The New York Times reports that game maker Electronic Arts and energy company BP have collaborated in designing the latest version of E.A.’s SimCity computer game.
The game focuses on building and managing a virtual metropolis. Environmental concerns have always been an element of the game play but they’re taken to a new level in the current version. Players are allowed to power their cities in a number of ways and there are trade-offs between the various methods.
For instance, for most players the most economically efficient way to power their virtual cities may be with coal plants, which produce 500 units of electricity and cost 3,000 simoleons, the game’s currency, to build. Coal plants, however, produce large amounts of pollution, which can lead to natural disasters like droughts, and they also reduce the happiness of the city’s nearby citizens, which in turn causes them to produce less tax revenue.
Is the a NZ version which allows you to continue using coal powered electricity generation while still increasing taxes and introducing the EFB to silence the unhappy citizens ?
NZ is only about 20% dependent on coal power while the US is at 80%. I think we’re setting a good example, although it’d be nice to do away with the Huntley station. Still, I don’t get your point.
I am noticing that as games get newer, they look more and more like bad raytraced animations. Should have gone more stylised IMO.
Burt do you actually have anything to add or are you just a hopeless troll?
Again Burt – take your Ritalin, I think you’re having another episode…
By the way, this is how SimCity traditionally worked. Nothing new here, it’s just BP paying an extortionate fee to slap their logo on something as part of their PR.
Fuck BP. Get Al Gore on this!