Asian specific aspects would have been nice. For instance in the ordinances list they all refer to America really, no parish coucil complaints or country lanes ordinances.

--- SOUNDS/GRAPHICS ---

No improvement on the sounds, unless they've hidden it from me. Sure there are some more Asian sounding songs, but no sound effects and music to make you feel like your'e there. The graphics could have been tweaked a bit to make it fresh, however they decided to stick with the original games graphics which are good enough. There's the building editor to play with which can keep the games graphics interesting for longer.

--- NEW FEATURES ---

There are no major changes to the the basic gameplay, which is slightly dissappointing. There's the scenerio's which add a bit of a challenge (and also provide city scapes of major cities around the globe such as London). New disasters such as Whirlpools, Space Junk falling out of the sky and swarms of locusts are there to play around with and cause havoc. The full landscape editor (which the original Sim City 3000 lacked) so your can create the right conditions to build you city on/in is a much welcomed addition. There is also the building editor which lets you bring your own designs into the game and is very detailed. Both these new features add much variety and longevity to the game.The new building sets add some renewed interest, but sadly some of the sets of which there are three, American, European of which the British buildings are part of and Asian don't change all the buildings. So American buildings remain in your European city as the games creators feel they are European enough I presume. What would have been welcomed would be some more admistrative aspects to the game such as new ways to raise funds and control your citizens lifes or perhaps new buildings altogther, for instance pubs, drug clinics or holiday parks.

--- PRICE ---

Very good value, now available in the Sold Out budget range at £4.99, available on the web for even cheaper. Don't bother with the original Sim City 3000 as this version includes that and the UK edition add on.

--- CONCLUSION ---

Cheap, no major changes to gameplay, the building/landscape editor, new building sets and new disasters are the best new features. Overall the small changes and the price make it worth a purchase for those of you entering the Sim City club or who already own the original Sim City 3000 game, but don't expect anything too radical.

--- SPECIFICATIONS ---

Publisher: Electronic Arts
Developer: Maxis

-Windows 95/98/XP
-Intel Pentium 166MHz
-32MB free system RAM
-450MB free hard drive space
-4 x CD-ROM
-2MB Video Card

Summary: