Maxis believes that the PC gaming market is alive and well, and that in spite of the engine powering SimCity, they believe that the PC space is the best fit for the game.
"Our engine is definitely portable, it could be operated on many platforms, but that's where our market is," said Kip Katsarelis in an interview with GI International. Katsarelis is currently the lead producer of SimCity.
"We’re still seeing the PC market is not dead, it's very much alive," he said. "Blizzard's shown quite a bit of success with their recent Diablo launch, The Sims is highly successful, so there's a market there, we've got an audience there that wants games on that platform, and we are still a PC house and will continue to be so."
Katsarelis says that although the studio may yet release SimCity on a different platform, the PC will remain the game's lead platform. He cited SimCity Social and SimCity Deluxe as examples of the game's potential for portability.
The developer spoke highly of the game's Glassbox Engine, which he says is "a simulation engine capable of doing many things." He hinted at the possiblity of future games being developed with the SimCity engine as its underlying framework.
"Internally when we bring people in we give them Glassbox and let them go make their own games. People have made simulation wineries, one guy made a honey bee farm, so there's a lot you can do with it."
SimCity is coming to the Mac and the PC in 2013.
