»SimCity 4
»Harrisburg PA
»Negishi
»Wataru
»Wuphons Reach
»Atashi
»Bayview
»Blue Bottle
»Blye
»Dartmoore
»Dee Five
»Diesto
»Doogiezop
»Eaton Gorge
»Faven
»Greenleaf
»Jenza
»Kebsun
»Kirkenes
»Montessa
»North Bend
»Oestrang
»Ollissary
»Orange Seven
»Ossia
»Oyster Bay
»Patrilii
»Reikishi
»River Bend
»Saotome
»Scelle
»Shinobu
»Slade Canyon
»Socksville
»South Bend
»Tulinick
»Weedzuck
»Westview
Wuphons Reach - Slade Canyon
Slade Canyon lies just west of River Bend along the south edge of the region. The primary concept behind this zone was to provide a link between the coastal plains in the western half of the region and the river valley in the southeast corner. The middle of the western half is a rolling valley that serves as the base of a "mountain pass" so that roads and rail lines can be connected to neighboring zones. Building anything complex is going to be difficult given the rolling nature of the terrain, so this zone may not get much of any development (other then enough to pay for rail lines) until the connecting zones are finished. (Feb-2-2003)Update (Feb-7-2003): Plans change, experience changes the player and all that... I'm not exactly sure at this point what Slade Canyon is going to turn into, but it now has (3) neighboring cities. South Bend to the east is a major metropolis of 100k+. Montessa to the north is growing like a well water weed. Blue Bottle to the west is just getting started, but holds promise of a very large city as well.
Terrain Development
Terrain development began with creating the river valley and letting it slowly rise up to the level of the rest of the tile (which had been initially set at an altitude of about 12-15 "clicks" above base level). I then applied the Erosion tool to start randomizing the terrain a bit and to give me ideas for where to put hills and mountains. After that comes the process of adding mountains, and iterating through all of the surrounding zones, slowly matching up edges with the Reconcile Edges tool.
Pre-planning rails/roads
As with the development of River Bend, I began the process by playing around with a throw-away city and checking the layout of rail lines and roads.
Starting out - laying the rail lines for real
Since I needed to develop this city to drive growth in South Bend, I came back and laid out the rail lines and connected them up to all 4 of the neighboring city tiles. Cost to do this was probably $30k or so as some of the bits were more difficult then others. I did spend some time in god mode first, making sure the areas around the river canyon were level enough and gently sloped enough to permit those important rail connections to find their way to the upper portions of the mountain pass.
Growing the city
Slade Canyon was actually pretty easy to grow. I found a flat area along the southwest edge that was well suited to building a starting city core at. Once again, I hit a budget crunch about 5-10 years in (adding health and education... which I had resisted adding for the first few years) so I ended up making the business deals for the federal prison and army base.
