This next game is not a new effort, and yet it has been enjoying renewed interest of late around the Web and it deserves a play through if you're unfamiliar with it.
Following the trail blazed by the tremendous popularity of On's Eyezmaze Grow series of casual Web games, two enterprising young Flash developers used that inspiration to create a sim-ilar game with a SimCity-like theme.
Created by Nick Pfeifer and Aaron Hibberd, Cityscape puts you in charge of breathing life into an otherwise undeveloped land mass by choosing the building order for the elements that make up a standard city.
Simply click on the small icons in the bottom right corner of the game window to build residential areas, industry, an airport, seaport, amusement park, etc. The order you choose determines how far each of the areas develops and matures via a process of leveling up, just as in the Grow games. Once you you are finished adding all 18 elements, you are scored out of a total 60 possible points. And just like Grow, if at first you don't succeed, try, try again.
Analysis: The first time I saw this game about a year ago, I passed on it because I was expecting just a little bit more after having just played the original Grow. And while Cityscape may lack the intricately detailed and delightful animations that On puts into all of his games, it does present a hearty challenge with its many more elements.
Another difference I noticed between the two game designs is in the way leveling-up is handled. With On's Grow, although there exists some dependencies between elements (one requiring another to be present to level-up, for instance), each element generally levels-up on its own with each passing round. In Cityscape, the leveling-up appears to be more cause-and-effect than a passing of time. While this may be easier to implement, and even seem logical when building the rule set for a game like this, it also causes an unpleasant side effect that reduces the depth of gameplay. For example: if adding a commercial area influences the interstate to level up, then adding the commercial area before the interstate will never cause the interstate to level-up, even after it is added.
Games of this kind are difficult to design and become exponentially unwieldy with each new element added to the number available to choose from. Considering this fact and the sheer volume of possible combinations, the authors did a commendable job putting together a decent and very playable game that will appeal to fans of the Grow series, as well as to those that just like a good logic puzzle to solve. Click.
Cheers to Dan, Matt and Kevin for suggesting the game. =)
Cityscape walkthrough now available!
Comments (may contain spoilers)
Wow. This is hard. the best I've gotten is 33. here's a hint:
Lol i got 34 but i dont remember what I did... Hint:
yay for the mention! I think I got to 36 once, but I have no clue what I did. With 18 choices, it's hard to run through all of the iterations. 18! hard. (And that's factorial, not an exclamation mark.)
i only got 22 :'(
The walkthrough if interested:
i got a 60/60!! after 60 million tries! haha.. it was pretty mind-boggling.
This game misses the point I liked best in oryginal Grow games - the wonderfull animations and sound.
Althrought - people who appreciate "mind" part more than visual one may like this one too.
Purely based on guessing, lacks the sense of accomplishment at the end and all of the fun and creativity Eyemaze has.
What the heck is that song, anyway? I like it, very mellow.
Hahahaaa!!!! I FINALLY BEAT IT!!! Mayor Annie, Brackenwood is a cityscape!! WOOOHOOO!! don't ask me why i named it after Brackenwood, I dunno... i liek brackenwood :). I LUV THE MUSIC!! IM LISTNING TO IT RITE NOW!!! Anyway...
fishing,mining,airport,themepark,seaport,media,health,religion,police,army,tourists.
SO DANG COOL!!
Via the posted walkthrough, I got my 60/60... And after I read the walkthrough, I realized that I would have never figured out the order by myself.
Anyway, I always enjoy seeing the daily updates! Keep up the good work Jay!
Chris
the order in the solution walkthru doesnt make much real world sense.
What I thought was the strangest thing about the game was the fact that
it was hard. took about 20 mins just to get an idea of the order.
I dislike games that change cursors on me for NO reason.
blech, i hate games like this because i suck so badly at them...32/60...sad day!
Not as good as grow, too much guess work
Hahah, I thought it odd that education wasn't right after residential, police was almost last, and health came later too. I mea, what city prospers without hospitals, police and schools? go figure!
I also had a "Wuh?" moment when
...wuh?
I don't mind minimalist graphics/animation.
But I do mind that none of the elements are labeled or color coded. When something levels up, you should at least know what's being levelled up, not just a random gray block that I can't tell from other blocks.
It was pretty cool. Saw it for the first time today and beat it after playing for a bit, taking a shower and thinking about what improves what, then going back at it. 5 mins later it was done.
Here's the entire walkthrough, slightly different from some in one or two ways:
Explore
Survey
Residence
Industry
Interstate
Commerce
Education
Fishing
Mining
Airport
Theme Park
Media
Seaport
Health
Police
Religion
Army
Tourism
great game to play at work - trial and error, trial and error. finally got it though, 60/60, such a great gotdang feeling! 18 to 34 to 42 to 45 to 48 to 49 to 60!
if you want 60/60 heres the walkthrough !!
Personally, I can't stand games that force you to listen to their choice of awful music. How hard is it to allow you to turn the darn thing off! (Yes, I know I can turn my speakers off, but I want to listen to something else and can't because they want to force some new age John Tesh music down our throats.)
it's a good game but if you don't get the point of i't, it's hard. I like it because it reminds me about GROW.
City Scape
Walkthrough
This game isnt any fun..... i thought it might be but the order makes no sence. the best game like this that actually goes in order is sandbox of god!!! that game is the hissy shizzy buizzy lizzy nizzy for all you gaming fizzles out there.
Harry
60/60! :D
Posted by:
Sarah 
|
April 12, 2006 10:12 PM
This one was rather hard and didnt seem to make much sense to me. I was able to figure out the first two sequence and also the last, because they actually made sense, but apart from that not really. Grow cube was much better. Does anyone know where you can get any more mind boogling games?
it took me a few hours but i finally worked a 21/60 up to a 60/60. Its very helpful to write down the steps you take each time you do it and plan out your next controlled move to see what works
YES!!! The quickest and easiest way to get 60/60 for me was this! Just click on the spoiler button!
I was Mayor Maynot, City of Skidmark
Jay, you're not quite right in saying that the elements of On's games simply level over time. The difference in progression between this game and the GROW series is that Cityscape's level system is event triggered, while GROW games have a state-based level method--level of GROW elements is affected by both existence and level of other elements. I think event-triggered leveling would be appropriate for some types of game, but doesn't serve so well in a city-building sim.
Hmm, well that's an over-simplification to what I wrote, but I do agree with you, as I did in my review. ;)
Posted by:
jay |
June 28, 2006 10:31 AM
yes i beat it mayor Nguyen, Viet town is a cityscape i got a 60/60 Anyway walkthrough below:
Surveyors
Residential
Industrial
Interstate
Commerce
Education
Fishing
Mining
Airport
Theme Park
Seaport
Media
Health
Religion/or Police
Police/or Religion
Army
Tourism
this game was terrible. its completely random. a game like GROW makes you think of every possible thing that could happen and in every order it would have to happen. not cityscape though. just because its "hard" doesnt mean its a "thinker" it just means that no effort was put into making it an actual, playable, game.
Yeah, this game is kind of a letdown. The order makes no sense and I don't really know how it is you're supposed to figure it out. With most puzzle games with definite solutions, I'm usually kicking myself for not figuring it out sooner, but really, with a game like this the solution doesn't really make more sense after than before.
It's pretty much all been said already, but what is up with the graphics? Seriously, how much time did it take the guy to make this? One hour? If it took someone more than an hour to make a game like this, he has serious problems with computers.
The most annoying thing was, after closing the popup, even when browsing away from this page (Alt+Home ftw) the music kept playing... had to close the browser to get rid of it
Posted by:
Nathanyel |
October 12, 2006 5:02 AM
woo hoo, Mayor Matthews, Citiopolis is a cityscape
cool game but i don't really get the order, it really makes no sense at all! it's very odd that fishing and mining come AFTER industrial:S that's not really logical at all..
but well, the whole order makes no sense.. it was a fun game to play though, for some minutes..
not too difficult, it's a trial and error really.
this game is pretty cool eyemaze is cool too but they both make you think so i think there equal
it was great!!!
well i dont know and i try the first to the list and i got it!!!
I find the level-ups are just too ILLOGICAL!!!
Why would
Waaaa!
I liked the music.It was calming and cool.
And the order wasn't so great,but oh well.the game itself was good, at least.Graphics, bad, I know, but theses guys, overall, made a pretty good game out of just flash. The game they made cityscape from, Sim city,
used a bunch of 3-d animation and stuff so it wasnt easy to make a game like that from flash.
Anyway, here's the spoiler.
Surveyors
Residential
Industrial
Interstate
Commerce
Education
Fishing
Mining
Airport
Theme Park
Seaport
Media
Health
Religion/or Police
Police/or Religion
Army
Tourism
Hey i have to say this was a hard game, but if you want that will drive you nuts!!!, then you want to try Submachine, without any walkthrough until you've given up. Of Course by now there are actually 4, it's an ongoing chapter thing, so make sure to try them all in order, or you'll get even more messed up. good luck guys ;)=
Good Game....Just took forever to get the order!!
lol! got 60 easy
This game is dumb. the order is so messed up. If this game was in real life the worlds going to blow up!!!!!!!!!
Be careful next time!
I loved it. it was confusing at first, but then I caught on. It was amazingly done, and I loved the music. I litterally turned this on JUST for the music now that I've beaten it, and it's hard to make me like music! and the gameplay is so smooth, too.
this is a good game and it is a very challenging game so thanks to all that helped so if you need help
I do not get why
How very strange.
I did it I did it!
I got a 57/60 i named it GROW City.
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The walkthrough if interested:
Posted by: Tylor | March 4, 2006 2:47 AM