Your goal in Simcity is to create a city that will reach the year 2023 with at least 15,000 residents.
Click this link to start playing the game.
Start a NEW CITY in the year 1900.
Give your city a personalized name. For example, mine is "Gillville."
BEGINNERS TRICKS AND TIPS:
You absolutely need three things to start a city in Simcity 2000. This is the toughest part for beginners.
FIRST: Build a Power Plant.
Hold the button down on the red lightning bolt to get the option for power plants. I'd start with coal or oil.SECOND: Build Roads (a grid pattern works very well.)
THIRD: Build a mix of Residential, Commercial, and Industrial zones not more than 3 blocks from a road.
The BUDGET WINDOW will pop up once per year. You can set your game to AUTO BUDGET if you don't want it to pop-up, but I wouldn't recommend leaving it like that forever. You need to see what's going on with your money.
This took me a long time to figure out. If you press the mouse button and hold it down on the menu bar where you choose which structure to build, a menu will pop up with more choices. You need to know this.
You will probably have zoning that does not develop. Check the following things.
Does it have a road within three tiles?
Does it have access to power either through adjacent buildings or power lines?
Can the people who might live (or work) there have a short, connected route to another zone type?
Now, look at the demand indicator. What you want is for all three indicators to be in the full + position. If they are not, then something is wrong with your city that makes it undesirable.
The first thing you can do to raise the demand indicator is to lower taxes in the budget window. Lowering taxes always brings cheers from the populace.
The second thing that you can do is often overlooked by people. You must have the correct ratio of Residential to Commercial to Industrial. The optimum ratio changes as a city grows larger. The ratios are approximately as follows:
