Just thought I'd post this to let everyone know that the original SimCity had the source code released (I don't know when) and from this a Java source port has been built. I only found out about it the other day but it has been around for some time. It is called Micropolis, which is apparently what SimCity was originally going to be called.

Anyway, here is the link: http://code.google.com/p/micropolis/

It is just a Java program, so as long as you have the Java Runtime Environment installed you can play it. Obviously it has some clear advantages over running the original game inside DOSBox, those being that it runs in a window natively in the Operating System and it allows you to utilise a larger screen area to see more of your city at once. However, there doesn't appear to be any music (though you could provide your own via a media player running in the background). Also, being Java it is cross platform too, and there are downloads for Windows, Mac and Linux.

I have to say, though, I was never any good at the original SimCity. I just could not maintain a positive cashflow and kept having to resort to a cheat code to get me extra cash.

Sweet! Thanks for the link :)

I'm extremely paranoid about this kind of stuff, so just wanted to check with others... is it safe? Legal? Etc..?

It's perfectly legal. The original developer released the source code and data files for free. As for safe, I didn't notice anything suspicious when I tried it out or scanned it. As far as I know, Google also scans Google Code from time to time and removes suspicious programs and downloads.
The same happened to Tyrian.

Thanks for the info.

Another thing-- I know it's kind of against what GOG stands for, but you know Origin has the real game (DOS edition, sadly) for free right now? Just in case any of you wanted a digital backup copy and didn't have one already.

The project link now redirects to github.

In case anyone's wondering, the detailed explanation for why Micropolis exists is that EA open-sourced the UNIX port of the original SimCity as part of donating it to the One Laptop Per Child project.

Their only condition (beyond the usual "It's licensed under the GNU GPL 3. Obey that.") was that EA has to approve every build that uses the trademarked "SimCity" name, so only builds that pass EA's QA for being included in the OLPC system image can be called "SimCity". Micropolis was the original name for the project before "SimCity" was chosen.

(Also, they've been doing a bunch of rewriting. The current development is focused on a version which uses a C++ engine with the UI written in Python for easy extensibility and experimentation.)

Can you please point me to the most up to date source tree? The newest version that I've found uses Java, also there haven't been any changes this year.

It's all in the same GitHub repository. The C++/Python version is in the MicropolisCore folder. The Java tree is newer because it's a contributed side project.
https://github.com/SimHacker/micropolis

This file gives a human-readable account of which updates happened when:
https://github.com/SimHacker/micropolis/blob/wiki/News.md

If you want to understand the C++/Python version more, there's this series of blog posts:
https://weblogs.asp.net/bsimser/building-a-city-the-series

Thanks. I've read that several years ago. I hoped that there was something newer that I've missed.

You'd have to build it.

There's an in-browser version available here (http://micropolis.mostka.com), though I don't know how current it is.

amazing game i love this game

Hi, I have posted binaries on:
github.com/matthias24/micropolis/releases/tag/1.7