The patch is being prepped for deployment later this week, and aims to improve traffic, add variation to hotels, and fix bugs.
If you are one of the five people still playing the colossal train wreck that is SimCity (2013) you might be interested to know that Maxis is prepping another major patch for the game, due out later this week. Patch 3.0 promises to fix traffic issues (I thought the last patch was supposed to do that?), add a bunch of new hotel models to increase variety, and fix a some other issues. If it’s anything like the previously released patch 2.0, it will also introduce a whole new suite of bugs to frustrate its dwindling playerbase.
Other tweaks to the game include changes to ground and air pollution. Trees now last longer, but eliminate less ground pollution, and radiation will generate less ground pollution. Air pollution should also be ‘fixed’, no longer generating large amounts of phantom pollution for no reason.
Some bugfixes to trading, including improving the reliability of gifting and making sewage trading more reliable, should come as a welcome relief to those of you whose cities are literally drowning in fecal matter following the 2.0 sewage bug. Resource and delivery trucks will also no longer permanently vanish if they get stuck in regional traffic for too long.
I feel like this is a big case of too little, too late. No matter how many minor bugfix patches Maxis releases (despite giving them big whole numbers and claiming that they are major patches), the game is way too far gone for most people to care. The only patch that would get people to actually sit up and pay attention would be the one that removes the need to be constantly connected to play and increases the city size limits.
Despite modders and hackers proving quite easily just how arbitrary the online and city size limitations are, EA and Maxis have flat out refused to give comment, hoping that if they just ignore the problem people will forget about it in time for Battlefield 4.
Maxis previously released some free DLC for the game, via two bizarre product-placement tie-ins with a toothpaste company, and an electric car manufacturer.
Will Wright, the man who created the SimCity franchise, recently said that SimCity (2013)‘s server issues were “inexcusable”.
Source: SimCity 3.0 Patch Notes
