https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/simcity-4-the-greatest-citybuilder-of-all-time-was-released-20-years-ago * Star Wars Jedi Survivor walkthrough * Honkai Star Rail tier list * 2023 games * Elden Ring boss locations and order * The best Minecraft seeds 1.19 * The best builds in The Witcher 3 Rock Paper Shotgun * Latest * News * Reviews * Hardware * Features * Videos * Guides * Bestest Bests * Free games * Supporters * Deals * Podcasts * Discord * RSS Support us Join our newsletter Visit our store [ ] Sign in / Create account If you click on a link and make a purchase we may receive a small commission. Read our editorial policy. * Home * News * SimCity 4 SimCity 4, the greatest citybuilder of all time, was released 20 years ago We may never see its like again A few city streets in 2003's SimCity 4. Graham Smith avatar News by Graham Smith Contributor Published on Jan. 15, 2023 Follow SimCity 4 * * * * * 46 comments When it was released on January 14th 2003, SimCity 4 had its problems. Its huge cities would chug on even decent PCs, for one, and its traffic simulation seemed outright broken. Twenty years later - thanks to faster PCs, the Rush Hour expansion, and a huge modding community - SimCity 4 is the best of all SimCity games. If what you care about is simulation, scale, variety, and the beauty of urban sprawl, it's also the best citybuilder. Setting aside fantasy and medieval variants, the template laid down by the SimCity series remains the expectation for most citybuilders. As the mayor of a fledgling town, you zone commercial, residential and industrial districts, place down amenities and services to satisfy residents, and attempt to balance the budget as your town begins to take on a life of its own. Then, when you've constructed a sprawling metropolis and have grown weary, you trigger some natural (or unnatural) disasters and start over. SimCity 4 did nothing to change this formula but continued its logical progression. It has 3D terrain and crisp, clear sprite-art buildings, which are one of the reasons it still looks great today. It lets you build enormous cities, and then trade resources with the neighbouring city you built previously. It has a day/night cycle, so you can see your skyscrapers twinkling in the dark. You can plop individual Sims into your city - The Sims 1 released in 2000 - and then track their lives as they commute from your polluted suburbs to their awful job, then move out of town or die. Perhaps most importantly, SimCity 4 included the BAT, the Building Architect Tool, which enabled modders to create their own buildings and place them in the game. Custom buildings, maps and mods have greatly extended the life of SimCity 4 and at the time of writing there are over 21,000 files available from community site Simtropolis , including several new uploads in the past 24 hours. Mods are why I'm confident calling SimCity 4 the best citybuilder of all time. More specifically, it's thanks to the Network Addon Mod. NAM set out in 2004 to fix SimCity 4's traffic issues, and as of its last update in September 2022 has expanded to include new UI tools, road types, light rail and much more. Given that every modern-day citybuilder inevitably boils down to tinkering with road networks and mitigating traffic jams, NAM is essential. To address the skyscraper in the room: I love Cities: Skylines and if you're new to this genre, Paradox's SimCity milkshake-drinker is where you should start. If you have been playing Cities: Skylines and you're tired of it, however, or if you don't want to cough up for the next piece of DLC, then you should graduate to SimCity 4. The SimCity 4 Deluxe Edition (including the Rush Hour expansion, also released 2003) is on Steam and GOG. Given that 2013's SimCity was a bomb, and Maxis's original studio in Emeryville closed in 2015, we may never see its like again. You're not signed in! Create your ReedPop ID & unlock community features and much, much more! Create account Topics in this article Follow topics and we'll email you when we publish something new about them. Manage your notification settings . * EA Maxis Follow * Electronic Arts Follow * Management Follow * SimCity 4 Follow * Strategy Follow Follow all topics Congratulations on your first follow! We'll send you an email whenever we (or one of our sister sites) publish an article on this topic. You can manage your preferences here . Close Subscribe to the Rock Paper Shotgun Daily newsletter Get each day's biggest PC gaming stories delivered direct to your inbox. Sign up About the Author Graham Smith avatar Graham Smith Contributor * Graham used to be to blame for all this. Comments Please enable JavaScript to see comments. More On SimCity 4 [justin-biebers-house] Please enjoy Justin Bieber's new house put into 90s strategy games [simcity4] Have You Played... SimCity 4? 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