Cities Skylines Review (PS4)

For years SimCity 4 had been my city builder of choice.  It's the one game in the genre that I always go back to.  Just my opinion, but SimCity 4 is the greatest city builder of all time.  Then, Cities Skylines for the PC came around.  I bought the game only to find that neither of my computers could run it.  One computer would overheat and hard crash (those darned A processors) and the other played the game, but it was slow to the point of being unplayable (those darned Pentium processors).  I was crushed.  I lost all hope of playing it until I heard that Cities Skylines was coming to the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One.  I said to myself, "Hey!  I own a PS4.  Why don't I pick it up now?"  So how does it stack up?

Yes, you can make your city look just like this.

While I can't make a real comparison to the PC version, the PS4 version is highly playable.  Everything seemed smooth and looked good.  The only real difference that you don't have to play the PC version to know is that you won't have access to the countless mods.  That's right.  This version is borderline vanilla.  Of course that doesn't mean you can't still have fun.

Cities Skylines plays like most city simulators.  First you select the area you want to build the city in.  Then, you lay down roads, paint zones, and provide essentials (such as water and power).  As the city grows, you'll be able to provide your citizen needs and want like parks, better energy buildings, better roads, better schools, healthcare, and public transportation.  All the while, you have to make sure citizens have enough water and power as they Tweet what you're doing right and wrong.

As the city grows, perks will get unlocked.

The game also allows you to make districts, which also you make rules apply to some citizens, while others don't have to follow those rules.  For example, if you wanted a certain neighborhood to not have pets, you simply draw a district over the desired area and enact a pet ban on that specific area.  Districts also enable you to specialize industries.  If you want area of industry to specialize in forestry, simply plop down some industry tiles near some trees, then draw a forest district over them, and the tiles you laid with act accordingly.  Each kind of district has it's own tab, so you don't have to worry about laying down a ore industry district when you meant to lay down residential district with a high-rise ban.

One thing you must know is that this game is large in scale.  The game starts you out in a square that's about the size of an average SimCity.  You can expand your city up to eight times for a grand total of nine squares.  In other words, your cities can get HUGE if you want them to.  Yes, you have to buy these square, but it's cheap to do so (most buildings you plop down cost more).

See that square in the picture.  Your city can grow up to nine times that size.

As mentioned before, the game looks good.  There are some parodies of businesses you'll instantly recognize, like Penny (or Denny's) and Pancakes International (IHOP).  Also, what you see is indicative of what's really happening.  You'll watch as fuel trucks actually deliver fuel to the power plants so they can generate power.  When a crime is in progress, you can see the cops leave the police station, drive to the seen of the crime, then got out of their cars and actually walk into the house where the disturbance is happening.  It really is awesome the amount of detail that went into the visual.

Denny's and IHOP, almost right next to each other.

Look at how that fire lights up the night sky.  Burn, baby burn.

The music is meh.  It has sort of a superhero vibe to it.  It can be loud, but you'll probably tune it out while you tune up your city.  It's not bad.  It just doesn't seem to fit.  The zones you lay and buildings you plop down have their own sounds, too.  Get near a school and you'll hear kids playing.  Go by a fire station and you'll hear a phone ringing.  Like the visuals, a lot of detail when into this area.

So what all can you do?  Well, you can build.  And build.  And build some more.  Oh, you can expand your borders occasionally.  Then there is the micromanagement aspect.  You'll unlock buildings, roads, parks and other good crap.  Typical stuff from a city builder.  It's the execution where this game shines and ultimately what sets it apart from the average city simulation.

So how does Cities Skylines measure up to SimCity 4?  SimCity 4 is still the better game.  In SimCity 4, you could do everything you can here.  Plus, that game had better music, more music, and the ability to turn songs on and off.  Also, there's the ability to jump into cars and go on special missions to unlock buildings.  Or you could just drive around.  None of that is present in Cities Skylines.

A beautiful scene, despite the factories spewing smoke into the air.

Okay, so the game is inferior to SimCity 4.  But is it a bad game?  Heck, no, especially if you like city simulators.  SimCity 4 is still the king, but Cities Skylines is the prince who could one day inherit the throne.  BS (like people saying they don't have power when they do) pops up from time to time, but nothing game-breaking.  The worst part of the game is that you won't have access to the mods and DLC that PC players have.  You still have milestones to unlock lots of neat stuff.  If you have a computer that can handle it, get it on PC.  As for PS4 version, I still give it a strong recommendation.  Don't miss this one.