SimCity hands-on preview: building Port Foozle

Zoning

Once I'd built a few roads, I zoned Foozle's residential, commercial, and industrial areas. Unlike previous SimCitys, zones border roads instead of filling areas, and density is defined by the size of the zoned road.

High density streets zoned for residential construction will result in apartment buildings, for example, and small streets will become suburbs. Eventually, the commercial properties on my main avenue will become much bigger, as long as there's room for them to grow. This gets tricky: if you pack in low-density roads early on, you may have to demolish them later to make room for bigger buildings.

I didn't plan for Port Foozle's future very well, but there's always the next attempt, and the attempt after that. Starting a city is like rolling and re-rolling an RPG character to get just the right mix: it's almost as addictive as actually playing the game through.

Tyler Wilde
Editor-in-Chief, US

Tyler grew up in Silicon Valley during the '80s and '90s, playing games like Zork and Arkanoid on early PCs. He was later captivated by Myst, SimCity, Civilization, Command & Conquer, all the shooters they call "boomer shooters" now, and PS1 classic Bushido Blade (that's right: he had Bleem!). Tyler joined PC Gamer in 2011, and today he's focused on the site's news coverage. His hobbies include amateur boxing and adding to his 1,200-plus hours in Rocket League.