City Specializations
In SimCity, cities can be specialized to serve specific purposes.
Cities can not only specialize into any of the big businesses but also create their own roles.
Contents
Big Businesses
Each city can specialize in one or more big businesses.
- Big businesses are pre-determined by Maxis.
The player becomes not only a mayor but also a business mogul.
There are five big businesses in the game: mining, drilling, electronics, trade, and gambling.
- Each big business has its own global leaderboard.
- The player's rank is determined by the amount of profit from that business in the past 12 months.
Mining
- Main article: Mining
Cities specialized in mining extract ore and coal for profit. To extract the minerals, Coal and Ore Mines must be constructed directly above the corresponding deposits. Extracted ore and coal can be exported to the Global Market for immediate profit. Coal Power Plants burn coal to generate electricity. A Smelting Factory can be constructed to process ore and coal into more valuable resources: alloy and metal.
Drilling
- Main article: Drilling
Cities specialized in Drilling extract and process oil for profit. To extract oil, Oil Well must be constructed above oil reservoirs. Extracted oil can be exported to the Global Market for immediate profit. Oil Power Plants burn oil to generate electricity. Oil refinery can be constructed to process oil into more valuable resources: fuel and plastic.
Electronics
- Main article: Electronics
Electronics city manufactures processors, TVs and computers from metal, alloy and plastic.
Electronics manufacturing has high profit margin but requires substantial investment in education and transportation infrastructure.
Trade
- Main article: Trade
Trade is about buying and selling commodities on the Global Market.
- Buy low, sell high is the main principle.
The key to trade is to import resources when their prices are low and export resources when their prices are high.
A city specialized in trade will have many trucks, freight trains, and cargo ships moving goods into and out of the city.
Gambling
- Main article: Gambling
A gambling city relies on casinos to attract tourists and generate revenue.
- Gambling specialization focuses on attracting tourists instead of the gathering resources or manufacturing goods.
Gambling city requires the construction of an adequate mass transit system to bring in tourists and avoid traffic congestion.
Casinos attract criminals. A large police force is needed to combat the increase in crime.
Other Specializations
Education
Some advanced industries, businesses and structures require educated citizens as workers.
Schools and Colleges are two types of educational ploppables.
Culture
- Main article: Culture
Culture specialization focuses on attracting and keeping tourists.
- It is similar to Gambling specialization and can be paired with it.
There are 2 types of culture buildings, Standards and Landmarks.
Landmarks are further divided into two additional types, Venues and Attracters.
- Only 3 Landmarks can be built in a city.
Power
A power city constructs power plants to generate power for not only itself but also neighboring cities.
- Revenue is generated from selling power to nearby cities.
Garbage
A garbage city also known as recycling city takes waste from other cities in the region for a fee and recyles the wastse to regenerate plastic, metal and alloy.