Newsgroups: comp.theory.cell-automata 
From: d...@brillig.umd.edu (Don Hopkins) - Find messages by this author  
Date: 26 Dec 89 13:37:09 GMT 
Local: Tues, Dec 26 1989 5:37 am  
Subject: SimCity 
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I just got a chance to play SimCity! It's like a drawing program that 
lets you build cities, by zoning districts, putting down power plants 
and football stadiums, wiring up the power grid, laying down roads and 
railroads. The simulation is actually running *while* you're 
constructing it! It acts like cellular automita with very high level 
rules -- it keeps track of each cell's population, land value, 
pollution, and many other factors, and the rules that govern how the 
zones develop are based on the state of neighboring zones, and other 
global factors (tax rate, etc). Districts that you've zoned don't come 
online and start developing until they're hooked into the power grid, 
by being connected through power line cells or adjacent buildings. 
Buildings seem to "feed" off of people brought in by roads and 
railroads. Residential zones in busy districts grow into high-rise 
apartment buildings. Traffic patterns develop on the roads, and you 
can see little cars zooming around based on the population of the 
area, and the flow of the roads! Once you build an airport, a 
helicoptor flies around the city and reports on heavy traffic, 
encouraging you to redesign the roads in that area! 


You may wonder what traffic copters have to do with cellular automita. 
You just have to play it yourself to understand. 


SimCity is absolutely the most amazing game I've seen on the Macintosh 
to date! (It's available on other computers like the Amiga, as well.) 
The graphics and animation are beautiful. I'll leave it at that -- 
mere text cannot do it justice. 


        -Don