SimCity/Starting a City

Once you've loaded up the game, you will have two basic options: Create a City, or Play Scenario. It's not recommended to play a Scenario until you have the basics down, at least.

Click Create A City. A box will pop up asking you to name your city, name your mayor, choose difficulty, and other options. Then it will take you to the map-builder screen.

Note: SC2K Users:

In order to use the map-builder, you must specifically select it in the menu that pops up when you load the game. If you hit Create A City first, SC2K will auto-generate a map.
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When you get to the map builder, there will be many options in a window. This window will have three sliders, a lot of buttons below it, and a square on top that shows a general indicator of how your city terrain will be made. You can click on that too if you wanna modify how the mapmaker will generate your terrain. The sliders control the trees, water, map, etc. that the maker will generate. There are various buttons that can allow you to add trees, water, raise/lower terrain, increase/decrease water level, among others. Feel free to experiment.