Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!sdd.hp.com!usc!julius.cs.uiuc.edu!psuvax1!swatsun!hirai From: hirai@cs.swarthmore.edu (Eiji Hirai) Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.games Subject: Re: SimEarth & Experimental Mode Message-ID: Date: 9 Nov 90 19:55:01 GMT References: <57050003@hpindwa.cup.hp.com> <5192@lanl.gov> <1990Nov8.220709.20025@isis.cs.du.edu> Organization: Medieval Metaphysics Dept., Miskatonic U., Arkham, MA Lines: 68 kreme@isis.UUCP (Fred Q Zeats IV) writes: > yossie@fnal.fnal.gov (Yossie Silverman) writes: > >Where does one GET SimEarth? It seems like local software shops got hold of it before the big mail-order firms did. Is this a new policy on part of Broderbund to promote local software shops? In any case, the big mail-order firms said they'll be getting it around the 15th with a projected price of $40-$43 or somesuch. > The game looks A LOT more complex than SimCity. I'm not sure if I like it > or not. Actually, I think the complexity is not entirely out of the ballpark of SimCity's complexity. After playing with it the entire night, it seems like there aren't THAT many variables that interact with each other. Furthermore, many of the variables you stuff you don't want to fiddle with once they're at a nice equilibrium point. > Also, it plods along rather slowly on our pathetic little SE. > though. I agree. This is a sloooow game even in the "fast" mode. I spent an inordinate amount of time doing other stuff (like reading the manual) and checking mail when it was running. A game shouldn't do that. > A lot of variables to be playing with, and a manual that could > choke your average behemoth. Most of what the manual says is intuitive, though there are nice bits of essays at the end. I was frustrated by (perhaps deliberate) omission of a section explaining how each variable interacts with each other. There's a very simplified flowchart at the end of the manual but for some variables, it has so many inputs that it's pretty useless. For example, what affects the Plague level, and how? Plague is grouped with War, Atomic War, Pollution, and Radiation in one box and that box has Civlization, Food, Energy affecting it. Well! How much and in what way do these three variables affect the variables in the box? Do the factors in the box feedback to other variables? I found out that only a tiny change in Food has an incredibly drastic affect on Plague while the advancement of Civilzation doesn't seem to affect the swings of Plague either lower or higher. What about the effects of Medicine? Where's that on the flowchart? In the SimCity manual, it at least said "if you have pollution, then reduce pollution making stuff - and these are the units which increase the pollution level in a city and how." I see less of that in this manual. Maybe this is deliberate, though I question some of the assumptions they made. In any case, don't let me put you off by all these critiques. It's a good game and if you liked SimCity and don't mind plunging a LOT of time into the game, then by all means, order this one. The pluses I see are the experimental mode where you have as much leeway as you want in doing anything you want to your planet, all the scenarios, including Venus, Mars, old Earth and current Earth, etc., very nice graphics, some funky way of setting and showing you the variables, and other stuff. Make sure you order this the day before you have lots of free time though. -- Eiji Hirai @ Mathematics Dept., Swarthmore College, Swarthmore, PA 19081-1397 hirai@cs.swarthmore.edu | hirai@swarthmr.bitnet | uunet!hirai%cs.swarthmore.edu Copyright 1990 by Eiji Hirai. All Rights Reserved. Permission to reproduce or quote explicitly denied except on Usenet. I don't speak for Swarthmore College.