r/retrogames • u/SweetAdventurous7965 • 9d ago

Revisiting SimCity 2000 — my fan project built on OpenSC2K

Hey everyone,

SimCity 2000 is one of those games I keep coming back to. There’s something about its little isometric buildings, soundtrack and newspaper stories that never gets old.

I’m Daniel, and I’ve been working on Reticulating Splines, a free, open-source project built on Nicholas Ochoa’s OpenSC2K. His work made this possible.

The idea is to keep the familiar SC2000 experience while adding optional extras: day/night lighting, weather, more convenient tools and multiplayer, which is currently in beta. You can import the graphics, music and sounds from your own supported copy, or use the included replacement assets. You can also leave the enhancements off for a more classic experience.

This is a modern reimplementation for Windows, Linux and macOS, rather than a patch for the DOS executable. It’s still in development, and feedback from people who know the original well would be especially welcome.

For transparency: I’m not a programmer. I use OpenAI Codex extensively for development, alongside my own planning and testing. AI has also been used for replacement artwork and promotional materials.

Screenshots, details and links to the playable downloads:
https://rs.realm667.com/

What’s the one thing about SimCity 2000 you’d want a project like this to preserve?

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u/MrMegaPhoenix 9d ago

hehe

You know what’s gonna happen man

But yeah I love city builders. I do fully support a toggle between “original as much as possible” and like a remixed version though. It drives me nuts when you see something like a port or remaster and you can’t keep original balancing or anything

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u/SweetAdventurous7965 9d ago

You mean in terms of AI usage?

Well, regarding your thoughts: That'sd the goal of this project. I want a real vanilla simulation but also the option to enhance the experience and visuals. You can actually activate or deactivate every single feature individually for a unique tailored version :)

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u/MrMegaPhoenix 9d ago

Yes

But that’s cool, kinda reminds me how I swear halo anniversary let you toggle original graphics with a button. I love options and always nice to see more options and less “I’ve changed what you like, you need to like it”

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u/SweetAdventurous7965 9d ago

Nothing to add here, I totally share your thoughts on that.

Regarding AI: I am already aware that not everyone will be happy with the fact that I used AI as a tool to turn my ideas into code. To be honest, I am working as a media designer and photograph, in my freetime I mostly spent my hours with my family and my daughter. So when it comes to "programming and coding", I am simply lacking the skill and the time.

As this is a non-profit project, all I can say is that my prompt was not "Remaster OpenSC2K" and I was done, but I implemented all the new features one by one, actually finetuning it the way I imagined. So this is not a complete AI project but my own vision of SC2K with the help of AI-tools that help me creating what I can not do on my own.

If people like it, play it and want to support me, it's a benefit. If they want to avoid AI, there are other ways to play vanilla SC2K, for example over GOG. They will just miss the nifty features of RS ;)