Hello Tycoons,
Computer Tycoon was put into Early Access exactly 1 year ago this day.
Nothing would feel better but uploading a new version today and celebrating the game's first year on Steam. I'm really sorry that I cannot offer that, but announcements. At least, I have good news for you.
I got a lot of good wishes and understanding from you concerning my father's and my own health issues - and I'm very thankful for that. That was a harsh period to us. There is a Hungarian saying (I'm sure you have a similar one in your own culture) what says "If something doesn't kill you then it will make you stronger." I’m here in that mentality…
And I'm extremely happy to tell you, that my father is alive and his condition is acceptable now. While we are still worried his life is not in direct danger anymore, his first surgery was a success. Also, I feel much better now physically and mentally too! I had no pains in the last month, even more, I can do the exercise again (what I desperately nowadays). My liver is okay now – and hell I’m not a big drinker but I really enjoyed my beer yesterday (after it was forbidden for that long).
Even with this hard period and being unable to work normally for a long time - (and it is kinda devastating for a solo man proejct), Computer Tycoon's first year on Steam was a moderate success. When I left my work as an architect in the IT business sector many was really skeptical about my plans, waves of laughter and dubiety were my constant companies, but against all of that and the “indie apocalypse”, I managed to be here. I tried to play it safe, but I put all of my money into this plan and I got back enough from you to expand the game into more. Now I'm not forced anymore to work on my games after a full-time day job in the nights, that's the only thing I have to focus on.
I have a LOT of work to do. But I’m in! I didn’t work 14 hours for months daily before early access because I wanted to abandon my dream game. In fact, I don’t feel like I’m working when I’m doing this. Marketing, business research, coding, art, organizing things, testing, planning… all of this is fun to me. That’s what can motivate you when the financial return is low – that now I’m really enjoying the thing what I’m doing in most of my day.
But yes… the situation is worse and worse on the PC platform. Even right now changes are coming what touches indies in a frightening way here, but I felt it is coming - and because of that I was thinking about the solution for a while now and I am prepared:
I am going to port Computer Tycoon to Xbox and PlayStation as well - and also in the future, I will create multi-platform games. It is not easy with strategy games, but it is still better than attaching to a single monopoly. The development will be done here, but when I’m done I will expand the controls and the GUI to fit those platforms as well.
With this, I think I’m done with announcing things. Or not? Oh no... not yet.
So yes, I know your next question… when the next version is coming? I really hoped that by now you will have it, but I failed. I'm very thankful for your patience! My last question to the community was about the tech tree and I got a lot of feedback from you what I’d like to build into the game. Let me show you two pictures of the progress.
The default research screen in the next version is going to be the "Research Tree" and the old window is going to be called as the “Research Queue”. The most important task of the Tree is to show your progress visually and help you in long-term planning. You will be able to put the techs in the queue from the tree and in the old way as well (on the Research Queue). Then you will be able to order your researches but you also get more tools to filter and order the coming researches than previously.
I have new techs in the Tree which were not part of the game earlier. Now we have "cooling" as well. The performance calculations are going to be completely different and so the hardware and computer design screens and system as well.
You won’t be able to trade with other companies in the game YET. But that’s another thing that will come soon, we will just need time to see how the game mechanics are changing because of the new features – thus I have to put it out as soon as I can.
Here are the things I want to deliver to you with the very next version of the game:
- New kinds of technology
- Tech tree, new research system
- New base properties for hardware and computer (noise, heat)
- New performance calculations and parameters (base speed, multipliers)
- Fixing some mayor issues with the ending screens, country names and so on
- Ability to turn off permadeath of the CEO and possibility to play after the victory condition is fulfilled.
I think you wanted to see this, although I will just follow the ROADMAP:
https://steamcommunity.com/games/686680/announcements/detail/1673520100901557536
I’m afraid to make promises, but I say maybe I will be able to release it this year – as I know that you REALLY would love to know when it is coming.
And here let me just put here some shots of the coming stuff again, to make you remember how many things I was working on in the meanwhile. (For example the prototype of the manager system is something that was very important to make happen earlier, although I won’t be able to put it into the game for a long time yet).
And… Thanks for your support! Thanks for being here and letting me doing my game! You are the best!
