When I began work on GDM a long time ago, I had a vision for what I wanted.
I wanted a deep, and immersive tycoon experience free from guides. Where I could just play the game, and make decisions in game without using any 3rd party references as to what matches with what, how to set my sliders etc etc..
I decided that the way to create this experience was through procedural generation on every game aspect. Combined with full transparency within game in the HUD's to show the player all the relevant data Ie. Design / Tech Balance, Slider priorities, slider bubble chances..
For the most part this created the experience that I wanted. This however has been a very polarizing design choice. Some people tell me that love the procedural generation, some people straight up hate it, and some aren't sure what they think. Any way you shape it people were split.
As much as I want fully procedural, I do not want to alienate any type of player. To that affect I have been hard at work on a solution that should make everyone happy. The funny thing is I believe I still managed to make both versions require thought and effort, and it keeps the engagement level high regardless of the seed you chose.
Lets get into how I achieved this.
Game Seeds
You now on new game creation have to select a game seed. Currently the options are randomized, and reality based. I have plans to add a custom sandbox mode, as well as season / league specific rule set in the future.
Random Seed
If you select random then you will experience the game as it already has been in the demo. If you are yet to try the demo the short version is all topic / genre / target audience matches are randomized. You will not know what matches with what there are no guarantees. Military / fps could be terrible, or it could be Great who knows. It is up to you to use the in game tools to research and learn what games will work in your world. For this reason i consider this the harder version of the game, as more research is required which is tricky in the early game.
Reality Based Seed
In this seed, as you might expect all matches have been hand set by me. I have attempted to mimic the real world as much as possible. I have put the most effort into the Great, Good match levels when it comes to genre / topic / Target matches. Now the one thing I have said over and over, and even had in game "Fantasy and RPG is not a guaranteed combo" is no longer the case. Fantasy is a great match with RPG. Military is a Great match with FPS.
I have put a lot of effort into hand making these matches, but I am not perfect. There are over 5000+ values I had to set, and I might of got some wrong based on what you think should match.
I encourage anyone that finds a match they disagree with to bring it to my attention, and we will correct it. Lets not get to crazy though, if you contact me to tell me you want tanks and idle to match well. That is a little crazy, but I might put it to a good match just cause your cool. :)
Some of the matches I had to take some developers liberties with though, to keep the game balanced. I dont want any genre or topic to be "Overpowered" compared to others. Some are tougher than others. For example, what topic can't be made into a sim? Or what possible game is there that Ninjas wouldn't improve. Some of these more versatile topics, and genres I had to make some tough calls to limit matches. Every topic has 2-4 Great matches, and every genre has a few topics they are great for. So, there are none that can not be used in some way.
Since we are using static matches, third party guides can now be used for this seed. I figured why fight that. So, I decided to create the matches in a spread-sheet before bringing it into engine. I have made this sheet public, but UN-editable for now.
http://bit.ly/gdm_matches
Please feel free to review this guide for fun, or use it while making games to ensure you have great matches even in the early game.
I have managed to keep the reality based seen very engaging though. What I have done is I am still using procedural generation for the Tech / Design Balance. Balance is determined as follows.
Design = (30-70%) / Tech = (100 - design)
So from one play through to the next FPS genre could want 50/50 or maybe 35/65 or maybe 70/30 You cant possible know.
What this means is you will still need to research the genre to see the balance. Researching the genre is the Real world equivalent to learning how to code a game in that genre, and should be mandatory.
You can know that your matches are great, you can even know how much each slider section wants without genre research via the guide, but you can not know the balance. Hitting the desired balance is a critical part of making good games, and is still a major requirement for reality based matches.
You will still need to use logic to decide how much you want in each section of a stage to create the bubbles you desire. Use skills such as Crunch, Passive, Take charge. Use Company programs to boost Tech or Design, and use game delays to finalize your build and hit those marks.
I think this is the best of both worlds, and honestly gets me excited for the realistic seed. You will still need to think and engage with the game to get 10's. You can however use your real life knowledge to make choices as to what to make, but the how still involves you in game not just a guide.
Balance
Clearly Realistic seed is a little easier than procedural. You can start a realistic game, see what topics you have, check the guide, and make your first game high end matches. For procedural you need to either YOLO and just make a game to see how it matches, or do some training or another activity to gain RP to research before you make your first game.
Due to this difference I have decided to have separate leader boards for each SEED type.
We now have
1. Procedural - Milestone scores
2. Reality based - Milestone scores
3. Procedural - Best Game Sales
4. Reality Based - Best Game Sales
5. Total Games made (both seeds)
The total games board shares both seeds, I think that is fair as it's more about the amount of time you played a certain character, not how well you did, or how fast you made profits.
Demo Update
I know I said I was not going to update the Demo until June 1, and the Demo Hall of Fame event would run until that time.
This change is so significant, and important to people that I feel it has to be added right now.
To adjust for this I have gone ahead and created the first Hall of Fame Board. The top 10 from each board have been immortalized into the Hall of Fame, and we will run a second event from today's update until June 01.
Demo only players will see a variety of changes / improvements to the client. New icons, balance changes, money rework, office tasks. Many new things that are not in the DEMO have now been added to the demo along with this SEED update. This totally messes with the game balance, that is why I was avoiding doing it, but since I have to. I decided to run 2 Hall of Fame pre EA as I dont want to take anything away from the amazing players who have already logged tons of hours in GDM.
The only thing I was unable to test is the new boards. Hopefully scores post to the correct boards as they should, but I can not test this until I wipe the boards. I will be testing as soon as I drop the update, if there is any issues you can expect a quick patch. Please hit me up on twitter @hulgarth or anywhere if you find any bugs relating to the changes.
Minor Changes
There has been a few minor changes to improve the experience. The majority of which are based on player feedback. I have a lot of little things to come, and I hope to have a good chunk of them in before EA.
Some of the small changes already implemented include;
-Some HUD formatting
-Spelling / Grammar
-Remove the cost of Game Reports
The idea of game reports not costing money was brought up in the forums, and I think they made a really valid point. The cost is the time it takes to make the report, you shouldn't have to pay. Since this is really only useful in the early game, and early game is when you need cash the most. I decided to cut the $5k cost for reports. They are now free, and still generate RP
Conclusion
This update marks a big step towards making the game more inclusive. I really look forward to hearing feedback on the system, as well as the matches. If people would prefer genre tech / design balance to be static we can discuss it, but I think the randomness on just that aspect keeps the game fresh and fun for reality seed players. let me know if you disagree.
I have a lot of big ideas planned during EA. There is also a million small things, and improvements to be done. If you have any big ideas feel free to hit me up on here or anywhere you prefer, and lets talk about it. I want to create the deepest most immersive, and complex tycoon game ever conceived. Your input will go a long way to reaching that goal.