Is This Game Challenging?

[RonBurgundy]

I bought this game a little after release and it seemed way too easy so I got bored and decided to wait until it was patched and I'd like to come back to it but I have to ask, is this game challenging? Like do you have to manage traffic, crime, pollution, etc. I'd rather face the challenges an actual city designer would face when he/she is designing a city. Thanks in advance.

 

[Greygor69]

I bought this game a little after release and it seemed way too easy so I got bored and decided to wait until it was patched and I'd like to come back to it but I have to ask, is this game challenging? Like do you have to manage traffic, crime, pollution, etc. I'd rather face the challenges an actual city designer would face when he/she is designing a city. Thanks in advance.

What challenges does an actual City Designer have?

 

[Myquandro]

To me only traffic is just a little challenging, but until your city grows beyond 100,000 population it's not enough of a challenge to make the game interesting. To me the game is more about creativity then about solving problems.

 

[Sanshy]

This is a sandbox game where you assign the challenge yourself.
If you need challenge set by the game maybe you are playing the wrong one.

 

[RonBurgundy]

What challenges does an actual City Designer have?

What I stated above. Crime, traffic. Stuff like that. Like Sim CIty

 

[Myquandro]

What I stated above. Crime, traffic. Stuff like that. Like Sim CIty

If you think it was a challenge in Sim City then you might think it's a challenge in Cities Skylines. Sim City couldn't keep me interested for long because it wasn't a real challenge and Cities Skylines has the same problem, but the difference between the two is that Cities Skylines makes up for that by giving me more freedom to let my creativity run wild by giving more build able area and mods.

 

[RonBurgundy]

If you think it was a challenge in Sim City then you might think it's a challenge in Cities Skylines. Sim City couldn't keep me interested for long because it wasn't a real challenge and Cities Skylines has the same problem, but the difference between the two is that Cities Skylines makes up for that by giving me more freedom to let my creativity run wild by giving more build able area and mods.

You might be right. I was also a kid when I played Sim City.

 

[Chyll]

To me the game is more about creativity then about solving problems.

Pretty much this.

Maybe early on, given a specific map and decision making... but there is a break through point that it is just doing what you want how you want and enjoying that. (Which is perfectly fine, IMO.)

 

[Cropper]

I bought this game a little after release and it seemed way too easy so I got bored and decided to wait until it was patched and I'd like to come back to it but I have to ask, is this game challenging? Like do you have to manage traffic, crime, pollution, etc. I'd rather face the challenges an actual city designer would face when he/she is designing a city. Thanks in advance.

The game is challenging in certain aspects.

Challenging :
1) Managing traffic flow in bigger cities
2) Overcoming bugs (like death waves, horrible hearse pathfinding)
3) Early game income (pre 5000 cims)
4) Trying to keep specialized industry around
5) Placing things like neighbourhoods, roads, to optimize your available land space

Not Challenging :
1) Crime (just place a couple of police stations on your map and your done with crime forever.)
2) mid game income - once you succesfully make it past about 5-8000 population, you will probably be swimming in millions of cimoleans that youll never be able to spend
3) education - place schools anywhere you want. everyone will go to university automatically and all your cims will become PHD's over time, they are all equally brilliant.
4) Tourism - doesnt matter what you place or do, you wont hardly have any tourism at all (its severly bugged), so dont even bother

I agree with others, its more of a sandbox than anything else. Theres really no "winning" in this game. Set yourself a goal and achieve it. That is winning.

My goal tends to be to fill up the maximum land space available, grow as large as possible, solve all my traffic issues, and keep around every type of zoning including specialized manufacturing.

I wouldnt say its "hard", but there are aspects that are a little tricky. Mostly traffic management.

 

[Botox]

The Challenge depends on what rules and or goals you set for yourself.
Money is not a problem besides perhaps for the first 30 min of the game. After that biggest "challenge" is to keep your traffic flow, lay down a city that looks good (for yourself) and to some extend to get your achivements (well at least the positive ones). At least these are my goals, and it can be a pretty pain in the a** to build a city that does look good (and not too grid-like or planed) AND keep my cims from just using all the same road and causing a freakin' traffic jam for somewhat like 200 miles long.

As there are no desasters (yet), you decide how difficult this game is... well or not. But after all, as already stated, its a city building sandbox game, so dont expect to be chasing one desaster after another or events/riots/whatever.

 

[Seth C Triggs]

I've found the game to be difficult even with mods, because of some of the limitations. And fixing the demand and preventing mass abandonment is difficult. At least I potentially have some strategies now.

But it does depend on what you want out of it. There *is* a hardmode mod that might be to your liking?

-Seth

 

[barrygreybeard]

For me the challenge now is to find a "hopeless" city someone has uploaded to Steam and try to revive it.

 

[Spookyashell]

I find traffic a challenge, but thats about it.

 

[charlesnew]

As some people have said. The challenge is really what you make it. The challenge is to work around problems you've made from before. Different people tend to have different challenges. For me, my challenge is to get my city the way want it to look or to be.

Also, if you want more of a challenge, try this mod:
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=408706691

 

[Greygor69]

For every one comment that the Game is Not Challenging enough I see 5 or 6 where people are struggling.

I think that's a sign that the game was aimed at the right level and we should wait to see how CO (or Modders) add features for those who are more skilled at City Builders.


Maybe if your lacking challenge at the moment, drop the game for a bit and play something else. Then revisit it after the next patch and see what's changed.

 

[Cropper]

For every one comment that the Game is Not Challenging enough I see 5 or 6 where people are struggling.

I think that's a sign that the game was aimed at the right level and we should wait to see how CO (or Modders) add features for those who are more skilled at City Builders.


Maybe if your lacking challenge at the moment, drop the game for a bit and play something else. Then revisit it after the next patch and see what's changed.

My experience is that most posts showing people struggling with challenges are just rehashes of the same issues over and over again. This is because the OP's have not actually bothered to read the forums to see that other people have already brought up the issue/bug.

I don't think I agree with your math that there is a 1:5 or 1:6 ratio of non-challenging vs challenging. Rather, I think most people have had enough time with the game that they are mature and proficient at it, and can build a reasonable city with not too much challenge (other than possibly traffic). I havent seen a "new" complaint about how difficult the game is for along time, just rehashing the same complaints without reading the forums first.

 

[Greygor69]

My experience is that most posts showing people struggling with challenges are just rehashes of the same issues over and over again. This is because the OP's have not actually bothered to read the forums to see that other people have already brought up the issue/bug.

I don't think I agree with your math that there is a 1:5 or 1:6 ratio of non-challenging vs challenging. Rather, I think most people have had enough time with the game that they are mature and proficient at it, and can build a reasonable city with not too much challenge (other than possibly traffic). I havent seen a "new" complaint about how difficult the game is for along time, just rehashing the same complaints without reading the forums first.

Not in these forums, no, I agree. But I'm not solely in these forums.

And if multiple people are hitting the same issue, that issue is the challenge e.g. Correctly balancing Industry, Commercial and Residential, proper placement of services, proper layout of roads and accesses, getting the import/export balance correct, etc. If they are hitting those problems, whether or not there are guides to help them it is still a challenge for them.

Could the game be more challenging for those that have all that sussed out, sure, as I said hopefully that will come with DLC's and patches or via the Hard Difficulty Mods that people are creating.

I still stand by my point, this game was aimed at the right level to get people into playing City Builders who may not have done so before, any harder and you'd risk alienating. You can make it more difficult as time passes.

 

[Cropper]

Not in these forums, no, I agree. But I'm not solely in these forums.

And if multiple people are hitting the same issue, that issue is the challenge e.g. Correctly balancing Industry, Commercial and Residential, proper placement of services, proper layout of roads and accesses, getting the import/export balance correct, etc. If they are hitting those problems, whether or not there are guides to help them it is still a challenge for them.

Could the game be more challenging for those that have all that sussed out, sure, as I said hopefully that will come with DLC's and patches or via the Hard Difficulty Mods that people are creating.

I still stand by my point, this game was aimed at the right level to get people into playing City Builders who may not have done so before, any harder and you'd risk alienating. You can make it more difficult as time passes.

I still dont agree. Most people who dont have a challenge arent going to post about it. Far more people will actually bother to post if they are having an issue than otherwise. The number of posts you see on this and other forums is no indicator of correct ratios. Rule of thumb : most people don't post feedback unless they have an issue. That is not a good indicator of actual ratios at all.

BTW I also read both the reddit forum and steam forums as well as this one every single day.

Based on the number of posts vs the number of people who bought this game, its unlikely that most people are finding challenges. Its much more likely that most people are not having challenging issues that drive them to post their issue. Otherwise there would be at least a million unique people who have posted challenges, which is not the case.

 

[JimmiG]

It's pretty difficult to lose in this game unless you really try. However designing a successful city or achieving a certain goal you set is pretty challenging. Traffic is also a major pain in the posterior and can be quite challenging.

If your definition of "challenge" is constantly running out of money, there are mods for that. Personally, I run out of money way too often in real life, so I don't need that in a videogame...

 

[Greygor69]

I still dont agree. Most people who dont have a challenge arent going to post about it. Far more people will actually bother to post if they are having an issue than otherwise. The number of posts you see on this and other forums is no indicator of correct ratios. Rule of thumb : most people don't post feedback unless they have an issue. That is not a good indicator of actual ratios at all.

BTW I also read both the reddit forum and steam forums as well as this one every single day.

Based on the number of posts vs the number of people who bought this game, its unlikely that most people are finding challenges. Its much more likely that most people are not having challenging issues that drive them to post their issue. Otherwise there would be at least a million unique people who have posted challenges, which is not the case.

So because a lot of people are not posting that the game is too challenging that is evidence for it not being challenging, er ... okay. That's hard to argue against

I can only comment based on what I've seen.

For myself I think it would be nice to have more challenge, but I think that will come.


EDIT: Actually I'm not sure if we are or why we are actually discussing/arguing this because essentially we probably think the same thing. IMO the game as it is matches the intention of CO as explained in the Rock, Paper, Shotgun interview earlier this month. To present a game that would be easy for new and casual players, no massive fail states.

What they should probably do now is look at the feedback they've been getting and provide more difficulty/challenges for more experienced players. I think in that interview it was also hinted that they had some ideas that would add more layers of depth to the simulation and I would be excited to see what they are.