The objective of SimTower is to construct and manage a towering
skyscraper and keep its occupants happy. Offices, hotels, and
condominiums give tenants places to live and work, while shops and
restaurants provide commercial balance. Utilities such as hospitals
and recycling centers become necessary as the tower grows in size.
One of the key activities of the game is effectively managing and
building elevators in order to allow occupants to move between floors
efficiently. Waiting for an elevator for too long causes the residents
to stress (indicated by a black, pink or red colour as they become
more stressed). Too much stress causes them to permanently leave the
tower.
The player's progress is based on a star system, similar to how hotels
are ranked, with new stars awarded for meeting population milestones
and other conditions. Population is measured by the number of
individuals currently in the tower; many hotel rooms will cause
population to soar during the night. As the tower's rating improves,
more facilities can be built by the player, such as a cinema.
> The Tower was initially a Mac game, and it was produced by a two-man
> team ? me and a freelance programmer called Abe-san. I did the basic
> graphic design. First I made a basic scaled design in monochrome,
> setting it in motion with HyperCard. Next I coloured it with 16
> colours, checking that the presentation made clear to the user the
> intended difference between buildings such as offices and hotels.
> Towards the end of development, the Mac's performance was starting
> to increase, so to switch the designs I'd produced in 16-colour mode
> to 256 colours, I enlisted the help of designer Horita-san. Thanks
> to his craft, The Tower featured some lovely palette animation, and
> the day-to-day happenings within the buildings were presented in
> vivid detail.
>
> As soon as the Mac version became a hit in Japan, the president of
> Maxis, Jeff [Braun], got in touch with me. The author of SimCity,
> Will Wright, apparently told him that my game was 'interesting', so
> Maxis immediately decided to contact me to discuss the prospect of a
> worldwide release for The Tower. As SimTower, it became a big hit in
> Europe and the States. I feel really honoured by that.
>
> Experiencing SimCity on a Mac with a monochrome screen was what
> motivated me to want to produce games. I had played many other games
> before that, but I hadn't been interested in making my own games
> until that point. I think that's why, even now, my productions are
> always strongly coloured with values that are important to the
> simulation genre.
>
> ? Yoot Saito
If you have the Japanese Mac OS version of The Tower, please upload
it.
DL #1 is the installer for v. 1.2
DL #2 is a hybrid Mac/PC install disc for v. 1.2
DL #3 is a game updater from 1.0 to 1.1
DL #4 is a save game editor that allows you to change your money or
add stars for your Tower.
DL #5 is a game updater for The Tower (Japanese Only) to 1.3J
DL #6 is a "limited edition" game updater, specifically the holiday
version, which is used to turn the floppy version of the game into the
CD version. You will need the original floppies (works on Mac and PC)
for The Tower. Updates to 1.2J.
DL #7 is a SimTower Mac demo
DL #8 is floppy images of SimTower v1.1 installer, in DiskCopy 4.2
format (2 x 1.44MB disks)
There's a [SimTower strategy guide][1].
Please see the sequel [Yoot Tower][2] and the [Japanese version
"Tower"][3].
Compatibility
Architecture: 68k PPC x86 (Windows)
[1]:
http://www.angelfire.com/wi2/zell/simtower/guide.html
[2]:
http://macintoshgarden.org/games/yoot-tower
[3]:
http://macintoshgarden.org/games/tower-12j
