Sim City 4 Deluxe Edition with Rush Hour Expansion

I been up sometimes to 3 am working with my cities.

I was in local government for 15 years and this game is also very realistic with traffic problems, budget problems, other officals who sometimes put their own interests above others and so on.

After reading some of the reviews I have a few tips for who ever is interested.

Computer Tips:

1.) Turn off antivirus software while installing and playing the game (this goes for about every game)
2.) Check for video card driver updates and direct x updates

Game Play Hints:

1.) Try and keep your schools in a central location in your residential areas, that way you can use less bus funding. Also do the same with your public services.
2.) Don't build any fire dept until the public safety dude is yelling at you.
3.) Try not to let the game auto place your streets when zoning. Build your own first and then zone around them and make sure the arrows are pointing to the street.
4.) When doing a lot of street building and zoning pause the game, it cuts down on the distractions
5.) You can sneak funding down a little on public ultities.
6.) You can sneak taxes up a little over time without too many problems.

Sim City 4 Deluxe is worth having.

Another major improvement is in the increased flexibility in building up each of your cities. Remember how, in previous SimCity versions, it's such a pain to figure out where to place your streets within your zones? Not anymore; each time you lay out a zone, whether it be Residential, Commercial or Industrial, the game will automatically lay down a grid of streets for you! That saves A LOT of time right there. Also, remember how you had to blow up your streets in order to replace them with bigger streets? Now, it's a lot easier, because first of all, the road system is much better organized. For example, when you start building a town, you start by using the simple, narrow streets (which are now specifically labeled as being "streets"). However, as people move in and your streets begin to get crowded with traffic, you can then upgrade to wider roads. Eventually, as traffic begins to overwhelm your roads, you may upgrade to wide avenues. All you need to do to "upgrade" is to simply drag a road along a street, or an avenue along a road and---boom!---it automatically changes to a road or avenue. No more having to demolish anything in the process!

The Rush Hour Expansion Pack just adds a new dimension to the game: now you can go out on selected "missions" by car, boat---even helicopter---and earn new buildings, more money, etc. for your city. Admittedly, I'm still trying to get the hang of these missions, as they aren't too easy, but it's still a cool feature for the game. Also, the buildings and airports are in much better detail now, and there is far greater variety of them. There are also many new landmarks to choose from; they are in much greater detail and there is no longer any limit how many you may place. (However, you now have to pay to place them.) There are many new rewards for being a good Mayor, too!

My hope is that with SIMCITY 5, they will make everything more 3-D and will finally provide us with the ability for a ground-level Pedestrian View; imagine being able to walk the streets and boulevards of your own cities, drive around, even take your own trains! I think the possibilities are endless. Till then, this will have to do. But, for what it's worth, it's still a pretty darn good game!

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED FOR SIM FANS