Campaign Duration

[STjay]

Hello all,

Forgive me if my figures are not exactly correct, but so far after reading i'm lead to beleive that the main campaign
mode will start within the mid 40's, post world war II and will last up to 2030 sometime.

That is a span of nearly 100 years. I was wondering what happens at the proposed end of the campaign; Is there
a set of criteria that must be met in order to have finished the capaign sucsessfully? Or is the game more open based
like other tycoon and managment simulation games such as Football Manager where the years will become endless and
dependant on the users game.

I know the managment simulation aspect has not been started yet but i'm guessing these things have probably been thought
out in some form for the future.

Cheers,
Jay

[Killrob]

Indeed The game will start in 1946 and continue till 2020. Techyears will range from 1940 till 2040.

At the end of the grand campaign you'll probably not be able to just "continue" in an endless loop of years where nothing changes anymore.
Personally I'm not a fan of games without an end. After the conclusion of the grand campaign your achievements and history will be analysed
and a look will be taken at how you have changed and shaped the automotive landscape. This will (most probably) also be connected to some
kind of score.

As this is a very important part of the game, we'll make sure to make the best out of it. It needs to feel like a really satisfying conclusion,
and you should have the desire to jump right into the next game, playing a different type of car maker
Cheers!

[FordManFromHell]

What about the length of the main campaign in terms of gameplay hours? Do you have any target like how much time should the “average” completion of the main campaign take? I just hope its not going to be too short. One idea would be to add different gamespeeds (like in Civilization) but im not sure how that would work out with this game.

[STjay]

Thanks again Rob for the quick reply !

I suppose that is where we differ, I would much rather have an open based game in respect of time constraints.

I would hate for the scenario to be the year 2029 and I have finally just released a brand new model of vehicle
that I am looking forward to releasing and outselling my long time rival manufacturer only for the game to
conclude a few months down the line.

Maybe a suggestion would be to optimise the campaign before the user starts; in order to select different options that they would prefer?

Obviously i'm in no real posistion to tell you whats best.
However allowing the user to select different variables to best suit how they would like to play out their campaign might be a good route
to take.

Cheers,
Jay

[Killrob]

We are definitely going to provide a good selections of settings for the main campaign... I would, for example, want to have a historic campaign with realistic markets, a random campaign with random events and crisis, an alternate universe campaign where the oil crisis never hits and the green boom is unheard of.

Extending the game past 2020 comes with some technical problems though... and I don't know how we'd solve those in a pleasing way. Also 2020 marks a very good interesting point in history: it's after what will be known as the first major world-wide collapse of the financial system (~2013-2018), with all markets tumbling and rising from the ashes. If you survive that as a car maker, you truly need to take that place in the hall of fame.

The length of the campaign really will depend on playstyle! I have no idea how long it will take, but lets make a little calculation:
How long does it take you to design one engine in the current version of the engine designer if you want to do a good job? 10 minutes? Let's go with that.
Now assume that you on average will take 10 more minutes to design a car in the car designer, 5 more minutes to set up production, engineering, and marketing for that car.
That is 30 min per car/series! How many cars will you make over the course of the game? Maybe on average 30-40? After a slower start in the early years you do more of course... but that really depends on what kind of car maker you want to play too.

40 cars x 30min = 20 hours of game time for the grand campaign. That sounds reasonable IMO
Cheers!

[STjay]

Hi Rob,

Yeah I agree, by that calculation 20 hours of game play will be sufice for any gamer.
I understand by the point of 2030 the technical advances will have finished as we can't just guess or
estimate what could be applied to vehicles in 20 years time...

And financial climate will probably come full circle to give the user every possible varient that
could help or hinder their company.

I suppose I don't like the idea of the campaign ending, I'd rather just keep producing new cars to beat
rivals to sales.

Thanks,
Jay

[hanitora]

I suppose I don't like the idea of the campaign ending, I'd rather just keep producing new cars to beat
rivals to sales.

Could just incorporate your campaign company(s) into the sandbox in many ways so you can design cars that your firm would produce and get accurate pricing and such.

[Lilguyofsteel210]

is the campaign even out yet?

[Jakgoe]

Not out just yet. In a month or two, it will be released on Steam as en Early Access game, and work will begin on the campaign then.

[gt1cooper]

en

*twitch*

Indeed, what has been said was that work will begin on the tycoon game around the end of the year; this does not mean that this will be when everyone can play it. This is simply the beginning, when the first rendition is being tested. Some time after this point, you can expect to start seeing actual campaign "Demos" (in quotes because it is less of a demo than an early widespread testing phase), and after our good higher-up's are satisfied with such renditions, (and understand that something this big/important/needing to be tested cannot be predicted accurately to a date), we will see a release.

[xABSOLUTIONx]

speaking of campaigns..

will it be possible to choose where the company originated from?

like spending trait/feat points in most RPG games

[Killrob]

Yes, it most probably will be possible to choose from a variety of starting locations.

At the start you'll be able to choose some tech points for your start-up too.

[Kev2442]

I think you could have a look at Game Dev Tycoon :
they had the game somewhat end on a said year, with score showing and all, everything done.
But you can choose to continue in free play without any changes.

What would be awesome is having the following option :
keep previous completed companies (from beginning to fall or end of game) as competitors.
That would add a real lot of fun, especially if you come to have an über-successful brand and have to overtake it.

As I plan a whole lot of companies working together and uniting at some point (that I'll show someday), I think the best thing would be to play with many independent companies at the same time.
If I remember correctly, it is turn-based. It could be implemented as either a menu on top to choose which company to manage until every one has ended its turn, or just have it in a set order, one company's turn at a time.

I know the latter one would be a complete mess to implement, but it would be sooo worth it...

[Yossarian]

hello,

it makes sense to have a point when the game ends and you get your scores and statistics, so youre animated to play a new campaing and beat your own score.
But it would make sense if we could chose to play after the "deadline", without new scores and new technologies, just for guys who would prefer to dominate the world market and expand the company to insane scales or whant to tinker a little bit after work with their powerfull company.

Personally I hate tycoon games which end after a period of time without me reaching all my goals i`ve set. It would mean that I have to start again and do it faster and hope I reach all my goals, this surely gives a nice challange, but costs a lot of time which not ever user (me for example) has.

just my 2 cents

Hopefully my english dosen't hurt you, it isn't my mother tongue