Gave the demo a whirl when I heard this was going 1.0. It's definitely not your average city builder with its high reliance of expansion via production chain management. Quite liked it so I actually may pick this one up.

Something to play until Workers & Resources, which is even more about those production chains, hits its 1.0. ;)

I'm still a bit on the fence due to the system requirements.

Got to love the guy though: "Maps based on real geographic regions, such as New York, Vancouver and Rio"

Dude! You are from Saxony! Your game isn't US-American, man. Your traffic lights or on the wrong side of the street, your street signs have the wrong color, your streets have the wrong markings, your houses have the wrong models. I know the original buildings on which you have based those highrises. This isn't bloody New York, it's a mixture of Chemnitz and Frankfurt!

Pal, you are building Little Saxony on a map of New York. I mean, I love it! But why? Please, whyyy?

Be honest, call it "Metropolitan Area Halle-Leipzig-Bitterfeld", and be done with it. Why on Earth do you try to be something that you aren't?

This seems to be a common idea among younger or less-experienced creative types. They either want to set their story (or, in this case, game) somewhere that they're not from--and about which most of what they know comes from entertainment media--because of some personal infatuation with that place (sometimes the U.S., but just as often someplace else, like Japan or Italy); or they feel they have to pander to the large potential audience in that place (in this case, usually the U.S., though I'm sure there are other "important" countries' populations also being pandered to by outsiders in this way) because they want their work to succeed. It's a shame that more creatives don't realize that the old writing advice "write what you know" doesn't just apply to writing a traditional story or [screen]play. If you're trying to set your game in Osaka or New York City or Cairo, but you're from a small town in Romania (for example) and have never even left your country, it's going to come off as weird to anyone who's been to the places you're trying to represent.

See also: people who aren't proficient with English creating works in English, which turn out to only be tolerable to other non-proficient English speakers. :P

And this is a problem how exactly? All it does is give you different pre-configured landmass shapes one can build on. This is a fairly common feature in many other city builders one can find. That's it.

You're reading way too much into this.

Ever looked which maps are available in Sim City 3000 and 4?
The games that will let you build US towns with square blocks only?

It's the second time a thread about this game reminded me of that bizarre High-Rise movie with Jeremy Irons.

The choice of setting doesn't make the game any less enjoyable.

What feels odd is that people, particularly in Eastern Germany, seem to feel a need to hide who they are and where they are from. There is nothing to feel insecure about in a job well done! Just because people, even in Germany itself, treat people in that part of their own country like shit, doesn't mean a person shouldn't stand up and be proud of their good work.

Why hide that one guy alone did the whole thing with next to no funding?

If one guy develops games in a garage in Dresden, it shows a passion so many other games lack these days. It is even more impressive than if this was done by a big company somewhere else instead.

Why does anybody have to pretend that this was "New York" or "Rio"? If you are modelling Dresden, let's call a spade a spade and let it be Dresden, for heaven’s sake! It won't be any less cool. At least Dresden hasn't been overused in every single city builder since the 70s.

That said, I'm still excited to see it released. Just worried the CPU and RAM requirements of 32GB might be too much for my machine.

Ask how that turned out with Forager. Turns out that was a lie.

That's a long article, and I'm not familiar with the issue. Is there a summary / bottom line?

Are you saying, the person developing forager lied about being only a single developer?

Things in Germany are quite a bit different. You have to register EVERYTHING. So, since the person has a business, that business must be registered to a real life individual, there must be a real name with a real address, which must be checked for mail, and so on. Sure, the address is allowed to be a mailbox, but even then the person must be publicly registered, and the public register has their home address.

Meaning, there is a name, there is the address of the "garage" where this was developed, and you got officials who would rip that guy's head off (legally, not literally) if any of that information was incorrect. Fines, police, and all.

Plus: The guy is from Dresden. If a dude from Saxony promises to do something, come hell or high water, they see it through till the end. ;)

Yes, that's what is being said.

As for the matter of German registrations, I'm hoping that comes to bite Intellivsion Entertainment in the arse, given that they had an office registered in Hamburg and grats from Bavaria.