This is fairly large build. It is the precursor to moving into a new structure of LOGistICAL games and add-ons.
This new structure links full, independent LOGistICAL games back to this original LOGistICAL game by sharing the same save game across them all. LOGistICAL: British Isles is the first of those games.
Here is a "simple" architectural diagram to show how LOGistICAL fits in with the Steam architecture.
Other things...
Background Textures
Background textures were turned off for a while as I dealt with lag and lockup issues. These issues have been mostly resolved with a new heart transplant, so the textures are back.
The new textures cover the entire map.
Since the textures were defaulted to "off" for new games for quite some time you may have to turn them back on. See Settings, Map, check on. The slider was to make the graphic fade but is now only working with the non-textured mapping.
LOGistICAL both Night and Day
Just so you know how hard you are working to fix these towns, LOGistICAL now moves between night and day. There is no advantage/disadvantage at this stage (coming soon), but you will see it in the background graphic.
Statistical LOGistICAL
Statistics are now available by clicking on the town trophy icon in the top panel, center screen.
Statistics are shown for all the modules that you own, including towns, roads, industries and a score.
You can drill into any module's statistics that have an asterisk (*). You can drill down through the regions to the towns.
Many stats may start as zero. To populate them load the DLC and then save your game (eg move a truck). You should only have to do this once.
On a slow computer, I found it easiest to just load a few modules, save, restart, check statistics and then load more.
Leaderboards will be added to the statistics soon.
Total Towns, Roads and Industries
These values are displayed when you mouse over your money in the top middle panel).
Since the "modular load" build of LOGistICAL, these values have not always been totally accurate, especially the roads and industries.
These have been fixed and are now totals of the statistics page, so if you can query them by drilling into them.
These values will only be fully accurate once you have loaded all the your game modules.
Dumping cargo
Once all towns are full, there maybe no where to deliver cargo from an industry that isn't fully upgraded.
You can now transport cargo to completed towns. There is no payment but the towns will gladly accept it.
Town Needs
Sometimes when there are town "needs" items that get duplicated. eg. a town may require bananas and fruit. Fruit also contains bananas. The collective groups will always show after the single items.
When this happens, you can't use bananas as a part of the fruit, as it will continue to be delivered into the banana line item.
Now the duplicate icons will no longer appear within those groups.
Towns decide where the incoming cargo goes with their own priority order.
If the town requires an item for their town needs and an industry within the town also requires that item, then the town "needs" get first priority.
The industry icon will now be displayed with a padlock over it until the town's needs have been completed.
New Tutorial
Flinders Island has been retired as a tutorial. It will soon appear as part of the Australia main map.
A new tutorial is now available and it is all about motorcycles.
This Isle of Man is known for its annual motorcycle races. The island is small and the bikes race around at crazy speeds.
Well, the Isle of Man wants motor bikes and lots of them. You are to build up all the industries that eventuate to a final product of producing motorcycles.
This tutorial is voluntary to all players that have passed the original tutorial.
There is no completion objective to allow you to move into the main games.
Just click the globe and click the country that you want to play and your initial truck(s) should appear with the first contract.
Achievements for the Isle of Man will only be available in the British Isles module.
Other things
Pause has been fixed and modified.
Pause now stops the trucks, industries production and town consumption.
While in pause you can still move trucks around the map and all the other general game play mechanics.
There is a pause icon in the center of the screen when the game is paused.
SPACE BAR is now a shortcut for pause.
The depot flag now sits over the town dot, so when zoomed out you can find it easier.
Iron ore in UK and BI modules has been hard to find, even for the most avid of players, so there is now a hint contract to help you find it.
Hint: If you are having trouble finding an industry within the map, try using an internet search. "Most" industries are placed where they should be.
A few minor fixes in the British Isles and Isle of Man modules.
Please Beta Test
As always, I would love you all to try the beta version out before it gets upgraded to Live (within the next 10 hours).
Beta uses the same save file as Live, so none of your game play will be lost.
I have set this beta to use the UK map, not the BI map, so it would be great to see if those playing UK find the new changes (eg Republic of Ireland and the Chanel Islands).
To play this new beta, right click on LOGistICAL in your Steam library, select Properties, select the "betas" tab, select "beta" from the drop down list. There is no password.
Thanks all for playing and hope you are all having fun doing so.