Review by: Bronwyn Lewis
I have a confession: I’m a SimCity addict. And when I saw that EA came out with a version for the iPhone, I knew I had to give it a spin.
At $4.99, I was skeptical. I expected a game dumbed down and stripped of what made it SimCity, or one that was so clunky and overwhelming that I’d give up after 15 minutes. What I found instead was a fairly intuitive and comprehensive version of the game I loved.
They’ve skipped over some of the menu controls, and removed the ability to landscape — though you do have some say over your piece of land when starting a game — but that seems to help in streamlining the game. You still have a ton of control over budget, ordinances, and a cadre of advisors to help you along in the game. Building city infrastructure is not as difficult as I thought it would be, since they force your to build roads, rail, pipes, and power lines in straight lines.
Unfortunately, since you are dealing with a small screen, it can sometimes be hard to see if you’ve missed a plot of land or laid something down exactly where you want it, especially when a large building is in the way — yes, there’s only one angle for your view of the city, though you can zoom in/out at a surprising number of levels.
My biggest concern was saving my game — what would happen after I poured hours into a city, and got a phone call? Thankfully, SimCity handles that seamlessly with autosave, and can also handle multiple save files (one per city, not including autosave).
So if you’re a SimCity fan, or just like the idea of a city living in your pocket, this is a steal — you definitely get your money’s worth.
Jump over to EA’s website for more info about the game.
Download SimCity from iTunes.
July 29th, 2009 at 1:34 pm
[...] reviews of iPhone games – the good, the bad, and the ugly. Currently I have a review of the SimCity iPhone game up on the site, with hopefully more game reviews to [...]