My Two Cents (Happiness / Clutter)

[Shannon]

Correct me if I'm wrong but it doesn't seem like happiness affects your city in any way.

My Suggestions
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Make happiness mean something. Make it affect factory production and/or the amount of coin you receive after cleaning.

In addition to the business / population ratio, implement some type of code that would analyze each residence and business location. If those locations are not 'reachable' - due to the fact that they are surrounded by other business and residences - reduce the happiness. No one wants to live in a city where you leave your front porch just to immediately be in someone else's back yard with no access to road or park.

As a principal, I don't even clean cities that are cluttered beyond belief. Row after row of houses they received from gifts.

I realize this isn't Sim City but I do think there's a huge difference between having row after row of corn in Farm Story and row after row of houses in City Story.

[Unregistered]

I agree, it adds nothing to the game when the easiest way to make money is to clutter your city beyond belief. If instead you made it possible to clean roads and other features, I think that would be a simple solution. Why should you be able to clean a swimming pool but not a playground?

[Unregistered]

As one of the players that use to have a very cluttered city, I got caught up in having to have buildings that my neighbors and vistors could clean. Getting coins for it was a bonus, except when I was trying to save for an expansion of my city. After a few expansions I noticed my city looked nothing like a city, but a building storage area.

When I started redoing my city, I noticed that as I took houses away, and put parks, trees, and playgrounds in my city that nothing really happened to my happiness level. But as soon as I added a few more businesses my happiness level when up to a very big smile. The moral of this story, to keep you happiness level up you need to find the right ratio of business, parks, and houses.

[Unregistered]

ok I like it when people put thought into their city regarless if it is more realistic or some interesting pattern or arrangement, but I think your going too far if you think everyone should have a realistic city with "access roads " every where. get a grip ! You said you don't clean unrealistic cities so what is the problem then?

[Unregistered]

ok I like it when people put thought into their city regarless if it is more realistic or some interesting pattern or arrangement, but I think your going too far if you think everyone should have a realistic city with "access roads " every where. get a grip ! You said you don't clean unrealistic cities so what is the problem then?

If this game were called something like "BuildingJamStory" I could see your response, however this is CITYStory, so that, while it is NOT Sim City, cities SHOULD resemble REAL cities, which have roads giving access to buildings, and even "Air" rights so that tall buildings can not be jammed up against one another, shutting off their windows. I lived in Manhattan (NYC) for twelve years, as well as a number of other cities with skyscrapers, etc . . . I f you cram buildings together NO ONE will LIVE or WORK in them!

As for WHAT is the problem, I have be*** purging my list of neighbors, removing those who have gone with CRAM-JAM building styles AFTER becoming neighbors. As a conscientious e-citizen I began by INFORMING them of my realism stance and giving them ideas of how we could REMAIN neighbors. A NUMBER of these people were IRATE that I would drop them from my cleaning/gift list BECAUSE of this, even using insulting terms! I suppose they were upset that I would stop "gifting" them, and thus diminish their ability to cram even MORE buildings together.

What MOST of the CRAM-JAM crowd do not understand is that simply building a cram of cheap buildings does NOT grow your city! By properly utilizing your factories, clearing the cleaning stars of your own city regularly and, SELLING the cheap units, you can gain coins to build MORE EFFECTIVE units, which is the secret to City growth!!!!

[Unregistered]

I sense that you have some control issues! Why would you inform them of your "criteria" in the first place? Is it your attempt to get neighbors to conform to your " criteria" ?

If they asked why you dropped them and you then told them and then they were insulting, I would be sympathetic regarding the insults. You can keep or drop any neighbor you want for any reason.

However you are dropping them and THEN telling them why as if YOU have some obligation to tell them. You do not! It's rather insulting in fact! No suprise to me that they would be upset especially if "cramjam" is not ugly to tnem. Some players are very young and would be hurt by your remarks too.

There are plenty of realistic cities so it is easy to avoid the row house cities. Also perhaps your standards are impossible to live up to? Cities, by Lava Team design, are a work in progress. Each player needs to solve how to balance making coins with building the city in THEIR own way NOT YOUR way.