SimCity 3000

"Is it really the fantastic sequel we were hoping for?"

Im sure you know what Simcity is. It's been around for yonks now, and nearly everyone has been lucky enough to play at least the SNES version. But does this sequel to 2000 better it?

Graphics:8/10
Wow. The graphics are a real jump from 2000. All the buildings are incredibly lifelike, and you can even see little people walking around on the streets! It's all brilliant animated, although all it is really is a world of sprites with 4 different viewpoints and sizes.

The menus are easily navigated, they are big and clear. One thing atht did surprise me is that it runs and an amazing pace even on my dated computer, a super slow AMD K6-2 450.

Sound:9/10
A massive improvement over 2000. There is music throughout the game now, it is very good, with a nice rythem and gentle ambient feel to it.

The sound effects are back but are even better-they sound more like what they are supposed to be this time. And the ambient sound effects are great too-when working with water pipes you can hear water dripping and a light echo when you place the pipes.

Gameplay:6/10
*Sigh*. Here, you ahve everything exactly eth same as 2000-but with improvements. Build a power plant, power lines, water pumps and pipes, zone out areas for industrail residential etc... it's all the same as before, but with some minor additions. Now you can zone in medium denisty, add garbage disposal options, add 2 landmarks, and there are some better advisors. Now- do they sound like the improvments you were hoping for? No. This game does nothing much new. Very disappoiting. A good game in itself, but a poor sequel.

They have less disasters in this game then the last-what's up with that? You have half what you did in 2000-not vey good for destroying a ready made city is it? *Shakes fist at developers*

You can also deal with other cities-take their waste, share water, have a labotory-lots of stuff, but not enough to make it a lotbetter than 2000.

Challenge:0/10
No challenge here. Why? Because they have no scenarios in the game. Instead you have real city terrains-which are nothing too special. Why did they take them out :'(

Overall:7/10
Not what I was hoping for, I spend more time on 2000 on the Saturn then I do on this. Get 3000 if your new to the Simcity series. If not, get it cheap if you want it.

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 09/01/02, Updated 06/14/03