videos GlassBox Engine Preview: Part 3, Scenario 2 - Water System, Water Delivery and Effects of Pollution

EA have released another GlassBox game engine preview detailing the water system, water delivery and effects of pollution:



Essentially water pumped from the ground is deducted from the level of water remaining and pumped around as agents along the pipes to water-consuming entities like houses which require periodic refreshing. The twist is that pollution from factories, etc. can creep into your water system and begin circulating, thus causing illness and economic problems as the effects of that illness result in sims missing work, etc.

I'm loving the realism in this so far and I like how everything seems to be interconnected. It seems a great deal of consideration is going to have to take place when planning out your city which can only be a good thing from a simulation perspective; in previous games supply of water was just a minor inconvenience of throwing a tower or pump up and laying some pipes. I also like the animations on the water tower itself so you can clearly see it is polluted. I'm hoping there are more advanced module addons or buildings which can be used to help purify water in high pollution zones!

It's intresting seeing how these things work behind the scenes and how even something trivial in the last game they have made more important this time which is great. Each new video is making more excited to get this game.