Once unearthed and installed, a city must be founded, expanded and maintained.Ģ000 managed to be as easy to use as a set of child's crayons, and yet abyssally deep – and the perfect scaffold for tactical imagining, like Chess, or Elite. Back in 1994 we couldn't help but worry about how close the industrial zones were to our suburban housing, or about how much we were spending on road maintenance, or subways, or airports.
The isometric depth of this sequel dragged us outwards and upwards from the original SimCity, inspiring us to such an extent that that original compulsion to build and zone and budget seemed flat and parochial by comparison.Ģ000's rich spine of management systems and statistical paraphernalia induces the weird urge in all gamers to become tight-fisted local governors. This is the Sim game upon which all others rest, like resource-pecking vultures on the bones of some perfect Darwinian entity. No subsequent Sim-sequel has been able to capture SimCity 2000's primal management essence. If nothing else I think that 2000 captures the quintessential essence of a City game. This look back at SimCity 2000 invites the anger of fans of the subsequent SimCity games by claiming it was the best the series had to offer.
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In keeping with our Sim theme, I thought I'd publish this piece which was originally written in summer 2007 for PC Gamer UK's Long Play series.