Skip to main content

There is a way to play SimCity offline and to increase city size, sort of

simcity 2013 screenshot
Image used with permission by copyright holder

Despite its many, many growing pains, Electronic Arts and Maxis’ new SimCity is by all accounts a very good game. It may not be perfect, and EA’s consumer unfriendly business practices may have irreparably damaged players’ relationship with the long-running simulation series, but SimCity is fun and well made according to a large number of players and critics, and some of the common criticisms leveled against the game are a matter of taste rather than poor design. The new SimCity has been knocked things like offering cities that are confined to smaller spaces than those of the decade-old SimCity 4, but the biggest complaint is that the game can’t be played offline as a purely single-player experience. Good news for players bummed by those aspects of the game: One modder has already found a way to work around the game’s restrictions.

Recommended Videos

Modder UKAzzer published a video of his would-be fixes for of SimCity on Wednesday, showing the game in its debug mode—a testing mode in most games used to experiment with various features—and demonstrated ways to work around the most contentious restrictions. What’s more, even if you break the game’s proper “rules” in the debug mode, EA’s servers will store your city as you made it.

“You can edit highways anywhere—even outside your city boundary,” said UKAzzer, “and even if you quit the game and log back in later, it’s all saved safely on the server. This shows that highway editing will be easily possible, and that editing outside of the artificially small city boundaries should be very viable too.”

With the city size issue addressed, UKAzzer moved on to discuss how the game could effectively be played as a wholly single-player experience offline. If a user is offline for more than twenty minutes, SimCity will automatically kick them out of the game. By going into the debug mode, he was able to set the game’s timer to give him an infinite amount of time, so he’d never be booted out. The game still can’t be saved in this would-be offline mode and there’s no access to any of the game’s new region features – leaving your city’s Sims landlocked – but it does work.

EA’s comment on these debug features? “EA does not comment on rumor and speculation.”

Source: Reddit via Eurogamer

Anthony John Agnello
Anthony John Agnello is a writer living in New York. He works as the Community Manager of Joystiq.com and his writing has…
The best Sims 4 mods

One of the things that makes the Sims 4 one of the best cozy games is how much freedom it gives you in crafting your perfect simulated life. There have been dozens upon dozens of official DLC add-ons for the game over the years that give you more content and options to play with while you wait for Sims 5, but even that is a drop in the bucket compared to what modders have done. These aren't mere Sims 4 cheats; they bring brand-new content and systems into the game at no cost. If you thought the number of official add-ons was overwhelming, wait until you start looking through the mods. Instead, you can just check out our curated list of the best Sims 4 mods.
What is a mod?
If you're here, you probably already know what a mod is, but for those getting into them for the first time, let's go through what a mod is. A mod -- as the name suggests -- is a modification to the game created by a member of the community. Oftentimes, mods are in line with what the community wants, and in some instances, are even more effective than updates implemented by Maxis. Other times, a mod is an outrageous yet fun implementation that makes the game more enjoyable. Modding has become so ingrained in The Sims experience that The Sims 4 has a section in its menu devoted to mods, allowing you to enable them without going through any weird processes on the back end.

The game's developers have embraced mods and recognize that the community loves to create and use them. It's part of the experience. With that in mind, you will need to download the mods you want to use, install them, and enable them from within the game in order for them to function properly. Once you do so, you'll be ready to jump in and try out your new mods.
Master Controller Command Center

Read more
The Sims 4 devs form new team to address the game’s long list of issues
A woman Sim fixing a boiler next to a male Sim in the Sims 4 For Rent expansion.

The Sims 4 may be hitting its 10th birthday soon, but the developers at Maxis are still working to update and fix the game. This time, it's with the help of a new team that will focus specifically on these core issues.

The developers posted a statement on the Sims X (formerly Twitter) account Thursday announcing the move, which they hope will "be able to increase both the number of fixes and the frequency with which we ship these batched updates."

Read more
The Sims 4: For Rent expansion pack pits landlords against tenants
A shot of a Sims 4 building that shows a Sims home broken up into different rental properties.

The Sims 4: City Living, one of the game's many expansion packs, first introduced livable apartments in 2016. For longtime Sims players, this was a welcome addition to the most recent iteration of the long-running series. But since then, players have asked for far more freedom in both apartment gameplay (i.e., playing a Sims family that lives in an apartment) and building.

The Sims 4: For Rent expansion looks to step up and provide players with some long-requested features that haven’t been available before. In a preview event, lead producer Rebecca Doyle and lead designer Jessica Croft took press members through the expansion pack’s features, and even provided the opportunity to play as a property owner.

Read more