(FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS)
A: (Taken from the SimTower box**)
Windows 3.1: 4 MB RAM, 386/33 or faster, 8 MB hard disk space, 2x CD-ROM drive, mouse, sound card, SVGA monitor supporting 256 colors
Windows 95/98: 8 MB RAM, 486/33 or faster, same as Win. 3.1
MAC: 4MB RAM, 68030 or faster, System 7.0 or higher, 4MB hard disk space, mouse, monitor supporting 256 colors
Q: What do I need to get to the next star?
A: 2 stars................a population of 500
3 stars................a population of 1,000 and more than one Security office placed
4 stars................a population of 5,000, more than one hotel suite, recycling and medical needs met, and a good VIP rating
5 stars................a population of 10,000 and a metro station placed
Tower level........a population of 15,000 and a cathedral placed
Q: I just don't have a high enough population to get my next star. What advice do you have?
A: Offices, offices, and more offices. Each office built brings in 6 people for $40,000. That's two times the population of a condo for half the price of one. My Tower-level skyscraper is almost entirely offices, and its population is somewhere around 22,000. However, if you really don't like offices, there is a more expensive way: Make your tower all offices until you get a Tower rating. Then buldoze all the offices and replace them with condos. Be careful, this is expensive. Plus, the condo tenants do NOT pay you a monthly rent, you get your money all at once. If you're not careful, you could go bankrupt.
Q: How many of each facility can I place?
A: Elevator shafts.........24
Cars per shaft...........8
Security..................10
Medical centers....... 10
Fast food, restaurants, and shops............512 total
Parking spaces......................................512 total
Stairs and escalators...............................64 total
Theaters and party halls..........................16 total
People you can name...............................20
Facilities you can name............................20
Metro station............ 1
Cathedral.................. 1
Total number of floors.............................100
Q: I keep getting messages like "No Transportation Connected" or "People on floor x need path to floor y."
A: Standard elevators will only cover 30 floors, and Sims will only change transportation once. This is where express elevators come in. The express elevator is located under the standard elevator in the tool bar, but is not available until you get a 3 star rating. It is a bigger elevator that will only stop at every 15th floor, plus all the basement floors. To make the express elevator work, do the following things:
1. Do not make your tower more than 29 floors until after you get 3 stars and can build an express elevator.
2. Make sure you have nothing but skylobbies on floors 15, 30, 45, 60, 75, and 90. The skylobby must cover the whole floor.
3. No matter how many floors your tower has, make sure you build an express elevator from your highest skylobby to your lowest basement floor.
4. Build a standard elevator from floor 1 to 29, another one from floor 30 to 59, another from floor 60 to 89, and one from 90 to 100. The Sims will take the express elevator to the skylobby closest to their floor, and then take the standard elevator. Let's say we have an office worker whose office is on floor 22. He will take the express elevator from the underground parking garage to the 15th floor skylobby. Then he will take the standard elevator (The one from floor 1 to 29) to his office. He only changed transportation once!
5. As your tower grows, add more standard and express elevators as you see fit. My 100-story tower with a population of 22,000 has 7 express elevators and about 4 standard elevators covering each 30 floor block.