Today I saw on Steam that Cities XL got released.

So my question is: How is it?
 Also, is there going to be a free trial any time soon?

They released the demo a month ago

http://www.fileplanet.com/204724/200000/fileinfo/Cities-XL-Demo

(close to 1 gig in size)

Yeah, unfortunately I didn't know about that.
And as stated on their website the demo "was ended" just before the release ... :/ 

It's total crap. See my other posts about it. It's so bad, its not even worth repeating how bad it is.

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Originally posted by Bit_Driver
It's total crap. See my other posts about it. It's so bad, its not even worth repeating how bad it is.
 

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Pretty pointless response.

Originally posted by Bit_Driver

It's total crap. See my other posts about it. It's so bad, its not even worth repeating how bad it is.
 

After reading your posts and those of the others in the same topic I think I will give the game some time before I try it.
That is if I will try it at all. Because I'm not going to buy this one blindly. A free trial or another demo would be appropriate.

Best city builder ever.  However, there have only been 2 companies who have released city builders, and this is the first one made since 2006.  There are many problems that plague this game with its current release.  Here is the list:

• Monthly fee too high $10/month is too expensive for the limited scope of the multiplayer aspects.  It should be closer to $5/month.
• Lack of a community forum.
• The trade server is flakey, and it doesn't update with the web server frequently despite in-network updates having vastly higher speeds.
• Memory leak.

As far as positives, there are alot.  It is literally the best City builder ever made.  You can play the game single player, so if you want a good city builder and don't want to subscribe it is an option.  The building options are immense.  The economy options are also relatively sophisticated.  However, there are some political aspects you don't have control in.  IE you have to provide healthcare, unemployment, education, waste, electicity, gas, and water.  I don't particularly like that aspect.  Where are the private hospitals to provide care I don't have to pay for?  As far as choice in other aspects, you define an area and companies come in on their own.

The trade system is nice, and is really effective as long as the trade server is working.  It is usually down half the day, and your contracts end up expiring hours later or the become in jeapordy and dropped.  I choose the hardest map in the game, its only resource is holidays which are vacation spots.  Compared to food, oil, and water.  Its the least useful.  However, its also one of the resources you don't have to pay an arm and a leg to extract it.  Infact, you profit from it exclusively.  I was surprised when I made the city, I was able to manage it well into the green simply through trading for all the resources I needed and exporting my crap.  There are some things I want to try with the trade system, however the problems with the servers makes it too risky.

One thing I think is funny is you can control the population through taxes.  Built too many houses and the unemployed are jamming up your system?  Just shoot those taxes to 30% and have them exodus your city, keep it at 17% and stagnate growth.  All the while making huge change.

This game is bad it's laughable. First of all it's so intentionally gimped in single player that it's impossible to have a successful city with any kind of large population because of the resource system. In the single player game there is one option for getting resources: Omnicorp. It's the AI company the only way to buy resources that your city is lacking. The problem is that the exchange rate is ridiculous (like you have to give them 4 tokens to get 1 in return). The game's tutorial even makes a comment about how expensive it is so you better fork over money to Monte Cristo so you can trade with other people.

There is no mass transportation in the game. None. Nothing. If they do ever end up putting mass transit in the game it's only going to be available to the people who pay them every month so basically the only thing you get by paying a monthly fee is the ability to trade resources with other players (when the trading system even works) and you'll get access to buses and trains if MC ever gets around to putting them in the game.

It's seriously like Sim City: Societies and Hellgate: London got together and spawned a horribly disfigured hybrid baby that needs to be put out of its misery.

 The game is pretty great and it isn't impossible to sustain a city in Solo mode you just have to be smart about how you do it.  It is called strategy and having a brain.  The planet mode is a total waste of cash so just buy it for solo mode and enjoy

Originally posted by Silacoid

 The game is pretty great and it isn't impossible to sustain a city in Solo mode you just have to be smart about how you do it.  It is called strategy and having a brain.  The planet mode is a total waste of cash so just buy it for solo mode and enjoy

If you are playing in a region that doesn't give you all four resources it is impossible to go past a certain population level because you can't get enough of the missing resources by trading with Omnicorp.

Maybe you're playing one of the EZ-mode cities.

The game is pretty decent so far in single player mode but it is no where as good as sim city 4. I'm so used to the detail of building a detailed transit system and better options for building and managing your city. The game is fun but seems a bit rushed. I had high hopes for the game but nothing has motivated me to ever want to go online. This game presents a great idea for sim city 5 online.