City Life
June 13,2006 - It’s been a long time since an economic simulation has caught our fancy. In fact, the last one to make a real impact was 2004’s Rollercoaster Tycoon 3. Obviously, there’s been a dearth of good empire builders, so City Life’s solid design is all the more welcome. It isn’t the most original game, lifting multiple elements from the vaunted Sim City series, but it ties everything together well while letting the player explore his city from a citizen’s perspective. There’s also a nifty social class element that adds an interesting twist, although some may dislike the game’s dependence on economic class as its primary distinguishing factor. Yet for its few quirks and familiar conventions, City Life is a satisfying, sit-back-and-relax gaming experience that most armchair architects will appreciate.

There are two play modes in City Life. You can either choose a goal-based scenario, which may require a population or economic benchmark to be surpassed, or free mode, which is allows you to build and advance at your leisure. There are multiple lots available in various climate zones, and once you choose a favored locale, you place a city hall and get started.

Your first step is to gain citizens, and while you only start with single-family dwellings, your options will grow significantly over time. The question that will always be first and foremost on your mind, however, is what kind of people you want in the neighborhood. There are a total of six economic classes in City Life, and which kinds of people move in depend on the businesses you build and the leisure activities available nearby. The poorest citizens, known as the Have-Nots, are content to work at waste factories and hang out at basketball courts, while your Fringe inhabitants (apparently, the lower middle class professionals) like working for video game developers and print shops.

You want to be careful how you distribute your classes, since Elites and Blue Collars don’t always see eye to eye. It’s not as easy as keeping your neighborhoods entirely distinct, however. For example, you can build restaurants for your upper classes, but they will require lower classes as employees, and each business has a limited area of influence, at least until you develop public transportation. If you tailor each neighborhood to a single type of citizen, they may have jobs, but there may not be anyone to work in the hospitals or restaurants, or to maintain recreation facilities or schools.

You can’t just make each area a class free-for-all, however. Too much class intermingling causes unrest, and you may have to contend with riots or protestors outside City Hall. City Life doesn’t promote the “separate but equal” mindset exactly, but it certainly encourages class division, which makes us wonder if City Life’s primary strategic element is also a political statement as well as a gameplay contrivance. If there’s any political commentary to be gleaned, however, you’d have to search deeply. As it is, juggling the needs of your citizens is the only way to ensure profitability, and economic stability is as good as any other way to distinguish how those needs should be met.

City Life makes it easy to get information, thanks to a streamlined interface. You can also minimize any aspect of the HUD you want, which lets you enjoy the sights better than when a window is stretched over the display. If you are losing money, you can pull up a list of your most- and least-profitable business, and then click them to zoom right to them, where you can demolish it and replace it, or construct others to better complement it. You can click on any building to find out how many inhabitants it has, how many employees it needs, and what classes are attracted to it. It will also indicate its diameter of influence, so you can determine if you need to build more shops or police stations. Icons over buildings will also give a quick indication of any missing needs, and a window in the lower right warns of any impending problems, such as fires or high unemployment levels.

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