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Brucemation on: The restrictiveness of the families system.

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Sayonara

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Post Thu Mar 19, 2015 9:19 pm

Re: Brucemation on: The restrictiveness of the families syst

Daffyflyer wrote:What is the disadvantage to specifying the largest capacity that will fit in the block when you design the engine?


What I suspect is happening:

Gamer:
"Hmm, I want to build an engine in three different displacements. I'll start with the middle one first, because it's the average, and it makes a lot of sense to start with the average. I can just make it smaller and bigger to suit the car it goes into."

Developer:
"We'll get the player to build the biggest engine first, because that's kind of how it works in real life. You can't magically stretch a block, so it makes sense to specify the largest engine first."

Gamer:
"Wait, why can't I stroke my 2.0L into a 2.2L? Honda did it. This game is stupid."

So basically "biggest engine first" isn't intuitive to a lot of people. Said people then perceive the system as something they have to work around rather than something to work with, which creates frustration.
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maffc

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Post Thu Mar 19, 2015 9:31 pm

Re: Brucemation on: The restrictiveness of the families syst

I reckon when the min/max capacities are displayed in the family tab it should go a long way to helping this issue.
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Daffyflyer

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Post Thu Mar 19, 2015 9:38 pm

Re: Brucemation on: The restrictiveness of the families syst

Fair call. I reckon we see how we go once minimum capacity is specified :)
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WizzyThaMan

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Post Thu Mar 19, 2015 10:55 pm

Re: Brucemation on: The restrictiveness of the families syst

Sayonara wrote:
Daffyflyer wrote:What is the disadvantage to specifying the largest capacity that will fit in the block when you design the engine?


What I suspect is happening:

Gamer:
"Hmm, I want to build an engine in three different displacements. I'll start with the middle one first, because it's the average, and it makes a lot of sense to start with the average. I can just make it smaller and bigger to suit the car it goes into."

Developer:
"We'll get the player to build the biggest engine first, because that's kind of how it works in real life. You can't magically stretch a block, so it makes sense to specify the largest engine first."

Gamer:
"Wait, why can't I stroke my 2.0L into a 2.2L? Honda did it. This game is stupid."

So basically "biggest engine first" isn't intuitive to a lot of people. Said people then perceive the system as something they have to work around rather than something to work with, which creates frustration.


I totally agree with this. I myself start off with the middle ones most of the times, and while I am at it tink, Oh Snap! I need to make the largest one first!
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Drake

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Post Fri Mar 20, 2015 3:40 pm

Re: Brucemation on: The restrictiveness of the families syst

I noticed that if when you are designing the engine family you can set the initial bore and stroke then head to the variant page and set the sliders to minimum then head back to the family page and it will show the minimum displacement as you adjust the bore and stroke further.

Just a little tip to make things a bit easier. ;)
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BurningBridges

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Post Wed Mar 25, 2015 2:40 am

Re: Brucemation on: The restrictiveness of the families syst

Sayonara wrote:Gamer:
"Wait, why can't I stroke my 2.0L into a 2.2L? Honda did it. This game is stupid."

So basically "biggest engine first" isn't intuitive to a lot of people. Said people then perceive the system as something they have to work around rather than something to work with, which creates frustration.


This is all so pointless. In the future all my engines will start out to be 120x120mm. I dont understand at all the need for another "feature" that increases work. As if the constant "could not fit engine" isn't annoying enough.
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nialloftara

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Post Wed Mar 25, 2015 4:41 am

Re: Brucemation on: The restrictiveness of the families syst

As you keep building a engine family I'd imagine you'd be able to open up new tech and can begin decreasing engine size as better technology becomes available. My 5.0 liter 1980's 4 barrel carb v8 can become a lighter weight 4.0 liter fuel injected while still keeping the same power and time tested family reliability. I can see this system working quite well once we all figure out how to use it.
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Daffyflyer

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Post Wed Mar 25, 2015 3:12 pm

Re: Brucemation on: The restrictiveness of the families syst

BurningBridges wrote:This is all so pointless. In the future all my engines will start out to be 120x120mm. I dont understand at all the need for another "feature" that increases work. .



Which will make all your engines very large for their bore and stroke.

No you probably don't understand the need for this feature, but it's a pretty important in the context of how the finished game will work. Lot of the design decisions we're making now are made with things further down the road in mind. And they can sometimes temporarily make the current game worse. Sorry.

We'll certainly be improving things to make it more clear what range of available capacities a given family size can fit though. That absolutely needs improvement.
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Post Thu Mar 26, 2015 10:48 am

Re: Brucemation on: The restrictiveness of the families syst

Devil's advocate - the current system when building, when you're setting max bore and stroke, does say "minimum capacity" already on the tooltip. I don't think it will take much more work to make it clearer. Maybe making the main UI itself have a max/min figure side by side or stacked where the existing displacement indicator is.
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