While writing this, I’m uploading a “nuke changeset” which will erase my capital city Markvað almost completely. If you ever visited Markvað, you probably will know why. The city was quite… “edgy”. The reason for this might be interesting, so I’m telling you the history of Markvað and also a short story of my mapping life before I came to OGF.
There is a railway simulation program around, called BAHN (which is just the german word for railroad). It’s not a “typical” railroad simulation - no 3D and also no cockpit simulation. Just plain 2D. You can create quite large networks with it and simulate complex train operations. It’s like a model railroad, however, you can have a model railroad in the size of an entire country. I used to play that game since I was 7 years old (it was 1993), in fact, it was my first computer game. Since then, BAHN evolved quite heavily. Well, I don’t want to make any advertising for this game, so let’s move on.
I had designed a large city in that simulation. And this city became Markvað when I started with OGF. The one more thing you need to know about BAHN is that you can only build tracks in 90 and 45 degrees (and, in the meantime, also 22,5 degrees). And this is the reason why Markvað used to be so rectangular.
In those BAHN days, Markvað was built with the goal in mind to maximize the public transport network to a phantastic density. When I imported the city to OGF, there were about 40+ Metro lines and a very dense tram network (which didn’t make it into OGF, I planned to insert it later). I guess, the new Markvað won’t have so many lines. However, I copied my “maximize the public transport network” dogma to Norðurland (as you can read in the wiki article about the country). So there will be still an almost unrealistic PT density in Markvað. However, I will design it in a way that COULD be real in a country which enforces its citizens to use public transport a lot.
As I returned to Markvað in the last days, I thought, maybe I coud just “wigglify” the city. However, I tried and I wasn’t satisfied. Also, I wanted to build some things different than I did in the first place. So I’ve decided to make a clean break and start all over. So let’s see how the new Markvað will look like.
Comment from Leowezy on 31 October 2017 at 22:00
Aww, 90’s simulation games… so much to love about them. Very excited to see what you come up with for “new” Markvað! :)
Comment from Luciano on 31 October 2017 at 23:38
I also recently deleted my capital city, Villa Constitución. I understand that feeling of reaching a point where you just don’t know how to correct earlier mistakes and want to start over. For me, I had made the same mistake so many new mappers in OGF make: I’d started with the streets as if that were the skeleton of the city, and adding in the water and topo features later seemed impossible. I highly recommend starting with the natural parts if you’re starting over! I’m close to being ready to upload some streams and the Río Hierro (northern boundary of the city). Contours are well in progress, too.
Comment from eklas on 1 November 2017 at 05:52
I had to delete my country’s capital city too, so I know how it feels. Good luck with the new city!
Comment from trabantemnaksiezyc on 1 November 2017 at 07:40
And I’ve deleted my capital multiple times!
I know Bahn for being ridicoulously overpriced. And I couldn’t ever do anything interesting with it for some reason. Maybe that’s because of the grid, it seemed boring to me.
Comment from No Way on 1 November 2017 at 16:53
I have three adopted cities that were part of Common at one point. I am thinking of wiping out Ebudae. The other two I think I can transform but Ebudae is a mess.
Comment from PortCal on 2 November 2017 at 00:05
That might be the best decision, although I think it will be very hard to do that. Good luck with the reconstruction of Markvað!
Although not the capital of Paroy, I’m starting to think this might be best for Trevers too. I’ve tried for so long to build something decent and adjust everything as much as possible, I’m just unhappy with a lot of things. Like Luciano already describes, I too started with neighbourhoods and thought I could squeeze geographic features between them. It looks very weird and not very realistic. Now that I’m happy with the shape of the island (now peninsula) I’m at the point where I will probably wipe entire neighbourhoods and will start over with a better geography planned first of all. I might keep some details though, like Unity Station, the stadium and the airport. But most of the neighbourhoods and road network will be redone on top of a much better planned geography.
