Maxis

Remember Maxis? They were the computer game company of my formative years. Also: Remember Will Wright? I am certain he used to be famous. Famous for making computer games for Maxis. Let's take a look at some early Maxis games, as last played by me about ten years ago. (Imagine the titles are written in severe sans-serif font.)

Sim Life: This game is typical of Maxis efforts. After you have played this, you sit back and say to yourself, "did I just play a game?" The game I guess is about designing lifeforms and trying to populate the world with them. You can't win. I didn't like it because whenever you design a lifeform, you have to design a 16x16 pixel icon for it, using only 16 colors and all of them ugly. I can't draw. Everything ends up dying out in the end anyway, except for cottonwood trees.

Sim Earth: I think this must have been a reworking of Sim Life, or the other way around. It's the same concept, isn't it? But this one has trichordates, built in. You can't ask any better than that. Except graphics that aren't ugly. But really, nobody makes games like this with proper graphics. What would be the point?

Sim Ant: "It is about time someone ought to make an ant colony simulator." That's what they said and Lo someone did. I like the caterpillars.

Sim Tower: Yes, in this game you simulate a skyscraper. In the real world, are there really such things as sky lobbies? How come I've never seen one? Sim Tower is actually very boring. I like the easter eggs in this game. That is a lost art, don't you think.

Sim City 2000: This is the only Sim City game I ever played much. Sim City 1 was before my time I am sorry to say. I always thought it was very ugly, and that any game that classified a single city as a "megalopolis" must not be very good. I did like how you could import Sim City 1 files into Sim City 2000. Those cities always looked like North Korean cities to me. So severe.

Sim City 3000 (or is it 3?) was clunky and cartoonish. I hate it.

Sim City 2000 was just right. I especially like how you can leave it running overnight, and accumulate millions of Sim City dollars. Maxis knew what they were doing when they designed a game you could play in your sleep. With one bold stroke they doubled your leisure time. Who needs the AFL-CIO when you have Will Wright?

A-Train: One of the most surreal things in the world. It's a railroad simulator, right? But all the colors are weird beige and bright green and pale blue and pink. And your trains move around commodities which are represented by gray cubes. And roads are one of the rarest things in the game, but when they do happen, land values skyrocket. And there's a stock market, and oh all the companies have such bizarre names. And the manual must have been over a hundred pages. I seem to recall it had a lot of useless information about the bullet train.

Sim Health: I just learned about this one yesterday. Did you know that Maxis made this in response to the popularity of the Clinton health plan? For that reason alone, I definitely recommend this game. "An incredibly complex simulation, it was generally regarded as difficult and dry." Oh Maxis. These days I guess Maxis is focused on making The Sims or something. Now that's boring.