the actual simulation was being done on the servers, rather than on the client I remember that's what they said, but I doubt it was ever the case. Wikipedia sa

the actual simulation was being done on the servers, rather than on the client I remember that's what they said, but I doubt it was ever the case. Wikipedia says the cloud functionality "enable[d] cloud saves and multiplayer functionality", and shortly after launch it was determined you could patch the game to run offline for an indeterminate length of time. To me, it was pretty obvious back then that it was purely an attempt at copy protection. Beyond that, the game was just bad. The simulation just didn't live up to the hype, and while it did have a lot to live up to given its fantastic predecessor, SimCity 4 was old by then, and people expected a big upgrade. Specifically, I remember "sims not living persistent lives but rather going to the nearest available workplace for work and nearest available house after work" (Wikipedia again) as being a huge deal in the community back then. And then there was the limited play area, which was just ridiculous when you consider what people want from these games.