Make a Successful City in SimCity 4

Sim City 4 is a fantastic game but is rather frustrating. You may regret spending 30 dollars buying a game you cannot enjoy. If this is what you're thinking, I may be able to help you.

Steps

  1. Create a new region. Pick plains. At first you have the chance to be "God" and create valleys, mountains, mesas, lakes, animals, and so on. I suggest making a plateau in the center and covering the land with trees. Do not make animals! Eventually you will destroy their habitat and make the llama people aggravated. Once you've created a sensible and mostly flat region,turn on mayor mode and name your city any desirable name of your choosing.
  2. Choose what to build and develop first. The key in making a successful city is the order in which you build things. Another vital ingredient is extreme patience. All of my successful cities took hours of careful placement and risky decisions. In the long run, they all pay off. Anyway,the first thing you should do is place a natural gas power plant in the corner of your city.
  3. Place a road adjacent to it and drag it down to the bottom middle of your city. Once there create a decent sized medium-residential zone and at least one medium sized park. Drag a power line from the plant to the neighborhood.
  4. Stop there and pause the simulation. Unlike Sim city 1, 2, and 3, you do not need to create every single building and rely on resource trade. Sim City 4 will cream you if you use this tactic. Instead you will rely on taxes. Although neighbor deals can be helpful you have to create a city to deal with. There are no already-made cities neighboring you. So you will need to open the tax menu and crank high, medium, and low wealth residential taxes to at least 8.5% and all wealth industrial to 9%. Move Commercial taxes to 7.5% and un-pause the simulation.
  5. Make some money. Go to the city ordinance menu. First click "legalize gambling". This will add 100 dollars to your income. Then click the "smoke detector ordinance". I will explain that one later.
  6. Go back to the power plant and take its funding down to one light bulb efficiency. This will help a lot.
  7. Create a small area of dense industry away from the neighborhood and near the power plant. Make sure it has road connection, otherwise it can't create jobs and will be a waste of your your money. Now make a road connection above the power plant and create some agricultural zones. I know what your thinking but skyscrapers and big cities won't be here for a while. All of my successful cities started as cruddy industry towns or rural villages.
  8. Expand your medium density neighborhood just a little. Remember do not build civic buildings or water systems yet. At this point they are not mandatory.
  9. Wait a bit and let things happen. Your city population should have at least 350 residents before the next step.
  10. Now on the far side of your neighborhood, away from pollution and power plants, create a small low-density commercial center. Do not make it big! Commercial zoning is very important, if it overwhelms the residents, it will be abandoned, but if it is ignored, it will never grow mid and high wealth office.
  11. Wait until your population reaches 500 for this next step.
    • By now you have the mayors house and should have placed it in the neighborhood. It will attract mid and high wealth residents after a while. Now your income should be at least 500 away from your expense. And you should be pulling in some small cash now. Now lets build some civic. We can only afford one thing right now, so we don't break budget. On one side of the neighborhood build an elementary school. Look at the number of students. It should be far from the maximum capacity. Take the funding down to a point where the capacity is about 20 over how many students you have. Now on the other side of the neighborhood build one local library. It's funding should be simultaneous to the school. Leave it that way. Now expand the residential area a little more and build one more farm then let the game sit for a while.
    • At this point you should have a population between 850 and 1,450. Hopefully you've at least reached 1,000. You should have a house of worship by now and should have placed it near the neighborhood. Now expand your commercial center just a little same with the neighborhood and we should be ready for some new ideas.
  12. Build one or two water towers. Build them near the commercial center. If you build near the power plant and industry, you will need to invest in an expensive water treatment plant. Only place the pipes under the residential and commercial zones. Once finished expand the dense industrial zone and let the game sit.
  13. Have Smoke Detectors! They help your budget greatly. By now its time for another civic and that's a small fire station. Why, you may ask? Simple, your industrial zone should be blazing right now. Here, let me explain. Civics(and landfills/incinerators) are extremely expensive investments, unfortunately they will become valuable necessities. My opinion on fire stations and police stations alike; why invest when not needed? Don't protect fires until one is created. At this point your industrial zone should have caught on fire, create a small fire station near the industrial zones and take its funding way down. Even if the red ring doesn't cover the whole city, which it won't, the firemen will still drive out to the neighborhood. Back to smoke detectors, without this ordinance you would have to invest in fire coverage before water and education. Water and education are much more significant than fire coverage. Smoke detectors prevent most fires until this point in time. And by the way, by this point in time your population should be somewhere between 1,600 and 2,500.
  14. Continue expanding slowly and maybe consider making your low-density commercial into a medium-commercial zone. Remember to ignore Neil Fairbanks and Monique Diamond and that bunch because as a mayor you know who is best. And we know what the people want.
  15. Stay patient. You should be receiving the cemetery and a few high tech industries should be appearing remember patience and order. Hospitals and Police Stations won't be too soon in your future. Maybe around a 5,500 population just for one. Go hospital first, then landfill, police, and eventually around a 17,000 population you get a recycling center and an incinerator.
  16. Make some neighboring cities, start lowering taxes, and slowly expand. Eventually you will have zero farms and an incredible demand for high-rise. Dense zoning will come for that and a full power/water system. Consider airports and private schools. Never except a business deal unless it's a casino. And make sure your casino has a police station nearby. Soon you'll have skyscrapers, landmarks, and 2% tax rates. I have to go, so make your urban utopia with your decisions now. Please ask any questions you may have and check out my suggested ordinances in the tip menu.



Tips

  • Once you have enough money for landmarks you should consider more than the smoke detectors and casinos; Here are suggested ordinances:
    • Tire Recycling
    • Nuclear Free Zone
    • Clean Air Act
    • Commuter Shuttle Service
    • Junior Sports
    • Pro-Reading Campaign
    • Neighborhood Watch
    • Free Clinic
    • and Especially, Tourist Promotion Program

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