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Musical Highway

Better late than never. Since I've been looking forward to the review of SimCity 4 and its addon Rush Hour for a very long time, I'm now following up my short stopover in Nintendo's darker past with SimCity 64 . I have already mentioned several times that this was my first SimCity-game and, after economy-centered games such as Transport Tycoon, Industry Giant or Emperor: Rise of the Middle Kingdom , my entry into the world of city-building simulations.

Generally speaking, you could count any strategy game with base building or goods cycles as such, but that would do the genre an injustice. There are far too many nuances, too many adjustments and points such as taxes, infrastructure (both transport and public services) or, as in Cities: Skylines, even traffic management. The focus in this type of game is much more on the small details - there is also a lack of military action.

This mixture of macro- and micromanagement was one of the reasons why almost all my cities in SimCity were in the red, as I really only wanted to build a beautiful metropolis and not worry about such trivialities as the education system or the drinking water supply. Business taxes? That's for nerds! Besides, I don't even know what a business tax is! Not enough electricity? Then let them eat candles ... or something.

Good for me that only eight months after the main game, the expansion Rush Hour, was released. This included a feature that allowed the player to freely explore their own city by vehicle. A nice gimmick, but one that brought tangible benefits. In addition to leisurely driving through the neighborhood, we were also given tasks from time to time, the fulfillment of which flushed a lot of money into the coffers.

As a result, the inhabitants of my city would turn around in amazement at irregular intervals when the mayor rolled through the streets in a tank, zoomed across the canal in a speedboat or sprayed the farmer's field with pesticides using a biplane. SimCity 4 had everything I could wish for and is still the highest-rated offshoot of the SimCity-series.

In my opinion, the soundtrack, which was composed by Jerry Martin in a similar way to its indirect predecessor SimCity 3000 , also contributed to this high level of appreciation. As with the Sims-games, not all the pieces were written by him, but his signature is clearly recognizable in the score. But before I go into detail, a quick note: Surprisingly, publisher Electronic Arts has released an original soundtrack (OST) for the game. I have expanded this 15-song album with the tracks I was able to find on the SimCity-wiki and marked them with the addition [Bonus] . Consequently, this review is for a kind of Deluxe Edition. You can find the tracks from Rush Hour in the corresponding review below.

But now to the score, which I had long since placed on the Olympus of video game music for nostalgia's sake. Rightly so? If we look at what's on offer, a few points can be made immediately. There is the remarkable average duration of five to six minutes per track, which makes it clear that the album is not in a hurry to tell its little stories, but takes its time. Time to present and experiment.

Again and again, the score offers us pieces that develop over their course, often interspersed with a dominant instrument or a beat that, as in The Lighthouse for Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory, accompanies us over the entire length of the song and acts as a common thread to show us what we have already experienced. In this way, the score succeeds in capturing the hustle and bustle of the simulated city musically without us getting lost in it.

Furthermore, the joy of experimentation becomes clear when we look at the genres we can assign to the individual tracks: Rush Hour falls into the breakbeat category and accompanied the trailer and intro at the time. Swing can be applied to the busy Bohemian Street Jam , and tracks like The New Hood, Urban Underground or Crosswalk Talk [Bonus] fall into the genre of trip-hop due to their funky fresh style. The latter is not for me, but it's somehow part of a diverse urban culture, isn't it?

These are all tracks that we hear when we are trying to manage the city. Similar to the Sims-series, we can also change the game mode in SimCity . A distinction is made here between the mayor mode and the region/god mode. While we spend 99 percent of our time in the first one, in the second mode, besides terraforming, we can also cause such pleasantries as environmental disasters, attacks by giant robots or volcanic eruptions thanks to the add-on.

As the modes change, the soundscape also rotates, the bustling musical confusion giving way to ethereal tones that suggest spherical sublimity. Songs such as Shape Shifter, Above the Clouds / From Above [Bonus], Parallel View [Bonus] or Taking Shape [Bonus] allow us to float above the clouds and escape the hustle and bustle. That may suit the game, but it's too boring for me. In addition, tracks like Without Form or Terrain [Bonus] show how it could be done better with the use of marimbas, electric guitars and drums - reminiscent of the vastness of Edge of Chaos . Meanwhile, we won't talk about Primordial Dream [Bonus] which sounds like something borrowed from a Christian horror story.

But enough of heavenly expanses. I want action, I want motion, so let's get back to business, which brings us to my favorites. Topping this list are By the Bay and Epicenter / EpiCentre [Bonus], which are polar opposites and juxtapose the basic feel of the game in a wonderfully pointed way. By the Bay by Jerry Martin begins with a single marimba strumming away a little. At some point, a clarinet is heard, playing a lonely, almost wistful tune. When electric guitars and drums join in later, it practically sounds like the credits after a turbulent, emotional movie. Basically, we see our protagonist walking towards the sunset. Here, too, associations with Edge of Chaos come to mind.

In contrast, Epicenter / EpiCentre [Bonus] shows what happened in the film. As I was delighted to discover during my research for this review, it was composed by the musical duo The Humble Brothers, which explains the resemblance of other tracks such as Oasis [Bonus] to Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit 2. Epicenter / EpiCentre [Bonus] is driving. It chases us through the streets of our own city, but takes the time at 1:35 and 5:55 to remind us with a short guitar break and a wink that it's not all that serious. It also features the only vocals that, in accordance with the Sims-formula, remain incomprehensible.

The score cannot deny its closeness to the Sims series in other places either. In fact, according to the wiki and my memories, a few of the pieces even appear in the TV channels of The Sims 2. Tracks like Street Sweeper or Transit Angst immediately conjure up the image of Maxi's life simulation in my head, while Tarrmack, Rockin Down and Landfill [Bonus] take me back to SimCity 4. That may sound strange, but it's true. The Jerry Martin-typical piano strumming in No Gridlock [Bonus] and the, in my opinion, super exciting Zone System should also not go unmentioned - this repetitive, almost Western-like sound is quite something.

The music of SimCity 4 is many things: it is experimental, it is rich in variety, it is decelerating and yet moving. Is it groundbreaking? I cannot say. In my opinion, however, like the first Sims , it conveys a feeling that I miss in many 'modern' games. A kind of pioneering spirit, the desire to try things out. Many soundtracks these days sound like they've been produced off the shelf. The big composers have found their sweet spot, the small ones flirt with visionless novelty. This is a score that knows what it wants and meets us, listeners and urban planners, at eye level. And that both as a child and as an adult. For my part, an absolute, nostalgia-tinged recommendation.

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SimCity 4 [Deluxe Edition]

No.	Title	Artist(s)	Ratings
01	Rush Hour*	Jerry Martin	4
02	By the Bay*	Jerry Martin	5
03	The New Hood*	Jerry Martin	2
04	Bohemian Street Jam*	Jerry Martin	4
05	Shape Shifter*	Jerry Martin	2
06	Without Form*	Jerry Martin	4
07	Street Sweeper*	Marc Russo	3
08	Transit Angst*	Robi Kauker	2
09	Zone System*	Kent Jolly	4
10	Urban Underground*	Anna Karney	3
11	Tarrmack*	Kirk Casey	3
12	Rockin Down / Gritty City*	Walt Szalva	3
13	Re-Development*	Jerry Martin	4
14	Chain Reaction*	Edwin Dolinski	3
15	Night Owl*	Kirk Casey	3
16	No Gridlock [Bonus]	Jerry Martin	3
17	Crosswalk Talk [Bonus]	Robi Kauker	2
18	Epicenter / EpiCentre [Bonus]	The Humble Brothers	5
19	Landfill [Bonus]	Marc Russo	4
20	Oasis [Bonus]	The Humble Brothers	4
21	Above the Clouds / From Above [Bonus]	Jerry Martin	2
22	Terrain [Bonus]	The Humble Brothers	4
23	Taking Shape [Bonus]	Bob Marshall	2
24	Primordial Dream [Bonus]	Michael Land	1
25	Parallel View [Bonus]	Kirk Casey	2

*Track contained in the Original Soundtrack

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Rush Hour

I have already explained the features of the only expansion for SimCity 4 up above. What it has to offer musically, on the other hand, comes now. At this point I could refer to the review of the main game and use phrases like "Jerry Martin continues with consistency here what he has already started in SimCity 4 ", but that would be both an accurate and abbreviated description ... too abbreviated!

There is no doubt that this album remains true to its formulaic lack of formality. Nevertheless, the eleven-track score for Rush Hour expands the main game with the facet of classical music, without drifting off in the direction of genre relatives such as Cities: Skylines . Even though both sound the same tune, as with Dig Deep they are fundamentally different at their core.

Jerry Martin and the other composers do not present us with classic video game music, but rather traditional ... classical music. The score seems to have been borrowed from 2001: A Space Odyssey or a historical drama rather than an urban planning simulation. Bach instead of building? A bit. Taken on its own, you could get the feeling that SimCity 4 is a much more 'ordinary' strategy game, whose musical accompaniment more clearly emulates that of the first Sims , rather than paving the way for the poppier Sims 2, which was to be released a year later.

Indeed, tracks such as Floating Population and Deserted are reminiscent of a mixture of big city meets Peter and the Wolf. Wheels of Progress on the other hand, has a certain movie-noire feel. And Bombay and Arctica have that unmistakably 'Indian' feel. On the other hand, my favorite from the score is ElectriCITY, again by The Humble Brothers, who don't care about stringency to the rest of the album and create a proper breakbeat mood.

As these songs from the add-on mix with those from the main game during gameplay, they are an interesting addition, but the overall work is not a classic video game soundtrack. For me personally, I would have liked a little more of the original SimCity 4 , but I'm not sad about the new course. The pieces are really nice to listen to and could well appear in any play or travel documentary. Just something like a good background music.

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No.	Title	Artist(s)	Ratings
01	Bombay / Area 52	Jerry Martin	3
02	Bumper to Bumper	Jerry Martin	3
03	Floating Population	Walt Szalva	4
04	Wheels of Progress	Andy Brick	4
05	Metropolis	The Humble Brothers	4
06	Deserted	Andy Brick	4
07	Chain Reaction	Edwin Dolinski	3
08	The Morning Commute	Jerry Martin	3
09	Arctica	The Humble Brothers	3
10	Dig Deep	Jerry Martin	4
11	ElectriCITY	The Humble Brothers	5