SimCity 2000 has been tested with many, many extensions with few or no
problems - however, we cannot guarantee that there will not be conflicts. It's
possible that, if certain extensions are loaded in a certain order, or in certain configurations, SimCity 2000 might not work correctly. If you do have problems running SimCity 2000, we suggest re-starting with extensions off. To do this, select Restart from the Special menu, and hold down the Shift key until you see the "Welcome to Macintosh" screen with the text "Extensions Off". When you are finished playing SimCity 2000, restart your machine again and your extensions will load properly.
Make Sure You Are Running In 32-Bit Mode (If Possible)
In your Control Panel folder, select the Memory control panel and make sure that 32-Bit Addressing is enabled. Some machines will not have this option available. If this is the case, 32-bit addressing is probably not the source of the problem.
Upgrade To Sound Manager 3.0
We also recommend upgrading your system software with the Sound Manager 3.0 extension available from many online services (including the Maxis Technical Support BBS at 1-510-254-3869) or directly from Apple Computer.
Switch To 256 Colors (660av Users Especially)
SimCity 2000 automatically switches your Macintosh to 256-color mode if it is not already set, and returns it to the original color depth when exiting. Some Macintoshes display erratic behavior when this happens (e.g., the Newspaper display draws pixels on the top area of your screen and doesn't display newspaper articles when you click on newspaper article headings). The solution is to manually switch your Macintosh color depth to 256. This is done in the Monitors control panel.
Beware Of Screen Savers
Certain windows in SimCity 2000™ may not re-draw after some screen savers have cleared the screen. This will leave you with a white window and no idea what to do with it. The buttons in these windows are still active; just keep clicking around until you hit something. In some situations, Delrina's Bill'n'Opus screen saver may conflict. We recommend disabling the screen saver while SimCity 2000 is running.
Speed Issues
On slower machines, you can improve performance by zooming all the way in and reducing the size of the edit window. Also, pausing the simulation will speed up the editing tools.
Virtual Memory
SimCity 2000 will work with Virtual Memory enabled, although performance will suffer noticeably.
Importing/Exporting Files To SimCity 2000 DOS And SimCity Classic
SimCity 2000 Macintosh can import SimCity Classic Macintosh files directly from the Load Game dialogue box. To import files from SimCity 2000 DOS or SimCity Classic DOS, you will need to add a bit of header information to tell your Macintosh that the file is a SimCity 2000 or SimCity Classic file. This can be done automatically through several DOS-to-Mac utilities (such as Apple File Exchange or Access PC) or through ResEdit (or any other file manipulation utility, such as Resourcerer). If the file is a SimCity Classic DOS file, you need to change the File Type to "CITY" and the Creator to "MCRP". If the file is a SimCity 2000 DOS file, you need to change the File Type to "CITY" and the creator to "SCDH". In ResEdit, this is done by opening the saved game file and selecting GET INFO FOR <cityname> (<cityname> will be whatever the name of the city is). There, you will find the entries for File Type and Creator. Be sure to do this on a backup of your city file, just in case something goes wrong.
Problems With Games Imported From SimCity Classic
In SimCity Classic, it was possible to use the bulldoze tool to cut a hole in residential zones and place another zone in that hole. When these cities are imported into SimCity 2000™, the resulting structure may appear as a brown rectangle (kind of like a hole in the world). To clean this up, you'll need to bulldoze that area and re-zone over it. The brown rectangle won't cause any problems; it just looks ugly. Certain other configurations of bridges and objects may also cause these brown holes. You can use the Query tool to see what kind of object should be there and then bulldoze the area and rebuild it if you like. In addition, be aware that rails no longer work properly without rail depots. Cities that are based solely around rail systems without roads will fail unless you place down some railroad depots where sims can get on and off the trains.
II. GAME PLAY ISSUES
Micro-Simulators (Important!)
When querying some structures, you get specific information about that structure. For instance, querying on a police station will tell you how many crimes and arrests were handled by that station, and querying on a school will tell you how many teachers and students are attending, as well as the average grade of the students. Most placeable structures have these micro-simulators (police and fire stations, schools, colleges, most power plants, the Mayor's House, arcologies, etc.). Some structures share one micro-simulator for all the structures placed. Things like bus stations, railroad depots, marinas, libraries, windmills, and hydroelectric power plants, among others, have one micro-simulator for each category (one micro-simulator for all the bus stations, one for all the railroad depots, etc.). Where is all this headed, you ask? Well, each city can only have 150 micro-simulators in it. If you go beyond that, the structure you place will still affect your city (police stations will still stop crime, bus stations will still carry passengers, arcologies will still hold people, etc.); you just won't be able to see any in-depth information on those structures. This isn't going to harm your city in any way. We're just telling you this because it's pretty easy to run out of micro-simulators in a large city and we don't want you thinking something's wrong.
Newspaper Strikes
Sometimes, SimCity 2000 will not be able to load the newspaper into available memory. In these cases, the newspaper will go "on strike." We recommend freeing up more memory for SimCity 2000 by quitting other open applications or restarting with extensions off (see above).
Terrain Editing
If you are building a city and go into the terrain edit mode, your city will disappear, but any trees or water that you have placed in the city will show up in terrain edit mode. Also, if you have placed a bridge or other structure that needs to build landfill, it will also show up in terrain edit mode. These can be removed with the lower terrain or level terrain tools.
Airports
Keep in mind when building an airport that it needs space for a runway, or it will not build. Your best bet is to build the airport 2 tiles by 6 tiles, and make sure that no tall buildings are nearby; SimCity 2000 pilots are not known for their avoidance skills! In addition, make sure that airports are adequately powered. Some airport tiles will not build unless power lines are run to that tile (just to be safe, we recommend covering the entire airport area with power lines).
Water Pumps
"I keep adding pumps, but I don't see water in this part of my city!" Water does not flow from pumps (it does in reality, but not in SimCity 2000). It flows from the center of your city (more or less). Zoom out and view your entire city to see if the pumps/towers/etc. you have just added are having any effect. Also, remember that pumps need to be powered and connected via pipes to the rest of your water network to contribute.
Funny Noises
"My computer is making explosions, but nothing is blowing up!" or "What's that funny growling I hear?" The explosions are most likely from airplanes crashing into tall buildings in the flight path. If you have No Disasters selected, the planes will crash and blow up, but there will be no resulting damage or fire. The growling could be from a zoo... or it could be from that which lurks below the surface of the lake....
Dispatching
"I placed thirty or forty fire trucks to put out my fire, and now when I try to place more it just makes a noise, but I don't see anything." SimCity 2000 can only handle about thirty or forty dispatched units at once, and any units placed after that do not appear and don't do any good. (Pretend that you only have a forty-channel emergency radio.)
Trains, Planes, And Cars
Sometimes these things get stuck (in the case of planes and trains) or look like they don't connect (in the case of roads or rails). Don't worry about it - just because things look ugly doesn't mean they really are. Your sims are still happily flying around or commuting just like they're supposed to.
Hotkeys
SHIFT - Press while dragging a zone, power line, road, rail, or other draggable item to cancel the placement.
- Hold down to temporarily turn cursor into the Query tool.
- Hold down and click on buttons or windows to get Help.
- Hold down using Tree tool in the Terrain Edit Mode to remove trees.
B - Hold down to temporarily turn cursor into the Bulldoze tool.
OPTION - Hold down to temporarily turn the cursor into the Centering tool.
HOME - Zooms the view in one level.
END - Zooms the view out one level.
DEL - Rotates the world 90 degrees counter-clockwise.
PAGEDOWN - Rotates the world 90 degrees clockwise.
CURSOR KEYS - Scrolls the view of the world.
Things Fixed In Version 1.1
The budget should work properly now, transit figures should be correct (and stay that way.)
The Bulldoze Tool should always default to Bulldoze instead of whatever tool was last used. This should prevent accidental mass destruction caused by forgetting that the last bulldoze tool being used was Raise/Lower/Level Terrain.
Airports should build correctly now (the ratio of towers to runways should be better.)
Several problems that show up with more than 7 stadiums/teams should be gone.
Figures in the Analysis window (from the City Hall query window) should stay correct.
Sometimes, destroying bridges would leave an un-usable shoreline tile. This should be fixed.
Querying on certain tiles of the Forest Arcology in certain situations would report bare land, this should not happen.
Arcologies that do not have micro-simulators attached should now affect population (populations far greater than 9.1 million should be attainable.)
There is a new button when using the query tool on a library.
Placing highway and re-enforced bridges now charges the user correctly.
Schools should work properly at population levels above 60,000.
The date should now properly display above 9,999 years.
The power graph should be more accurate.
This Read Me file has been updated.
Legal Stuff
ResEdit, Apple File Exchange, Sound Manager 3.0, Resourcerer and Access PC are copyrights of their respective owners.
This text file is in the public domain and may be freely distributed. SimCity 2000 and
SimCity 2000 1.1 are NOT in the public domain and may not be freely distributed.
Special thanks to Simon Slavin, Kevin Endo, and the Internet community (you know who you are) for helping get this rev. (and readme) in shape.
