Cities: Skylines Snowfall Gets Some More Details

Published: January 27, 2016 10:49 AM /

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Cities Skylines Snowfall Logo

Now that the weather outside is getting more and more frightful by the day, the fans of the pretty great city builder Cities: Skylines are slowly getting fed some more details on the Snowfall expansion, which is going to add dynamic weather and snow to the game. In a developer diary on the Steam community page, Colossal Order PR manager Totalymoo outlines some more details on what we can expect when the expansion drops.

Cities Skylines Snowfall (1)

A new feature coming to the game is road maintenance. While making sure that your city keeps on turning in heavy snowfall is exclusive to the winter-themed map coming with the expansion, road maintenance will be available on all maps, snow or not. Players can send out maintenance trucks to the streets to periodically improve the roads, which gives all the vehicles driving over the improved roadways a speed boost. This boost fades away over time so you'll have to make sure you'll have enough trucks driving around at all times. On the winter map you'll also have access to snow plows to keep the roads free from snow, and this effect stacks with the maintenance trucks.  

Another new addition to the game's public transport system are the trams. These little railcars are a nice, scenic addition to your city while giving your citizens more options as to how they want to travel around your metropolis. Trams, in essence, work the same as other forms of public transport. Trams get dispatched from a tram depot and will drive along the lines you've built (these tracks can be built by improving your existing roads or you can build brand-new roads with tracks in them), with longer lines getting longer trams than short lines. Tramlines can also be built without roads, essentially giving them the option of bypassing busy intersections or gridlocked inner-city roads. If you look at the screenshot below you'll get an idea of what a tramline in your city may look like!

Cities Skylines Snowfall (2)

Trams can carry more passengers than taxis or buses, but cost more to maintain. The best use of this will be to use them for short trips around your city center, as opposed to making them the de-facto mode of transportation for your citizens. While trams don't really benefit from boosted roads, they won't be slowed down by snow either. 

Finally, Totalymoo adds that Colossal Order have also implemented several changes to the way buildings look to fit the winter theme. Buildings will be covered in snow, your citizens will prefer the warmth of their homes to being outside and the expansion will also include new winter-themed parks to complete the look. While most of these things will only be available to those who purchase the expansion, some elements will find their way to the base game. What those are remain a mystery for now, but we will let you know once we know!

Cities Skylines Snowfall (3)

Cities: Skylines Snowfall is the second expansion for the surprise hit of last year, with the first expansion After Dark adding in a day and night cycle. Snowfall was announced recently and is set to release sometime this year.    

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Chris Anderson
| Staff Writer

I've been playing games since I was just barely able to walk so I might as well write about them.