Behind the Scenes #5: Citizen Characters Hi and welcome back to another development diary for Cities: Skylines II! We’ve talked about the …
Greetings city-builder. To celebrate Cities: Skylines turning 8 years and to give the game the send-off you deserve, we have another free patch full of presents for you and I’m excited to show you everything Hubs & Transport has to offer! The patch brings new content to the base game as well as After Dark, Snowfall, Natural Disasters, and Mass Transit, all available automatically on the 22nd of March.
As the name suggests this update is focused on expanding the existing transport options with new public transport hubs, new public transport vehicles, new roads, and much more! We also have a few quality-of-life updates, but more on those tomorrow. Let’s have a look at what transport additions are coming your way!
There are 9 new transport hubs in total allowing for multiple lines and, in some cases, mixing different transport methods so your citizens can easily transfer. For everyone who owns the base game, we have a new Harbor-Bus Hub for the busy tourist harbors and a Multi-level Metro Hub for your city’s metro. The harbor is larger than the existing one and has room for 2 cruise ships to dock at once as well as 5 bus stops to get your tourists into the city. And as you may have already guessed from the name, the Multi-level Metro Hub combines underground, ground level, and elevated metro in one building.
If you own Snowfall we have 2 new hubs with built-in tram stops. Combine your tram and metro network with the Metro-Tram Hub with Road which offers a central platform and access to the underground metro – perfect for all the roads with central tram lanes. Snowfall owners can also benefit from the Bus-Train-Tram Hub with an elevated train track, a ground-level tram stop, and no less than 8 bus stops to choose from. A great option for transferring many passengers!
In addition to its existing hubs Mass Transit gets 2 new harbors. First up we have the Harbor-Ferry Hub which lets you integrate your ferry lines directly into your harbor. No need for tourists or citizens to walk between buildings when transferring from one to the other! But there’s more – the large Harbor-Bus-Monorail Hub combines cruise ships and bus lines with the city’s monorail system. Like the Harbor-Bus Hub, it has room for 2 cruise ships and 5 bus stops with the addition of 2 stops for the monorail.
When you own both Snowfall and Mass Transit, you get 3 additional hub options. The Ferry-Tram Hub expands your options with a tram stop right at the ferry allowing for easy transfers. Continuing your tram line further inland you have the option to combine it with the monorail through the Monorail-Tram Hub with Road. With its 6-lane road underneath the monorail stops it’s ideal for busy parts of the city. And last but definitely not least we have the Metro-Train-Monorail-Tram Hub with Road. This large hub offers both elevated and ground-level metro and train stops, 2 monorail stops, and 2 tram stops making it an ideal hub for combining your many public transport lines.
As you can imagine from the hubs we just looked at, you are going to need some new roads to go along with them – 15 in total to be specific! But before we dive into the ones that combine multiple expansions, let’s first have a look at which roads will be added for everyone who owns the base game. We have a Three-Lane One-Way Road with Bus Lane for you which fits perfectly with any bus network or the Airports terminals using a similar road. If you’re a fan of wide sidewalks we have three new medium roads with four lanes and wide sidewalks – with or without grass and trees!
Mass Transit gets 9 new roads with new highway options, new asymmetrical roads, and of course more monorail roads. The new highways let you expand your two-way highways with the new Asymmetrical Three-Lane Highway and the Four-Lane Two-Way Highway. Both of these come with or without sound barriers like other highway roads. Asymmetrical roads are not just for highways though, we also have both a medium and a large asymmetrical road for you with 5 and 7 lanes.
For your city’s monorail, we have 3 new roads bringing more options and more lanes to your city. Monorail Tracks on Four-Lane Road with Trees compliments the existing medium road with monorail tracks and lets you bring more greenery to the roads. But if 4 lanes aren’t enough we have the option of Monorail Tracks on Six-Lane Road which also comes as a tree-lined version.
For those hubs combining tram and monorail, you will need some roads which do the same. When you own both Snowfall and Mass Transit you get 2 additional roads that do this. Monorail Tracks on Two-Lane Road with Tram Tracks can be found in the small roads menu or in both the Tram and Monorail public transport menus. But 2 lanes don’t always cut it so we have the large road Monorail Tracks on Six-Lane Road with Tram Tracks for the busy parts of the city.
Hubs & Transport is a great opportunity for us to bring you new vehicles to celebrate the amazing 8 years we have had together with Cities: Skylines. Do you remember when the metro only ran underground? Since then metro was expanded to above ground, and we think that warrants more options for metro trains. If you own the base game you will have 6 new options for metros with varying capacities ranging from 120 to 500 for those extra busy lines! Two of the metros come in both a short and long version giving you more flexibility in the same style.
Metros aren’t the only new base game vehicles though, we also have a new train option. It carries 240 passengers like our previous trains but offers a new look for you to enjoy. It can bring in tourists from outside connections or you can select it for any of your train lines that need a little something new to distinguish them from other lines.
I mentioned After Dark at the start, and while the expansion got a lot of love in Roads & Vehicles, there is one thing it didn’t get: A new taxi vehicle. With Hubs & Transport, we’re adding the Black Taxi Cab for everyone who owns After Dark. Natural Disasters fans also get a new vehicle in the form of the Articulated Evacuation Bus which is able to carry 100 citizens to a shelter when disaster strikes the city.
But wait, we’re not quite done! With the new options for Mass Transit we of course need new vehicles too. We’re adding 2 new monorail vehicles able to transport 120 and 240 passengers, and 4 new ferries with capacities ranging from 10 to 40. The new ferries all have a lower profile than the original ferries making them ideal for fitting under low bridges – perfect for low bridges in a canal city!
That’s all the presents we had for you today, but this is not all the content coming in Hubs & Transports. Tomorrow at 4 PM CET we continue celebrating Cities: Skylines turning 8 years old with a look at new decorations, options, and improvements. Stay tuned!
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