Concerns have been raised over the upcoming SimCity game, which will feature a much smaller city size than players have gotten in the past. Speaking with IncGamers last month however, Maxis' Ocean Quigley explained that it was a trade-off in favor of better performance on more computers.
He explained that the studio thought it'd be better to have smaller, more interactive cities, rather than sprawling, low resolution ones that didn't feature a lot of activity.
Luckily though, those with higher end machines can look forward to larger city environments in the future. Quigley recently stated that it was, "just a performance decision. Given that was the performance constraint we decided to work under, we built a larger region environment and a bunch of the multiplay to work with 2km cities. At some point in the future, especially with mainstream computers become more capable, we could certainly make the city sizes larger. We need to keep in mind that SimCity is a mainstream game, it's not a game that is only going to run on high-end gaming PCs, it has to run in your Dad's PC as well."
Even so, Maxis recognizes that many gamers want to see a more elaborate SimCity experience. The studio explains that they currently have plans to expand the maximum city size, they just can't be specific as to when.
"We'll eventually get around to expanding the city size but I can't make any promises as to when."
The upcoming game, the sixth major release in the series, is simply titled SimCity. It will be released on March 5, 2013 on the PC. Maxis is also planning an eventual OS X release.
"This is a new SimCity that delivers unprecedented depth of simulation. The model-like world and detail of the simulation make this the most responsive and personal SimCity ever. This is also the most expansive city management game yet where you can control a region that delivers true multi-city scale and play a single city or up to 16 cities at once each with different specializations. Multiplayer is also a first for the series, which adds a new dimension to your game as your decisions impact both your city and your region and creates new ways to play by collaborating or competing to earn achievements. Finally, SimCity is a live service that simulates real time updates from new challenges to new features and content," reads the game description on the official website.