BeforeCities Skylinestook the city-building genre by storm, Maxis’SimCityfranchise dominated the market. The series was the king of urban city builders, but the franchise has faded into obscurity in recent years. Now, Maxis solely focuses onThe Sims, but there was a time when there was no escaping theSimCitybrand.
SimCityhelped put Maxis on the map, and it practically created thecity building game genre. It was a great franchise, and would go to spawn other mega-popular franchises likeThe Sims. However, theSimCityfranchise would sadly come to an end with 2013’sSimCity. It was once the biggest name in the genre, but it seems like the series has now become a part of gaming history.
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SimCity Was On the Top of the World
TheSimCityfranchise began in 1989 with the aptly titledSimCity. It was developed by Will Wright, and wasthe second game from Maxis. After struggling a bit at launch, the game would go on to become a bestseller, earn numerous awards, and kickstart the urban simulation genre. Players were drawn to its innovative and engaging city-building gameplay. Its success would put Maxis on a new path that would see it release all sorts of new non-linear simulation games, and change the industry forever.
Maxis would launch a sequel toSimCityin 1993 calledSimCity 2000,which took everything good about the first game and made it even better. It was met with critical acclaim, would once again be a commercial success, and would help redefine the genre all over again. EA ended up acquiring Maxis, and the studio went on to releaseSimCity 3000in 1999. It continued to expand this city-building franchise in new ways and once again set the standard forthe best city builders.
In 2000, Maxis would release itsmost successfulSimCityspin-offThe Sims.The Simsspawned its own acclaimed series that would rival that ofSimCity. Three years later,SimCity 4hit store shelves. It transitioned the series to 3D, vastly expanded the core mechanics, and would once again show the industry thatSimCityand Maxis were here to stay. It continued to push the city-building genre to new heights, and would go on to become one of the best-selling games of 2003. It seemed like there was no stopping this franchise, but that all changed in 2013.
SimCity 2013 Killed the Franchise
TheSimCityseries would see a couple mediocre spin-offs between 2007 and 2012, including a Facebook game calledSimCity: Social.Maxis was focused on developingSporeandThe Sims 3, but the mainSimCityseries would not stay dead for too long. In 2013, Maxis would release aSimCityreboot that was supposed to usher in a new age for this iconic city-building franchise. However, it would end up burying the series instead.
It seemed like Maxis hadbig plans for thisSimCityreboot. It was developed in a brand-new engine, reimagined the coreSimCitygameplay, featured a full online mode, and was far more detailed than its predecessors. It promised a lot, and it failed to deliver. Players quickly learned that the online play was mandatory, the size of the cities was limited, and the engine was filled with technical issues. At launch, players were met with constant network outages that would result in long loading times, disconnections, crashes, and the loss of saved games.
SimCity’s horrible launch stateresulted in reviewers not being able to review the game and players not being able to play it. Various critics urged players to avoid it until the issues were resolved, and Maxis had to spend months getting the game into a playable state. Eventually, the studio let players play in offline mode and finally let them save their cities on their own device. It was such a mess that EA offered players a free game to compensate, andSimCitywould only receive one DLC pack before Maxis Emeryville was closed.
The only otherSimCitygame to release since 2013 was a mobile game titledSimCity: Buildit. The franchise is essentially dead, and its failure led to the rise of Paradox’sCities Skylinesseries. It is sad to see an iconic series like this fall apart, but at least the genre lives on. MaybeSimCitycan rise from the ashes one day, but probably not for a long time.
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