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- SIMCITY 2000 (TM)
- Last Minute Info
- 12/27/93
- -----------------
-
- Please read _ALL_ of this document! This stuff is important!
-
- It covers a lot about memory, installation, various graphics cards and
- sound cards, gameplay issues, importing cities from other versions of
- SimCity 2000 and hot keys.
-
- ** MOST IMPORTANT STUFF--ABOUT MEMORY
-
- SimCity 2000 requires a lot of memory to run--4 MB total, but also a lot
- of free memory in the conventional 640K range. On some machines, even if
- you have the required 4 MB, SimCity 2000 may report that you do not have
- enough free extended or conventional memory. If this is the case, your
- best alternative is to create a boot disk as outlined on page 6 of the
- SimCity 2000 DOS Addendum/Quick Start Guide. Another solution that may
- help is to install SimCity 2000 with No Sound and No Music selected. If
- you have already installed SimCity 2000, you can change your current
- sound, music, and video settings by running the INSTALL.EXE program in
- the SimCity 2000 directory.
-
- We recommend that you not load any memory managers or disk cache
- utilities while running SimCity 2000. Especially if you are using
- DOS 6 on a machine with only 4 MB RAM.
-
- If you are using a memory manager, you MUST NOT have it set in auto
- mode--this will cause a conflict with SimCity 2000.
-
-
- If you are using MS-DOS 6 and absolutely must load EMM386.EXE,
- you will need to either have the EMS size set to 'noems' or larger
- than 4096. See your DOS manual for information on how to do this.
-
-
- ** INSTALLING STUFF
-
- Video Selection
- ---------------
- The SimCity 2000 installer will attempt to figure out what kind of
- video card you have in your machine. If it can, it will list that card
- in the video selection window. If it is not sure what kind of video
- card you have, or the installer detects a VESA driver in memory (or
- in BIOS), it will default to the VESA VIDEO DRIVER. You can click on
- the arrow to the right of the VESA VIDEO DRIVER entry for a list of
- other cards that the installer thinks you might have. If your card is
- on this list, you can select it instead of the defaulted VESA driver.
-
- Sound Selection
- ---------------
- SimCity 2000 cannot automatically detect what kind of sound card you
- have in your machine. You will need to pick your sound card(s)
- out of the lists provided. The installer will then try to verify the
- presence of that sound card in your machine. If the installer is
- unable to detect the sound card you have specified, certain hardware
- settings on your card may be different than what SimCity 2000 is
- expecting. To change these settings, select the Change Settings
- option from the sound card verification window (Where it says "OK"
- or "Failed!"). For more information on these hardware settings, see
- the manual that came with your sound card.
-
-
- ** VIDEO CARD SUPPORT
-
- VESA Drivers
- ------------
- SimCity 2000 supports a variety of different video cards and VESA mode
- 101 (640x480x256 colors). VESA stands for Video Electronics Standards
- Association. If you do not find your video card listed by name in the
- installer, we recommend that you pick VESA VIDEO DRIVER and run a
- VESA driver supported by your video card before booting SimCity 2000.
- Some video cards have built-in VESA drivers so you won't need to
- manually load a driver. Other video cards have an external file that
- needs to be run from the DOS command line before running SimCity 2000.
- Others, like the Diamond Viper VLB, have the VESA driver built into
- the video card BIOS, but you still need to tell the card to load the
- driver before running SimCity 2000. In the case of the Diamond Viper
- VLB, you would need to type 'VPRMODE VESA' [Enter} at the command line
- to load the driver.
-
- If the VESA driver is an external program, it would probably be found
- on the disks that came with your video card. If you don't have a VESA
- driver you should contact your video card manufacturer. We have
- included VESA drivers for most popular cards on your SimCity 2000
- disk 1.
-
- ATI Ultra Pro or Mach 32 Video Cards
- ------------------------------------
- If you have an ATI Ultra Pro or other card based on the Mach 32 chip,
- you must run the included utility MW_ATIUP.EXE before playing
- SimCity, for complete compatibility.
-
- Simply type: MW_ATIUP [Enter]
- then type: SC2000 [Enter]
-
- to use your ATI card with SimCity 2000.
-
- Trident Video Cards
- -------------------
- Some older Trident video cards may not be compatible with the Trident
- driver installed by SimCity 2000. If you installed a Trident video
- card and are experiencing video problems, try running the INSTALL.EXE
- program in the SimCity 2000 directory and selecting the VESA video
- driver.
-
-
- ** SOUND CARD SUPPORT
-
- Miles Design Drivers
- --------------------
- SimCity 2000 sound support is accomplished through the use of the
- John Miles Design AIL audio driver libraries. These drivers are
- available for many different sound cards, most of which are included
- and installed by the SimCity 2000 installer. If your sound card is
- not mentioned specifically in the installer, you may be able to get
- drivers from the manufacturer for full SimCity 2000 sound.
- SimCity 2000 requires "32-bit flat mode" Miles Design drivers.
- Non-32-bit drivers will not work.
-
- Pro Audio Spectrum
- ------------------
- MUSIC: The Music Driver for the Pro Audio Spectrum requires the Media
- Vision Driver MVSOUND.SYS to be loaded in memory as a driver in
- your CONFIG.SYS file. If this driver is not loaded, you will receive a
- verification failure during installation, and you will NOT hear music
- during the game. For more information about MVSOUND.SYS, please
- refer to your Pro Audio Spectrum users manual, or call Media Vision
- Technical Support.
-
- SOUND EFFECTS: If you choose Pro Audio Spectrum as your Sound
- Effects sound card, you may experience some sound effects "dropouts,"
- or even no sound at all. This will only happen on some Pro Audio
- Spectrum sound cards. If this does happen, you can re-run the INSTALL
- program and choose Sound Blaster for the Sound Effects Card, instead
- of Pro Audio Spectrum.
-
- CAUTION: This may or may not work depending on your Pro Audio
- Spectrum. Please call Media Vision Technical Support if you have more
- problems.
-
- Gravis Ultrasound
- -----------------
- SimCity 2000 is compatible with the SBOS Sound Blaster Emulation TSR
- for the GUS. However, it is NOT compatible with both SBOS and most
- memory managers (such as EMM386) loaded the same time. DO NOT attempt
- to run or even install SimCity 2000 with both SBOS and a memory
- manager present. Bad things may happen.
-
- Aria Sound Cards
- ----------------
- We now have Miles Design Drivers for all sound cards based on the
- ARIA Sound Synth by Sierra Semiconductor. These include:
-
- Viva Maestro 16
- VR Alpha Systems
- Cyber Audio
- Add Tech Sound 2000
- Sound Tower
- Cardinal Technologies Sound Pilot
- Diamond Computer Systems Sonic Sound
- Sonic Sound Pro
- Genoa Systems AudioBahn
- AudioBahn Listener
- Kingston Technologies Omnivox
- Zoltrix TESS
- and Others...
-
- ** GAME PLAY ISSUES
-
- Saved Cities
- ------------
- For your simulating pleasure, we have included several saved cities
- created by various Maxis employees. They are located in your
- SimCity 2000 directory.
-
- Micro-Simulators
- ----------------
- When querying some structures, you get local statistics about that
- structure. For instance, querying on a Police Station will tell you
- how many crimes and arrests were handled by that station, querying
- on a school will tell how many teachers and students are attending
- as well as the average grade of the students. Most placeable
- structures have these microsimulators (police, fire, schools,
- colleges, power plants, the Mayor's House, arcologies, etc). Some
- structures share one microsimulator for all the structures placed.
- Things like the bus system, railroad depots, marinas, libraries,
- windmills, and hydroelectric power plants among others have 1
- microsimulator for each category (one microsimulator for all the bus
- stations, one for all the railroad depots, etc). Where is this
- all headed, you ask? Well, each city can only have 150
- microsimulators in it. If you go beyond that, the structure you place
- will still affect the simulator globally (police stations will still
- stop crime, bus stations will still carry passengers, arcologies will
- still hold people), but you just won't be able to see any local
- information on those structures. This isn't going to harm your city
- in any way. We're telling you this because it's pretty easy to run
- out of microsimulators in a large city and we don't want you thinking
- something's wrong.
-
- 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 edit terrain mode. Also, if you have placed
- a bridge or other structure that automatically builds landfill, the
- landfill will also show up in edit terrain mode. These can be removed
- with the lower terrain tool.
-
- Airports
- --------
- Keep in mind when building an airport that it needs space for a
- runway, or it will not build. The minimum useable airport space is
- 2 x 6 tiles. Your best bet is to build the airport in 4 x 6 tile
- increments. And make sure no tall buildings are nearby, SimCity 2000
- pilots are not known for their building-avoidance skills!
- In addition, make sure that your airport is blanketed with power
- lines. Airports may not initially build unless they are receiving
- power to certain tiles.
-
-
- ** IMPORTING OTHER CITIES
-
- Importing Cities From SimCity Classic and SimCity 2000 Mac
- ----------------------------------------------------------
- You can load saved cities from both SimCity Classic and SimCity 2000
- Mac into SimCity 2000 DOS.
-
- To import SimCity Classic DOS and SimCity 2000 Mac saved games,
- rename the file so that the extension is ".SC2". If the file is from
- SimCity Classic DOS, SimCity 2000 will ask you if you wish to convert
- the file to SimCity 2000 format. The conversion will not change the
- original file until you save it.
-
- To convert SimCity 2000 DOS files for use in SimCity 2000 Mac you
- will need to give the file a Filetype and Creator for the Macintosh.
- This can be done with ResEdit, Access PC, or one of several other
- PC->Mac conversion utilities.
-
- **NEWSPAPER
-
- If you are running low on hard drive space, you may experience a
- problem where multiple newspaper stories are open at one time. You
- will need at least 300KB free hard drive space (on the drive that
- SimCity 2000 is installed to) before starting the game, and this
- will fix the problem. If you do get multiple stories, you can clear
- them by pressing 'ENTER'.
-
- If you are running into low memory situations, the Newspaper menu item
- may gray out. Don't be alarmed, it won't hurt anything.
-
- ** HOT KEYS
-
- SHIFT KEY-
- 1. While placing items, press the shift key before releasing the mouse
- button will cancel placement of the item.
- 2. Holding down the shift key while clicking on an item in the edit
- window will open the Query window on that specific item.
- 3. Holding down the shift key while clicking on a button or entry in
- a window will open a help description on that item.
-
- CTRL - temporarily turns the current cursor into the Bulldoze Tool.
- HOME - zooms in one level on your city
- END - zooms out one level on your city
- DEL - rotates your city view left 90 degrees
- PAGE DOWN - rotates your city right 90 degrees
- Cursors Keys - scrolls around city
-
- Thanks for buying SimCity 2000
- We hope you enjoy playing it as much as we enjoyed creating it!
-
-
-
- [EOF]
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