The future of the community.

[vortext]

Some more thoughts on rearranging; I remember what led me to the tutorial section, it was this simple question how to make a custom lot. That's so easy to do nowadays but if one is completely new it may seem pretty complicated and alas, currently there're no step-by-step tutorials. It may be useful to make a 'custom content creation' portal, with a breakdown for LOT, BAT, MISC (transit, automata, rewards, etc.). This way the appropriate tools and tutorials could be grouped together instead of having these in different sections.

Also, imo it makes more sense to arrange all 'ingame pictures' threads together, i.e. the competition / MDs / Show us your . . / Project showcases / etc.

My two cents so far.

[peter007]

Well. I've been reading this topic and I have to admit that it were the longest posts I ever read (apart from the tutorials) I didn't even knew that there was a sc4 devotion urban design & planning area. How great. I must have missed that the last 3 years here. But I don't think that the forum beeing that complex is the evil-doer. It's just what already has been said. A to old game not made to last 9 years.
We got everything here. If you want to search powerlines you can go ahead and find some. That's not difficult. And for me that's because I can't finish something. We already have everything. There's no actual point in creating them. It has been done by someone better. I don't get motivation and can't finish anything because I realy can't put myself to work. I just cannot create something, which has been done before. I'm also not motivated by the community. It's not because of the lack of replies, because I have enough, but more because I don't have any inspiration. If there were just throughout the community some bigger projects or just something to keep me motivated than I maybe create a BAT which will eventually get into game. How to do that. That's the question  because I put up a project for the BNL team but that has gone to nowwhere. It was much too ambitious. If someone has an idea please say it. It's so bad from me that I haven't done anything for the community yet, while getting serious replies on my BAT thread.

[toxicpiano]

I rarely visit either this site of Simtropolis anymore but I have certainly noticed that the whole of the Simcity community is in permanent decline. This is expected given the age of the game, and I'm surprised it hasn't dropped off a cliff at this stage. When I joined Simtropolis back in 2005 there would be 30+ uploads to the STEX a day (at the least). You'll be lucky to get that in two months now. The LEX seems to be getting that almost per annum recently, though this is a cosequence of how closed it is. Natural decay of the community is hardly shocking in my opinion.

What does surprise me is that you can deny that modding the game is difficult to access for new members. As someone who has been on the periphery for a couple of years it looks to me to be completely impenetrable. I'm not sure where I would even start if I just bought the game in one of the frequent Steam sales.

The language of the community is probably a problem, all these ridiculous acronyms can be very confusing. There's really nothing worse than joining a modding community and having to work out what everyone is talking about. It seems to be a pretty common issue for a lot of modding communities, I got into OpenTTD last year for a bit and was constantly confronted with this patois where people regularly exchange words for acronyms. Eventually you learn what everything means but it's still an annoying barrier to overcome.

The thing that really hinders new players on a far greater scale than that language is dependencies. There have been many debates before (which is basically the reason why this site was founded as far as I remember) but it remains a massive problem that will not go away. Over the years I have collected and catalogued a grand total of about 1,300 files (3.6gb in size) which basically allow me to download almost anything without brown boxes. Connection speeds are much faster and hard drives much bigger than back in 2005, but plugins are spread across more than one exchange and most of them are separate downloads zipped up and then contained in installers. The process of getting yourself to the point I find myself in could take days and days. Who wants to do that? Who has the time? There were simple solutions to this that could have been implemented, package managers or maybe SVN but these never happened. I always assumed it was because no one in the community had the technical ability to do so, there are still separate accounts for the LEX and this forum for example. Some non community members have simply made up their own solution. I am a member of a forum that has a fairly active Simcity thread in it's games section. They compiled a 'gigapack' of dependencies and that's how most people get into the game there. AFAIK it's quite incomplete and riddled with duplicates but it's the quickest way to get into the game for newcomers and they take it by default rather than mess around with the dependencies on here or the STEX.

Really this whole thing could have been solved years ago, but no one wanted to do it because of politics or arrogance or whatever (real life was obviously an issue but probably a minor one). If anyone who was around then is still wondering why people kept complaining over and over about dependencies, it was because there was a real problem. It's a shame that instead of addressing it you just made another site with another exchange so you didn't have to listen anymore. I don't think I ever disputed that dependencies add real visual value to the game, only that their implementation was wildly wrong. I suppose the current situation isn't as bad as it was back then as we have megapacks now, but my point still stands.

So yes, this community is declining but this process probably could have been slowed if the right decisions were made.

[mike3775]

Even if it were handled differently 6+ yrs ago, the issues would still be here today because the game itself is 9 years old and when I went to Best Buy and a video game store, and not one time did I see a SimCity 4 Deluxe game being offered for sale.  At the Video Game store they stated they could order one if I really wanted it, but why would I since its so old?  Thats the problem, basically the only way new people are going to get into the game is from their parents now, since most retail outlets only stock current games these days

[dedgren]

Peter, I'm not meaning to pick on you, but what you said catalyzed my thinking about several aspects of the game.  I agree with you as to many things but gently disagree with you on a number of points.

Well. I've been reading this topic and I have to admit that it were the longest posts I ever read (apart from the tutorials) I didn't even knew that there was a sc4 devotion urban design & planning area. How great. I must have missed that the last 3 years here. But I don't think that the forum being that complex is the evil-doer. It's just what already has been said. A too old game not made to last 9 years.

I certainly agree that the organization of the SC4D site, while complex, is not generally a barrier to participation.  I think that something of its size on the web is inherently never perfectly accessible, but the staff is tweaking things all the time, and most functional areas (i.e.: the Mayor's Diary section, the Custom Content section, the Tools section, etc.) generally give someone who's looking for something a push in the right direction.  If anything could be better, it would be the in-site search engine, but that's a fault of the site software.  I don't see that search ability is any better on other forums I frequent, so I'm leaving that issue there.

What you say raises the larger issue of the vast amount of SC4 information that is out there.  We now have nine years worth accumulated, and some is at arcane levels that the game designers would have never dreamed that the user community would have access to.  This is both a blessing and a curse.  It is great to know how to tweak that one little thing that, in the individual player's eye, detracts from the city/countryside she is working on.  It is massively frustrating for a player to see others doing things that are seemingly taken for granted and have no idea how it is being done.  It is completely true that folks who have been playing the game since its first days have a huge leg up on newcomers who started last year.  It doesn't mean those long-timers are any "better" (in the objective sense) at SC4, but it does mean that they generally have an easier time with the more advanced aspects of gameplay on any given day.

The big point I see here is that SC4 does not fit the usual computer game paradigm- mastery of a new game within sometimes days but almost always weeks or at most months.  After mastery, though comes the boredom born of the game having become too easy or too repetitive, and then it's on to the next new game.  That fits the software developer's marketing plans to a T, as you are back in the checkout line several times a year.  The fact that most all computer games are not open-ended like SC4 is also part and parcel of the dominant paradigm.  Those who are used to that- folks who can whiz through 20 levels of a first-person shooter before breakfast after playing it for a short time, I think find SC4 disconcerting after the same period of time.  The cities and rural landscapes after playing for a couple of months look pretty much the same with some slow refinement.  Then, though, he or she sees someone else's work that just nails it.   That inspires some folks and discourages others.  The bottom line, though, is that the folks who hang on are generally rewarded.

Think hard- is there another computer game out there where you can gain the equivalent of nine years of mastery (besides NetHack, but that's another story)?  The trouble with doing that is that it pretty much takes, err... nine years to do that.  Sure, there's SC4 prodigies out there who somehow seem to have bypassed the "pay your dues" period, but they are few and far between.  Time and time again, the most talented members of the community have demonstrated that, just like anything else in life, the way to get really, really good at something is to stick with it, to work at it, and to not give up.  As a "Nine Year Guy" myself, I can only promise you that the effort is worth it.

SC4, my friend (and all my friends out there) is absolutely not "too old."  It was pretty cutting edge and placed a heavy demand on the average consumer computer when it was released in 2003.  Computers have caught up and, even though it is only a single-core game, it pretty much flies on any machine compared with how it used to run.  I think Maxis/EA showed a lot of foresight in using the "blended" 3D approach- 3D objects viewed from a fixed perspective.  If you think a true 3D citybuilder is in the cards any time soon, go play CitiesXL for as long as you can stand it (my tolerance is pretty low, so it's not a good guide).  Don't words like "cartoonlike," "blocky," "unrealistic" and the like pretty much quickly replace the initial shock and awe of seeing street-level graphics.  At the rate we are going, there will be a SC4-quality 3D city builder played by your children someday.  Don't hold your breath.

I've said before that Maxis/EA gave this community a huge gift.  They developed SC4 in a manner more or less open and accessible to  MODding, fixed most major deficiencies within a year with Rush Hour, then went away and left us alone.  To our own devices, as it were.  And what devices!  EA may hold the copyright, but we, the community, own this game.  With a small number of exceptions we can pretty much it do whatever we want, and we are still finding new things out.  Sure, we will never be able to make a curved tunnel or flowing water "in-game," but get a life!  Those are pixels on a computer screen you are looking at, my friend.  And there are MDs out there with pics that I defy you to look at and explain how this failing makes any difference.

By staying out of our hair, EA has made us self-reliant and pioneering.  We did it because we had to.  If EA had followed "The Sims" business model, all of us would now be about (US) $500-$1,000 poorer and likely be locked into a game where, just like Apple has with the iPod and iPad, EA would stamp ruthlessly on user efforts to gain a degree of control.  The narcotic of "someone else is taking care of that" would have stifled all the development and MODding we take for granted today.  At bottom, our situation, IMHO, is one to celebrate, not to lament.

We got everything here. If you want to search powerlines you can go ahead and find some. That's not difficult. And for me that's because I can't finish something. We already have everything. There's no actual point in creating them. It has been done by someone better. I don't get motivation and can't finish anything because I really can't put myself to work. I just cannot create something, which has been done before. I'm also not motivated by the community. It's not because of the lack of replies, because I have enough, but more because I don't have any inspiration. If there were just throughout the community some bigger projects or just something to keep me motivated than I maybe create a BAT which will eventually get into game. How to do that. That's the question  because I put up a project for the BNL team but that has gone to nowhere. It was much too ambitious. If someone has an idea please say it. It's so bad from me that I haven't done anything for the community yet, while getting serious replies on my BAT thread.

First off, my recollection is that things you've done that I'm familiar with have been quite nice, and that Team Benelux is a center for quality in the community.

I do agree that all the easy MODding is probably done, although I always have the capacity to be surprised.  BATting is hardly any different (as I understand it- as I've said elsewhere, I can't BAT for poop, so don't take my word) than it was way back when.  LOTting is pretty much the same as well.  The trick today is simply knowing where to look for the things you need among the tons of stuff out there.

I don't agree, either, that "someone can always do something better than you can" as any sort of principle to live by.  People striving for excellence have made the game and this community just that much greater.  I always start a project with the idea that I'm going to do the best I can, period.  If I do that, and it turns out to be the best there is, that's just gravy.  If it is not, I'm ready to accept that the particular division of labor involved does not favor me, except- and this is a big deal- I get the complete benefit without cost of the better item plus the experience of having tried.  Lighten up on yourself, eh?

So I still have more to say about this.  As with Peter, there's been comments I agree with and comments I haven't.  This is a process we need to go through though, as I begrudge the loss of a single member of this community who would have otherwise stayed had it been in our power to make that possible.


David 

[toxicpiano]

Thats the problem, basically the only way new people are going to get into the game is from their parents now, since most retail outlets only stock current games these days

This is completely inaccurate, Deluxe is sold on the Steam platform for £9.99 and there are regular promotions. Every time there is one new people come to the thread on the forum I was talking about. As I pointed out the community will naturally decay over time.

[dedgren]

Yep, Deluxe is pretty much always at all the box stores here (Wal-Mart, Fred Meyer, Target, etc.).  Last time I looked it was (US) $9.99.


David

[catty]

...Thats the problem, basically the only way new people are going to get into the game is from their parents now, since most retail outlets only stock current games these days

I don't have a problem getting the disks in NZ and they are LHD which is even better, its the cost    I have a problem with

http://www.fishpond.co.nz/Games/Sim-City-4-Deluxe-Edition-PC/5030930036386

luckily I don't have to pay for postage being local (the shipping cost to the US & Canada is $14.95 NZ + $4.95 NZ per item)

On a different subject a couple of people commented that they didn't like to keep posting the same things in each topic, I'm not sure if its available to all the site users, but at the top of each post is the "Bookmark and Share buttons", I've used it to send links to posts or pictures that I have liked to my Twitter account and it has a little counter to show how many times people have done this ... not the same as posting, but at least it shows the person doing the post or picture that someone liked it enough to want to share it with other people.

[whatevermind]

I suppose I'll drop my thoughts on a couple of the topics floating around here.

First, the topic of site organization.  I agree that there is work that could be done, both visually and organizationally to improve site accessibility.  Someone mentioned earlier being unsure about whether SC4D was one site, or a collection of related sites under one name.  This falls in the same category of problem of having two passwords for what is (essentially) the same site.  The LEX, the main page/forum, and the Wiki all look different, which gets a bit confusing.  I understand there are technical reasons for some of this, but even if parts must remain separate on the back end, work could be done to bring the LEX's appearance more in line with the main site, and creating a more uniform appearance overall, as well as consolidating and updating some of the information (for example the dependencies pages on the LEX and the main site are different).  The LEX in particular could use some profile options, so that you could at least change your s/n or password, etc. to match across the entire site if you wanted to.

On the topic of forum organization, right now, some of the sections are confusing, and some of the subforums (and even sections) appear to be duplicates at first glance.  For example, there are three sections on SC4D Teams.  Consolidate the entire thing into the SC4D Teams Place, which then breaks down into: 1) General Info, 2) Certified Teams, and 3) Other Teams - each section can then break down further from that point similar to how it does now.  Considering their prominence, subforums for 4) BSC and possibly 5) NAM - would also make sense to me.

The section on SC4D (the site and community, top of the forums), is fine as is.  However, site related help should be clearly within this section; at the moment it's not so obvious where to post those questions.  The sections related to the LEX, MDs, Japan, and Off-Topic discussion I think also work as they are.

The custom content and technical help sections, however, are a bit jumbled at the moment.  I think it would help to rearrange these into more clearly defined sections.  Right now there are two sections for displaying content (outside teams): "Sim City 4 Devotion Pictures and Projects Showcase" and "Sim City 4 Devotion Custom Content Showcase", which seem to largely overlap each other, which makes it confusing for finding work, and also figuring out where to post your work.  Maybe rearrange these into two new sections 1) Things you can use in your game (ie for displaying BATS, Lots, Mods, etc.; and 2) Pictures of other people's games (ie the picture competition, show us your.., GRV II, 3RR, etc.)

Likewise, there are four sections for technical help (non-site related): "Sim City 4 Devotion Tools", "Sim City 4 Devotion Tutorials", "Sim City 4 Devotion Help", and "Sim City 4 Devotion Custom Content - Discussion and Requests".  The first two, tools and tutorials, are well organized.  The second two could probably be combined, since they seem to overlap a lot.  They might keep all the same subforums, just under one heading (ie SC4 Devotion Custom Content Help, Discussion, and Requests).

So, what I imagine is a forum organized roughly like (new parts italicized, and descriptions in () ):
-Sim City 4 Devotion Site and Community Related
-Sim City 4 Devotion BSC LEX Related
-Sim City 4 Devotion Mayors' Diaries
-Sim City 4 Devotion Custom Content Showcase (the things you can use)
-Sim City 4 Devotion Pictures and Projects Showcase (the things you can't)
-Sim City 4 Devotion Teams Place (as described above - all team related pages)
-Sim City 4 Devotion Custom Content Help, Discussion, and Requests
-Sim City 4 Devotion Tools
-Sim City 4 Devotion Tutorials
-Sim City 4 Japanese Devotion
-SC4D Off Topic Section

Now, that's just my personal take from how I use the forums, but perhaps others will find that layout useful as well.

Next, I have to say I agree with toxicpiano regarding the acronyms, I suppose it's just part of the way we are, but it does get awfully confusing at first keeping them all straight.

Also, can't say I've generally had trouble finding the game in stores.  Whenever I do wander through the games section of any major big box or electronics store, I'm generally proud to discover copies of SC4 Deluxe (or more often the full set, with SCS and so on) setting on the shelves.

[mike3775]

I looked for it because my disc 2 is scratched and to install the game I need to use a copy that I had made.  It won't run off the copy, but the scratched disc plays the game fine, just won't install off of it.

The Walmart in my area I always go to doesn't carry many PC games(but 3 whole aisles of systems though).  Maybe tomorrow I go on a little shopping run to see where its at

[metarvo]

I'm going to echo David's words by saying that the game is available at every Wal-Mart in my area.  Honestly, 9 years is a long time for a game to be on the shelf.  This game has already outlasted the typical game console (~5 years) and Windows operating system (~3 years) life spans.  Now, that's saying something!

It could be that people just have other interests besides SC4, whether those interests include other games or non-game activities.  This is part of the reason for my recent inactivity, along with a little RL here and there.  This has happened to me with every game, SimCity or otherwise, that I've played.  However, I always find myself coming back.  My theory is that this will happen in the SC4 community as a whole, and we will once again see a great resurgence of vitality that the game and the community deserve!

[peter007]

Dedgren, David.

Thanks for the reply. I like the community very much. It's a very pleasant area and it's at the top of my daily want to visit list. I'm still happy with such a big community. You're right that not everything can be perfect here. But when I yesterday stumbled across urban design and planning area. I found it almost empty. It's totally not what I had expected from it. Almost nobody is using that. Do we still need that part of the community then? I say (not offensive meant) get rid of all the forums which hasn't been used recently or just blend them into another forum.

SC4 is a great game. No argue! I played recently Men Of War Assault squad & L.A. Noire. That last game was played for three days when I was finished with it. I have done batting for almost 1 year and a half. I know that I got the game when I became 10 in 2005. It was a gift from my my grandma. It was a nice game and I have been playing it since then. I never totally stopped with it. It's a timeless game. And I don't think that the community will stop before 2015. At least if the apocalypse isn't going to take place here. I hope that there will be lots of new updates and uploads to the community untill the end. (I hope that the end will be a new better game). And I'm kinda looking forward to the new game. This old rubbish is going to annoy me. I want to get 3D. Just like L.A. Noire & Men of War. And this sound maybe a little bit snobby but I want to get new. The level of 3D has been passed by almost every game. There's a small amount of games that still uses the perspective of SC4

SC4, my friend (and all my friends out there) is absolutely not "too old."  It was pretty cutting edge and placed a heavy demand on the average consumer computer when it was released in 2003.  Computers have caught up and, even though it is only a single-core game, it pretty much flies on any machine compared with how it used to run.  I think Maxis/EA showed a lot of foresight in using the "blended" 3D approach- 3D objects viewed from a fixed perspective.  If you think a true 3D citybuilder is in the cards any time soon, go play CitiesXL for as long as you can stand it (my tolerance is pretty low, so it's not a good guide).  Don't words like "cartoonlike," "blocky," "unrealistic" and the like pretty much quickly replace the initial shock and awe of seeing street-level graphics.  At the rate we are going, there will be a SC4-quality 3D city builder played by your children someday. 

True  I have a Acer Aspire 5750 i5. 2,9 Ghz. Great PC. Simcity 4 is going great, but if it was 3D it would have been better looking. Though I will only accept a new City-Building game which has the same realistic level as Simcity 4. And as I read there isn't one computer which can run such a detail in a city with thousands of buildings and models. I guess I have to wait untill then. But I will be there if there's going to be one new game. Maybe when I will turn 65 or something. It doens't have that much priority, because when Simcity 4 is stillan old game. 3DS MAX isn't. It's going new every year. And the fact that you can still use 2012 made buildings in 2003 SimCity is great. I truly commend the game. (If you say it like that)

[catty]

...But when I yesterday stumbled across urban design and planning area. I found it almost empty. It's totally not what I had expected from it. Almost nobody is using that. Do we still need that part of the community then? I say (not offensive meant) get rid of all the forums which hasn't been used recently or just blend them into another forum...

I don't disagree with you regarding tiding up the forums or even getting rid of the "Urban Design and Planning" board, but I do worry about your statement "Do we still need that part of the community then?" we run the risk of specializing ourselves to the point that no-one is visiting the site, I'm not saying we should open our arms to CitiesXL or any of the other "city building games" and turn ourselves into a smaller version of Simtropolis as well, but I think if someone was recreating London or any of the RL Cities using CitiesXL or something else and wanted a place they could showcase what they were doing, I for one would be following their work ... we need to embrace our visitors and their contributions to the site ... but not compromise the site values or why this site was set up in the first place.

[Shark7]

I can only speak for myself, but I'm sure there are others in similar situations.

My activity has always been sporadic.  Bursts of energy with periods of just lurking.  I have always been this way...so its not saying there is a lack of interest or that there is anything wrong with SC4D...its saying I actually have real life to deal with as well as other interests than SC4.

For instance..not only do I play SC4 regularly but I enjoy other games as well...

Distant Worlds: Legends, War in the Pacific: Admiral's Edition, Harpoon Commanders Edition, and Star Wars: The Old Republic are the 4 that currently compete with SC4 for my time.  There are also XBox titles releasing this quarter that I will be spending time with...

What it comes down to is simple:  There is not enough time in the day to do everything I enjoy doing (one has to work to support these hobbies after all).  This reflects in my posting here on SC4...when I'm spending time with other games, I tend to spend less time browsing the forums at SC4, etc.

In the end, the lower activity could be something, but in some cases (like me) its nothing out of the ordinary.  I'm sure there are plenty of others like me that spend more time playing the games than posting about them, but as I said, I can only say definitively about myself.

[Pat]

You know what ?

Communism is a social, political and economic ideology that aims at the establishment of a classless, moneyless, stateless and revolutionary socialist society structured upon common ownership of the means of production. In Marxist theory, communism is a specific stage of historical development that inevitably emerges from the development of the productive forces that leads to a superabundance of material wealth, allowing for distribution based on need and social relations based on freely associated individuals.
Communism comes from the Latin word communis, which means "shared" or "belong to all".

This is just like modern communism ^^ Marx should have been proud of us... lol !


Thanks from France !
Benoit.

Hmmm now that is a interesting point of view ^^ somehow I have to agree

Now are we talking if SC4 is communism and the content that is made? lol then yes in strange way this game does belong to us!

Ohhh speaking of still on the store shelves is the original SC4D Box set at my wal * mart in Hastings MN for would you believe it $19.95 yes that is right $19.95 not 9.95 lol

[madhatter106]

I don't disagree with you regarding tiding up the forums or even getting rid of the "Urban Design and Planning" board, but I do worry about your statement "Do we still need that part of the community then?" we run the risk of specializing ourselves to the point that no-one is visiting the site

But if people aren't going to that section and utilizing it, then it's just an empty space, isn't it?  A restaurant that doesn't sell slices of cake or pie doesn't continue to maintain an empty bakery case, in the event that someone one day might wander in and look for a slice of pie?  (Even if the bakery case has pie/cake in it, like the Urban Design and Planning section might, they're older and dusty slices of pike/cake.)  If there's nothing special to set this site apart from the others, then I think you've run in the opposite direction - it would be too broad and too much like the others.  Personally, I don't think specialization is a bad thing per se, for that very reason.

We need to embrace our visitors and their contributions to the site ... but not compromise the site values or why this site was set up in the first place.

Bold emphasis above is mine - I will admit that there are lots of things about the site that I don't understand, which is fine.  The organization, the segmentation, what-have-you.  And not to dredge up the past, but I am also unclear as to the nature and circumstances of "the Great Schism" which caused this site to be created in the first place.  But I think the "mission statement" of what this site is and what this site is supposed to offer should be clear.  Why was this site set up in the first place?  And how can the organizers and moderators help to forward that mission statement?

I would also add to the above that "the home for the serious player" and "the best SC4 custom content" isn't the mission statement, in part because they are descriptive and not active.  Personally, that first phrase sticks in my craw every time I read it - the implication being that if you're not posting or uploading or downloading from this site, you're not a "serious player."  I know that's not the implied intent of that statement, but be aware that this is something that might be construed or inferred by its presence; it would be very easy to read those two phrases at the top of the page and misconstrue "elite" as "elitist," particularly if you are new to this community.

So, ultimately, I guess I'm saying, what is the goal for SC4Devotion?  And how can the site best meet that goal?  And what currently within the confines of this site do not meet with the aims of this goal, and what can be removed that doesn't help in any way of achieving it?

[mike3775]

Personally, that first phrase sticks in my craw every time I read it - the implication being that if you're not posting or uploading or downloading from this site, you're not a "serious player."

I agree that first part can be taken that way, but I always took it more along the lines of this site likes to focus on more realism within the game then many other sites that have lots uploaded do.

This place tends to have more realistic style buildings and lots, not fantasy based lots like a subway station that looks like the stargate(not knocking that, I won't lie, I did download those, I like them a lot).  Thats the way I take what they say.

Fantasy looking lots are also good as well.  Most of my cities always have a mixture of realistic and fantasy and civic buildings that are as unbelievable as can be, and also civic buildings that are more realistic.  I tend to use more fantasy based civic buildings that give way more radius then the civic buildings that follow the maxis radius though, because in reality a city of 50K only tends to have a few elementary schools, maybe a couple middle schools, and 1 high school, but Maxis seems to think that a city of 50K  needs multiples of everything when in reality the opposite is true.

[dedgren]

So, ultimately, I guess I'm saying, what is the goal for SC4Devotion?

madhatter106, on one hand that's a legitimate question.  In the context of the rest of your post, though, I'm a little bit concerned about the intention behind asking it.  I don't want to see this thread head too far off-topic, as it, after all, is about the community at large and not specifically about SC4D, but when you say a statement by the site's management: "the home for the serious player," "sticks in your craw," red flags start going up for me.

First off, let's make sure we understand the part of the fan community that we are talking about.  SC4D is a site where English is the common denominator language.  Community members from all over the world are welcome, but the ability to post and interact in English has always been one of the requirements here.  That's not necessarily fair, but until the entire world can agree on a universal language, setting up the site as an English-speaking one was a purposeful choice on jeronij's part.  Note that he is from Spain.  Colyn, another key player in the site's early days, is from South Africa.  Barby (barbyw) is from France.  So you necessarily have to read into the "serious player" statement the player's ability to utilize English, even if it is not the player's first language.  Thus, the statement says nothing about non-English SC4 sites, such as (not meaning to leave any of the other fine sites out- these are just examples) Sim City Plaza/Simforum.de, Tout Sim City, and Sim City Polska.  Those too I understand to be homes "for serious players."

That said, we turn to English-speaking sites.  Simtropolis and SimPeg immediately come to mind.  Both also provide, I am sure, a "home for serious players," because if nothing else I know community members who primarily post at one or the other and not here whom I consider some of the finest players and custom content creators out there.  I'm a member of all three sites, and I wish everyone would choose to be, but that's not the case.

Schisms and arguments and site wars are so yesterday.  Right now I know for a fact that the management of SC4D and the management of ST have a great working relationship.  The relationship with SimPeg has always been at best more neutral, but the absence of any controversy between sites about anything over the past couple of years and the large number of folks with MDs here at SC4D that use significant custom content developed at SimPeg ought to be taken for something.

So, back to why this site styles itself as "the home for the serious player."  Not to take anything away from any other SC4 fansite, but that is SC4D's mission- it's ultimate goal.  To make itself such a place.  It does that by providing a venue that is intended to attract the highest quality MDers, custom content creators, MODders, code engineers, and occasional mad scientist to work together and interact with a single-minded purpose- to continue advancing and improving SC4 in the absence of the original developer (Maxis/EA) doing so.  By and large, jeronij and his staff have been hugely successful at doing that for the past five years.  The focus here, unlike some other sites, has always remained purely SC4.  Nobody was distracted by Sim City: Societies, City Life or Cities XL.  The site's popularity is apparent in terms of both membership numbers and ongoing activity.  Many of its members and the teams that are hosted here are among the most productive custom content creators in the community. "Devotion" is far more here than just a part of the site's name, and has been from day one.

Note that, in order to be "the home for the serious player," SC4D does not have to seek to destroy, undermine or compete with any other site.  There has long been a strictly enforced policy here of discouraging any comment about any other fansite that was not both objectively constructive and contributed to harmony in the community overall.  That has, IMHO, worked well, too, and has been instrumental in allowing the current peaceful state of affairs in the SC4 community to be reached.

So, speaking for myself (I was officially an administrator here many years ago, but it belongs to jeronij and his staff to speak officially for the site) to be "the home of the serious player" is both SC4D's goal and its overarching purpose.  That is what the site does, and that is, as far as I'm concerned, what the site is.


David

[madhatter106]

So, ultimately, I guess I'm saying, what is the goal for SC4Devotion?

madhatter106, on one hand that's a legitimate question.  In the context of the rest of your post, though, I'm a little bit concerned about the intention behind asking it.

My "intention" is to merely pose the question. I'm playing devils' advocate.  Are you perceiving an ulterior motive (whatever it may be) on my part?

I don't want to see this thread head too far off-topic, as it, after all, is about the community at large and not specifically about SC4D but when you say a statement by the site's management "the home for the serious player," "sticks in your craw," red flags start going up for me.

The thread was started as a question regarding the community activity on this particular website and what changes can be made to this site to make it better, and has morphed into a discussion of the community at large.

And that phrase does stick in my craw.  The frustrating thing about it is that it smacks of "hey the people in this clubhouse are the real deal."  The implication being that other clubhouses don't have the real deal people.  Which I want to emphasize - I know that is not your intent.  But it can still be inferred that way by others.

That said, we turn to English-speaking sites.  Simtropolis and SimPeg immediately come to mind.  Both also provide, I am sure, a "home for serious players," because if nothing else I know community members who primarily post at one or the other and not here whom I consider some of the finest players and custom content creators out there.  I'm a member of all three sites, and I wish everyone would choose to be, but that's not the case.

Yet none of those sites have a banner at the top saying they're a "home for serious players."  No one creates a website for a hobby with the intent of being a place for people who aren't serious about the subject.  So why the need for the phrase "home for the serious player?"

Listen - I know you're not all sitting in the clubhouse twirling your moustaches over expensive brandy and patting each other on the back saying you're the elitest of elite.  I know that's not the case.  I'm merely trying to point out that the banner phrase can be misconstrued or inferred as elitest or arrogant.  Again, I know that's not what your intent is.

The site's popularity is apparent in terms of both membership numbers and ongoing activity.

Yet the whole thrust of the thread at the beginning was in response to what the OP perceived as a decline in activity on this site.  So I am left to ponder...how can SC4Devotion evolve to meet current interest/activity levels of today?

[Silur]

There are many words around simple theme ... I like DEVOTION from first date ...
My mind - don't worry about SC4Devotion ...