You are viewing my childhood, �round about
1995. Well, let�s clarify: you�re viewing
a console attempt at my childhood, �round
about 1995. Despite the fact that the SNES
version of the original SimCity was widely
regarded as a quality port of Will Wright�s
masterpiece, SimCity 2000 had a much more
difficult time on the consoles of its era.
PCs could handle the intense number-crunching
required to reticulate all those splines,
and had a much easier time with input using
a keyboard and mouse. This Saturn version,
courtesy of friend-of-the-show Jeanie in PA,
maintains all the sewer-line running, development-zoning,
city-building fun of the original; It�s
a diligent attempt at recreating the PC experience,
but unfortunately it�s held back by massive
lag, uncomfortable controls, and a lack of
cows.
The idea is the same as it�s always been:
mold the land before you into a bustling civilization
full of dentists, mechanics, newspaper columnists,
and other citizens while keeping the town�s
coffers from going dry. You�ve got a familiar
handful of resources at your disposal: residential,
commercial, and industrial zones, road and
rail, power plants and water pumps, and connecting
wires and pipes for same. Like in the PC version,
you can terraform your own map if you care
to, or just play on whatever the game reticulatus
for you, or take control of a preset scenario
with a particular goal to meet. Regardless
of which way you play, you�ll have taxes
to set, funding to negotiate, and policies
to enact to keep your people - most of whom
happen to be named Akiko for whatever reason
- happy and healthy, else you�ll catch holy
hell for it in next year�s newspaper, right
alongside how sex figures into which way the
toilet paper goes and what animals are turning
blue now.
That�s all well and good, and the gameplay
is as sound as it�s ever been, the soundtrack
is near-identical to the original, and they�ve
even got the creepy photos of your advisers
who tell you whether or not you�ve got enough
hospitals. The problem with this version manifests
primarily in two forms: painful controls and
massive lag. The tight confines of this screen
and the low resolution of the console leave
almost no room for a toolbox, so your building
menu is popped up on-command (and suffers
from very slow movement). Actual placement
of resources is subject to a very finicky
cursor, though the ability to simply select
beginning and end points for a zone or stretch
of road helps correct errors... a bit. But
the lag, which pervades everything from cursor
movement to menu movement, is the largest
culprit here. One scenario. which has you
attempting to clean up after terrorists attack
the 1992 Olympics in Barcelona, is rendered
almost completely unplayable by the slow propagation
of fires should you so much as think of letting
up on the �bulldoze� button. Not only
that, if you actually want to save a city,
you�ll need some 470 blocks free, or in
other words, almost the entire local memory
of a Saturn. Hope your memory card works.
Had SimCity 2000 seen release later than the
first year of the Saturn�s life, it probably
would�ve been better-optimized for the hardware.
As it stands, though, stick with the PC version
to save yourself the hair-pulling.
