Philippe Da Silva, Internet Director for Monte Cristo Multimedia and frequent visitor of SIMphoni, had a very nice surprise for us today. No, make that several nice surprises. We were provided a glimpse into things we’ve been wanting to know about Cities Unlimited since we first heard about the game being in development.
Landscapes (or maps) have undergone a huge overhaul it seems:
On the technical side the big milestone was the landscape. We wanted to offer a really wide variety of maps, offering different challenges and opportunities to the players. We want players to be able to not only to create “classic cities” but also to specialize and build the Key West, Aspen or Detroits of this world. We are happy with the current results. Be prepared to build on maps as you have never seen before.
And we would like to say, the screenie showing the Aspen side of things made us want to go out onto the slopes right away!
(Click the images for larger versions.)
Then…something we have all been waiting to hear!
Our first goal is to connect with what makes the genre a success, I mean realism, solid economical simulation and transport system, user-friendly tools….Even if what you saw so far are a few high end graphic screenshots, rest assured we are also focusing on the depth of the city simulation.
It appears that Monte Cristo has made a very clear cut between the city simulation engine and the eyecandy. That is to say, they’re developing a quality simulator right from the start; Monte Cristo is not waiting for the graphics to be finished before they throw in a buggy game engine just ahead of the game’s release.
To achieve this a full team is working solely on the simulation engine using placeholder graphics. End of august they delivered their first playable prototype and we must say that fun is already there. If you like roads you will have a lot of them!!!!
Combining that remark with some of the road art we’ve seen players make in City Life ought to make any player’s mouth water.
The detail going into the city simulation engine certainly appears to be reflected in the buildings that will come packaged with the game.
Buildings and other game assets production is going well. Once again, we’re focusing on realism and details.
The apartment building shown in one of the screens certainly looks like it was taken from a Parisian suburb. It has a bar, a pharmacy, a halal butcher, a hairdresser, and a computer store.
No word yet on when Cities Unlimited will be released. Rest assured however, Monte Cristo has its biggest team ever working on the game:
We are currently 58 split between Paris, France and Kiev, Ukraine and growing. It is clearly the biggest team the company ever had.
We’re glad to hear that, and are looking forward to the official Cities Unlimited website, which is scheduled to open in October.
Thanks to Philippe Da Silva and Monte Cristo for providing us this opportunity to discover more about their upcoming game.
Comments
1 Gil
What I really like about the screens is the detail. I’ve never been keen on the transition from 2.5D to 3D, but with this detail it’s ok. I hope the accuracy of the simulation doesn’t suffer from the looks of the game.
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3 -M-
Well, right now this is looking MUCH better than EA’s SC:S!
4 Odinmoon
Will this game use a lot of computer power?
and will it work with xp?
Looks great. I hope my machine can handle it.
5 the Monkeys Uncle
Right now the game is very early in development, so Monte Cristo hasn’t said anything about system requirements. I’m sure they’ll work hard to make sure you won’t have to buy a new computer for it though.
6 Shegevara
Odinmoon, needles to say, even if game has top-noch best quality graphics, if you have an old, old computer, don’t expect miracles on it!
7 bel
oh I see the Bellagio in Las Vegas in there! i really like the details of this game specialy the mountain…
8 Stewey
This looks so much better than Sim Societies, EA have missed a huge opportunity and if this game is closer to being a true realistic city sim then I will definately consider this game.
Very impressive so far…
9 jp
wow i can easily tell this will be more popular than scs and if its popular enough it might make a franchise
10 meowza
I’m not completely sure if CU will beat SCS in the ratings. Since SCS focuses on a quite different target population of players than CU’s.
11 Philippe Da Silva
Hi Meowza,
I’m sorry but you’re wrong
We are targeting the same audience: players who enjoy managing a city in a game.
It just happens that we listened to the core city builder fans to define the main directions of the game.
We don’t want this game to be a niche game just for the geeks that we all are in here.
I keep saying it but there’s a real difference between difficulty and richness of a game.
We want to provide players with a rich realistic city builder game but with multiple difficulty ranges so that we can help the casual gamer to get in the game.
12 Vario
I’m deeply impressed by the new screenshots. They are really mouth watering and make me wanted that gane even more.
13 meowza
It seems to me, as a prospect buyer of both CU and SCS, that CU targets more on the avid city simulating (micromanagement) fans, unlike SCS. -That is the specific difference I saw… I know both games focuses on city management. But like I said, it does not perfectly fit (“quite different”) each other.
I know many ppl who do not enjoy playing a city management game, but wants to try out SCS, and unfortunately not CU (reasons: they never heard of CU, others really dont care on how realistic the gfx looks like, SCS is mostly integrated with their fav game the Sims).
With that said, what dyou think will make a bigger hit?: SCS, who’s main goal is to attract new city managment players? Or CU, who’s main focus is to give relief to the wants of the old school city-building fans?
Well I guess we really cant give a precise conclusion to this question atm…
14 Philippe Da Silva
Hey meowsa,
I’m still really sorry but I still disagree
You must understand that we are, today, focusing on city builder fans because YOU are the ones with the experience and knowledge that would make CU a great city builder game.
But we will at a certain point of course target the large audience and invite them to play CU. I stated it very often but there is a real difference between complexity and difficulty.
You can have a game really complex but still make it easy for new comers. It all depends on the tools you provide them with and mainly the interface on a city builder game.
15 cammo2003
And that’s exactly where I think EA has missed the boat. I think SC4 would have been more successful had the difficulty levels introduced by RH existed in the first place. I think reports of it being “too hard” drove people away. Of course, it was also the first SC that ever got advertised on TV here.
The terrain (which is probably one of the few strengths of SCS thus far) in this looks on-par at least with SCS. Having said that, I know you folks at monte cristo are capable of similar things that they’ve done (having seen shots of City Life and been impressed by everything but the building repetition, though that’s long been a problem of city simulations, and may not be possible to eliminate except by brute force — such as a direct command to not repeat x building within a certain radius).
That mountain look is something that no version of Sim City has quite been able to achieve (SC4 falls just short — no snow on roofs, etc.
Transportation is far, far to important to leave out (and EA may learn this one the HARD way)… It’s an aspect that even SC4 stopped a little short on (though I guess there’s only so much that can be done within a reasonable timeframe, although the NAM team have performed veritable miracles for some time now
.
Glad to hear it’s being worked on. I’ll stop now, because this post is rapidly becoming an essay :p.
16 Rusummer1
WOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
17 Edude7
Hey all!
Just wanted to say, that, as a SimCity4 fan, I was deeply disappointed and ‘hurt’ by EA’s decision to totally change the game engine for SCS. After seeing these shots and reading Phillipe Da Silva’s comments, I am actually excited about a new city builder game. That map chooser in the screen shot is AWESOME! It is something I had mentioned in my ‘wishes’ for the new SimCity in another post either on SimTropolis or on the Tilted Mill forums. THANK YOU Mr Da Silva for actually listening and PROGRESSING the genre. Everything I’ve heard sounds promising: work on the game engine, work on the graphics (which are awesome already), work on the transportation which looks like it is close to salivatingly satisfying already! After I tuned out from SCS, I am suddenly excited and prepared to follow a game development again!
Thanks again!
Edude7
18 Natewill28
At this point CU is looking outstanding with the graphics detail and with the terrain. One thing that I hope that they do impliment in this game is WEATHER! To me I believe that having different weather conditions will add such a realism that no city building game has brought to the table as of yet. I also hope that you can set day/night to change automatically.
19 Deimo
I am absolutely impressed by what I have seen with CU. Seeing those creative interchanges done in the original City Life gives me hope that the road system will be more versatile in this version–the ability to create any style of interchange with a simple “curve builder” but then render it to have smooth curves so it looks appealing and realistic. I also hope that in this version (if they even have school and hospital service boundaries) that they allow people to define the coverage area of a school, hospital, etc. instead of just use a radius which is not how the real world works. That’s my two cents for now. Hope they’re still listening.
20 Philippe Da Silva
Of course we are listening… And we’ll keep going
21 Long Time City Builder-Planner Fan
I have always played sim city genre games and every Simcity game released. I also own them all (decent ones) including City Life, the graphics were a let down for me and game style was a lot different than what i was used to but I still enjoyed the game. I wish Cities Unlimited had improved the graphics of the game from City Life. I want to see graphics as good as Simcity 4 at the least. Simcity Societies is going to kill the series dead, it should not look like cartoon graphics or some gimmick it is meant to be realistic.
Although Cities Unlimited does not have as realistic or high quality graphic as we see with SC4 IT WILL BE SO MUCH BETTER THAN SCS BY FAR!! I don’t mind the new gaming style in SCS with oppression, pollution, high-tech or clean or entertainment style sets it is the graphics and a few other changes that have killed the game, buildings alone now affect rating of mayor and city aura, and so on, demand has been taken away now. Non of it is realistic in those senses.
I hope CU take note of this and do what real simulated city builders/planners/managers want. Or I won’t be buying either. I think it is only good to have what SCS has implemented with political style but the rest of is sucks bigtime!
22 Twister_Chaser
Are you going to be doing anything with weather, seasons, the continuation of transport from SC4 to CU please. I hope we don’t have to demolish our transport systems just because sims tire of using them :/ It defeats the purpose if you ask me.
T_C
23 Twister_Chaser
I’m really like the structural development of this game, congrats to the guys at Monte Christo and thanks for listening to us
T_C
24 bern8
I am very impressed by what I have seen so far of CU. I like the graphics alot, and I like the idea that you at monte cristo are working hard to get rid of the building repitition problem. One thing that I would really like to have in CU, is a way, that you could distinguish a Citizen of your City from a tourist(maybe a tourist could have a camera on him). Another thing that would be great to have, is if you could organize a sightseeing tour in your city.
25 rovaira
I like what i’ve seen so far. It sounds like there going to have transportation options as well which is really important. I hope they have freeways, roads, avenues, buses, high speed transit, train, etc where I can click on each station to see how many people are using it as well. I also like toll booths on Sim City 4 rush hour. Hehe.
26 silentsly
if only gamespot or ign knew about this
27 Robert
I really like this game. I hope it doesn´t use too much “power” from my PC, though it worths it… I would also like to see some highways, elevated roads or viaducts, or even monorail.
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