User Reviews (31 - 41 of 80)

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Not worth it at any price

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 8 / 11
Date: November 17, 2007
Author: Amazon User

If I could go back in time, the first thing I would do is un-buy this game. It is terrible. It's buggy, it must have been rushed for Christmas, and tech support does not know how to fix it. Even after downloading the updates I'm having the same major problems, and the gameplay is so lame it's hardly worth trying to fix it anyway.
I was really looking forward to it, I wasn't one of those upset because they were messing with the sacred Sim City format, but I guess I should have been! I wasn't even upset by the goal-less, open ended gameplay, but I should have been. I thought it would make it interesting, but they got rid of the best elements of the game and they did it in a sloppy, careless manner so that besides being bad gameplay, it adds the frustration of crashing all the time.

Come on...

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 5 / 5
Date: December 31, 2007
Author: Amazon User

Come on EA! This is mess! I have been a Maxis Sim City gamer since Sim City 2000. I own all Sim City games and this one would be one that I could have gone without. I rushed to get this hot mess. Figured it would be worth the money. Out of the couple of times I have tried to play it, everytime I get error messages while in game play. They should have worked out all of the bugs and all before letting the general public have it. They did wrong by not letting Maxis continue producing the SimCity line.

If You Are a Simcity Fan... Don't buy this one

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 6 / 7
Date: December 21, 2007
Author: Amazon User

This game is visually pretty nice but it does not have any of the depth or realism that makes the other SimCity games fun. In fact almost nothing is really required for the city to function meaning that you can just basically build whatever you want. That probably sounds cooler than it is in practice. Without the need to create a balanced city it doesn't really feel like you are playing a game at all.
I bought this game as soon as it came out because I really like SimCity 4 but maybe the game would have been better if Tilted Mill, the maker of this game, had actually spoken to Maxis or played Sim City before making a sequel.

Too Big A Change

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 6 / 7
Date: January 14, 2008
Author: Amazon User

I have been A fan of SimCity games since the 1st. I thing this version is too geared toward new players. I takes the Micro-Managing out of the game, to an extent. I like the Graphics and the interface, but they made a game that is more like a SimCity LITE.

Should be called Disaster City

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 8 / 12
Date: January 28, 2008
Author: Amazon User

I bought a computer specifically to run this game because reviews had said it is a total system hog. The new computer had all the requirements listed on the game box. 10 minutes into the tutorial Sim City Societies crashed my computer. Sim City Societies will not run without the disk inserted, which would lead one to believe that the huge graphics are on the disk. They are not. It puts ALL the graphics into your computer. When it crashed my computer and I took the disk out, the computer came back up with Sim City Societies and said "Please reinsert disk". So I did that, and it put ALL the graphics back in AGAIN. I had to take the computer back to the seller for repair. It took more than an hour for the repairdude to get all the graphics back out of the computer AND Sim City Societies had removed essential drivers that had to be reloaded. Sim City Societies might be a fun game if you have a Cray to run it on.

A Disappointing Step Backwards for Sim City

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 7 / 10
Date: January 23, 2008
Author: Amazon User

As an avid fan of the Sim City franchise, I was hoping that this game would blow my socks off. It turns out, however, with Will Wright now working on other projects, the game lacks improvement or even playability in almost every aspect of the game.

If it wasn't for the advanced graphics, I would think I was playing an older version of the game from before Sim City 4. A sad day for me.

Does not deserve to be in the SimCity family

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 7 / 10
Date: February 11, 2008
Author: Amazon User

This is not SimCity. This game resembles the late 90's game "Constructor" more than it does any of the previous SimCity games. People come back to the SimCity franchise because of consistency, you are rewarded for laying down the infrastructure and planning well. This game takes that completely out of the mix. Instead of random buildings generated according to the mix of factors present in previous SimCities, this game forces you to place each building individually, which to me is more of a chore than laying electical wires, water pipes, or subway tubes. This game completely missed the mark, and it is just not as enjoyable or engrossing as the other versions of this game... even the Nintendo DS version of SimCity is more playable and addicting than Societies. I take no pleasure in writing this review, I was genuinely excited about getting my hands on Societies, and was amazed I was able to hold off doing so until it was bought for me as a present for Christmas. After an hour or two of playing though, it was clear that this was a dud. Just don't tell my mom, I don't want her to think she got me a crappy present!

Junk

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 5 / 6
Date: December 24, 2007
Author: Amazon User

This game is not made by Maxis, EA used some other outfit to produce this steaming pile.

The game has virtually nothing in common with the previous SimCity games. Seems to be a clear case of EA cashing in on the SimCity name.

Underrated and therapeutic

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 5 / 6
Date: May 04, 2008
Author: Amazon User

I am aware of the negative press accorded this game (good ideas let down by poor or convoluted logic driving it).

Having played it for an hour, I realized something -- the background music and the freedom to create and adjust a custom built city was fun, relaxing, and therapeutic. I also enjoyed clicking on individual sims and how they responded to their immediate environment.

I also enjoyed the updated interface; once getting used to it, it was easy to navigate around the city.

The game does have different pre-set challenges, including a free reign mode when you can create and enhance your city at any time, to have unlimited funds but otherwise abide by the game's rules, or work within limited funds and work up. I am content with the "free money mode" and working within the rules, and thinking within their logic behind how the game works.

My computer is running Vista Ultimate (64-bit edition), Intel Q6600 CPU, nVidia 8800 GTS video (640MB RAM), 300GB HD, Sound Blaster Audigy Fatal1ty, et al. It's a fairly new rig. When starting SimCity Societies (SCS), I was told about Microsoft's knowledge base article 940105. My system is already patched. I have had no crashes or other anomalies. Yet.

While existing reviews criticizing the game's downsides are correct, the changes put into this new version make it a nice complement to SimCity 4. On those days when I want to micromanage til I puke, I start SC4. If I want to relax, SCS is where it's at. Definitely underrated.

P.S.: The key disc concept is a bit annoying. Be sure to have the disc in your PC when you start the game. Having the legal serial install code isn't enough. :(

Disappointing Game All Around

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 4 / 4
Date: December 30, 2007
Author: Amazon User

This game is a poor game all around. This is NOT a SimCity game. There is little complexity to this game other than balancing energies. I recently purchased this game, a mistake indeed, a gave it a good hour or two of play and was instantly bored. EA really messed up on this game. I truly should have heeded the warnings of other reviewers and IGN for now I am stuck with 50 less dollars and a worthless game. In reflection this game seems to just be a repackaged version of the old game SimTown, which was designed for children too young to play SimCity. The major aspect of the game, dropping any building one wants to make a city like they desire is paralleled in both Societies and SimTown. Some have said SimCity 4 was too complex for the average player, but this seems to be a far to extreme change. In my honest opinion I am not quite sure if I would ever recommend this game to anyone.

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