SimCity 2013 limits the maximum size of a city to approximately the size of a “medium sized SC4 city.” There has been lots of discussion on whether these size limits are too small.
On one hand, some argue that the region-based game play works better if each city is small and focused on a particular task:
My second observation is that the size restriction forces specialization. If my city were three times bigger, it could eventually become a coal mining college town with a great tourism and gambling industry. Having an omnicity may not be especially fun. It would lack focus, and because cities interact with others in a region, we won’t need every city to be everything.
I personally feel that the “cities are too small” complaint has some merit. Real cities need to be able to facilitate a large number of different demographics and requirements. Part of the challenge in previous SimCity games (and real life, for that matter) is juggling those requirements to create a city which depends on its mining and resources industry, but is also heavily residential with some tourism thrown in. Such a scenario will create interesting conflicts between the needs of various citizens; making the game more interesting and challenging.
With a bit of luck; we’ll see the size restrictions alleviated in a future patch or expansion pack.
Wow that grid really does look quite small…
EA should rename their product to SimTown
it is too small and too square. they should bee asymmetric.! a city is not square
This game should not have the title “Sim City 5”, more like “Neighborhoods 1”
They destroyed Sim City with their Spyware DRM and foolish director.
This is the end of the series, there will be no more good Sim City.
What a bad move EA…. you destroyed the game. SimCity 3000 was 10x better than this. Maps are way too small. No subways… come on ?!!! 🙁
Tom K Christiansen is right maps are too small and cities shapes are perfect square. This is absolutely ridiculous also at least there is no subway or underpass. maxxis really destroyed simcity legend THANKS…
yeah what that dude says makes sense but WHAT IF I WANT AN OMNICITY? or at least some room to make infrastructure, reasonable roads and public service!
Sim City 5 is no where near the medium size area. We also do not want anyone telling us what we want. We are telling you what we want. Obviously you have never played Sim City 4.
Thanks for destroying what could have been an excellent game. The guys that created Sim City 4 were bloody marvellous. The Sim City 5 crew should hang there head in shame.
This isnt even SimCity anymore its SimTown. What city do you know is limited to 20 square blocks? Maxis have mess this game up big time. I have played every version of SimCity since conception and this small town size map is just stupid. They are no claiming they have screwed it up so much with the simulation engine that their programmers are not smart enough to figure it out so we are stuck with it. I think I want my money back. I want to build a city not a town.
New player to game….So far I noticed there are no underground buildings, subways or above ground Highways, “that I know of so far.” Game map is to small. It should of been as big as your computer could handle it. I run out of room and end up turning the game off in frustration of having to constantly make room for more fire, police, medical, educational, water, and power services so that my city can continue to grow. As I add more buildings I loose zoning. Eventually budget goes into negative income solely surviving on income from trade and/or gambling. Population falls and /exit…. Can we even design our own maps? What a waste of money. They should of just updated one of the older Simcity games. It would of been a bigger hit then this new one.
The size of the map discouraged me to buy the game. I wont play this sim city. Why EA released the game this way? Is quite obvious the fans wouldnt like the game so small.
Great game but I agree that the map sizes are way to small. There is not enough space on the grid to get flat out creative.