Hello Tycoons,

The Open Beta Branch moves to the Default Branch!

So first of all, the important stuff that will affect players right now! I'm moving the Open Beta Branch's current build (v0.9.9.16) to the Normal Branch. I won't even change the version number. I will simply move it to the normal branch. It means that if somebody installs the game now - that's the version that will be installed automatically.

This is a big deal because many of you still haven't played that version. It contains years of added features and improvements, and after all this time, I think it's ready to be pushed to the main branch. It definitely has some flaws, but compared to the original version, it's still superior in many ways.

Moving it to the main branch will also help me gather more feedback, which will be critical for the upcoming updates.

This means that your current saves will no longer work unless you opt into a legacy branch that I will create for the previous default branch version (v0.9.8.03). This way, you can finish your current games.

Here's how to do that. Don't worry, it's not complicated:
https://steamcommunity.com/app/686680/discussions/0/4031350783733793401/

(This is where you can opt in into different versions/branches)

Current Development: The CTN Feature

I'm close to finishing the main new feature of the game: CTN, which stands for Computer Tycoon News.

Back when I played Master of Orion 2 as a kid (a timeless strategy game), I really loved the news show that talked about recent events in the game and occasionally gave feedback on how the different empires were doing. CTN is something similar, but it features a much wider variety of news.

What kind of news? Well, there are five main categories:

Random Events
The news show will partially replace the pop-up messages for random events such as Product Recalls, Natural Disasters, or Viral Marketing Campaigns. Not all of them, though, since some events simply aren't newsworthy.

Company Interactions
The news show will report on Company Interactions such as court verdicts resulting in prison sentences, companies becoming rivals or allies, or even when a company starts having financial troubles.

Historical Events
This category is mostly about nostalgia and educational content delivered in the usual satirical style. The history of computer technology is full of interesting events that I really wanted to feature. Things like the Y2K Bug, spam, or the first email ever sent can give players some perspective.

Milestones
These news stories are mainly about the player. The news show will highlight achievements made by the player (and sometimes by competitors as well). Newsworthy accomplishments such as releasing the first exclusive video game or achieving worldwide sales will be covered.

Rankings
These will mostly be top-three lists featuring the best gaming machines, the best-selling computers, technology leaders, and more. Their purpose is to help players better understand their position in the world.

Some of the things covered by the news show are events that players should know about immediately, such as certain random events or two competitors becoming partners. These are considered "breaking news" and will immediately generate a news broadcast for the player to watch. Most news, however, concerns things that don't require immediate attention, so they will be presented in yearly broadcasts.

I plan to add all of these categories to the game's options menu so players can disable any categories they don't enjoy. If they do so, random events will continue to use the current pop-up system.

This feature required me to create a large number of texts and illustrations. The news show itself also has three unique visual styles to reflect different eras: one retro, one modern, and one futuristic, each with its own music.

I have high hopes that CTN will help players better understand and connect with the universe of the game while also making the world feel more reactive and alive.

The diplomacy system in Computer Tycoon was already partially inspired by Master of Orion 2, so it feels fitting that this feature is inspired by that game as well.

What Else?

There is still a lot on my plate.

I recently conducted some in-house testing to see what inexperienced players of the genre do when they first start playing, and I've created a dedicated to-do list based on the results to help them. On top of that, I still have plenty of my own ideas planned, as well as a long list of recommendations and suggestions from the community.

Some of the things I want to work on include extending the research tree (which would also increase the game's playtime by roughly 10 years), reworking user group and magazine priorities and their balance, adding some visual representation of consoles within the Home Computer category, improving how CEO relationships work, and expanding the Sandbox mode.

I will most likely release these features separately from CTN, as I know the community would prefer more frequent updates rather than fewer large updates that take much longer to develop. So I will likely split up the last major update into smaller installments. The game is close to version 1.0!

Localizations

Don't worry, I hear you! :)

Holy! The game's text file is already longer than the first Harry Potter book... Read this, if you'd like to know more about localizations: LINK

I originally wanted to use a service called Localizor, but unfortunately it is no longer available. That's a shame because it was probably our best option.

Lately, I've been considering a different approach. I may create a large text resource file that the community can edit on their own computers, possibly with AI-generated translations provided as a starting point. I'm not entirely sure yet, but given the current situation, this seems like the most realistic path forward.

The game now contains around 70,000 words, which is again... roughly the size of a Harry Potter book. Since the game isn't generating enough revenue to support professional translators, I will most likely have to rely on community translations for all target languages. I wanted to have professionals for Mandarin and German at least, but it is what it is. Since CT is a passion project I'm happy to offer anything instead of nothing.

That said, this process cannot begin until the texts are finalized. Please understand that I'm developing the game alone, and even managing the English text is already a significant amount of work, especially when volunteers are involved. Continuously changing texts while translations are being worked on would create a lot of unnecessary complications, so that's something I want to avoid.

Ending Words

Please keep the feedback coming, I really need it! Thank you very much for all the support and the patience! ^^

* Also thank you so much for the reviews, they help a LOT! *

Have a lot of FUN, my friends!

Andris aka Progorion

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