Does the ingame time pass in turns or more like real time?

[FordManFromHell]

"In game, time advances at the pace the player chooses and pauses automatically for events and occurrences." http://www.moddb.com/games/automation So does that confirm that there aren't going to be any "turns" in the game? Or am I misinterpreting that sentence?

I personally would have wished that this game would of played like Detroit and Motorcity, in turns..

[Killrob]

So what I'm saying now is what we currently think it will be like, which might actually not be the truth for the final version:

In Singleplayer you'll have pausable real-time, where you set what events time is halted at automatically (break-points). You may
adjust the speed of time passing to your own desire.

In Multiplayer there are two modes which we think of (all are NOT pausable!): adjustable speed (the game runs at the slowest
setting that any player has chosen), fixed speed (set before game start, anything from slow to fast). We imagine it to be
playing like a classic thoughtful tycoon game in the slower settings, while more like insane engine & car designing Starcraft in
the faster settings.

What you want to play like is up to you, there are modes for everyone.

[FordManFromHell]

I dont want to start debating over wich is ultimately better for games Turn-Based or Real-Time, but I personally do prefer Turn-Based over Real-Time. If somebody would ask me why is this, I probably would have to say that to me the TB is more “clear” way of doing things. You have your turn, then you end your turn and when you get your turn back again, then some things have changed and now you must take those changed things into consideration and make your move again. It’s the ultimate “basic” –way to count passing time in games.

I really am having hard time picturing myself playing Detroit –type game that would be RT. I would probably end up playing it like this: When I have done setting everything up in the game, then I would just make the time go as fast as it can until something happens, then react to that event and put the game at max speed again. While I do understand that there isn’t that huge of a difference in the way I would play it if the game would be TB, since then I would just press “next turn” until something happens, then react to that event and start pressing the “next turn” –button again. But my ultimate point is that I don’t think that in this kind of game there would be much to gain from going RT, in fact I cant think of a single thing that this kind of game would gain when going RT. So since I think the TB is more “clear” way of doing things, and that I belive that there isn’t anything that the RT could bring to this game, I would say why not consider making it Turn-Based?

[Killrob]

All valid points, and I agree on most of them. We definitely ARE considering turn-based models as well, but there is one big argument against turn-based game progression: it is not flexible. Say one turn is one month just as it is in most turn-based tycoon games I've played:

Say your R&D team finishes your current research on the 2nd of the month, your factory finishes the tooling for your new production line on the 10th, a fire broke out in one of your other production facilities on the 13th (and now people sit there waiting for new orders after one production line has been destroyed), on the 23rd your engineers finish the reworking of one of your engine blueprints, on the 24th one of your contractors offers you a ground breaking tech which changes one of your current designs such that you would need to cancel the current efforts.

Do you really want to see those things first on the end of the month? That would be horribly inefficient for your company! "Sorry, big boss is only here once a month to take decisions." I think you see what I'm getting at. I see no (good) way of making it highly flexible AND turn-based.

Cheers man!

[Daffyflyer]

Consider it like the Anno series in terms of how it would play i'd say, whilst there are only major events to respond to now and then, there is always a bit of tweaking that can be done, you can always be tweaking prices, checking on marketing campaigns or what have you.

[AutoHappiness]

Awesome! Yay!

[FordManFromHell]

Say your R&D team finishes your current research on the 2nd of the month, your factory finishes the tooling for your new production line on the 10th, a fire broke out in one of your other production facilities on the 13th (and now people sit there waiting for new orders after one production line has been destroyed), on the 23rd your engineers finish the reworking of one of your engine blueprints, on the 24th one of your contractors offers you a ground breaking tech which changes one of your current designs such that you would need to cancel the current efforts.

Good point, however the game could be allowed to pause even in the middle of the month IF some important event occurs that needs the players attention. I belive there was at least one game that I have played which had this kind of system, but I cant remember what game it was (perhaps it was Motorcity?). Also I cannot see any reason why the game couldn’t advance in weeks instead of months (not saying it should though).

Consider it like the Anno series in terms of how it would play i'd say, whilst there are only major events to respond to now and then, there is always a bit of tweaking that can be done, you can always be tweaking prices, checking on marketing campaigns or what have you.

Well first of all I havent played the Anno series, actually now that I think of it the last real-time strategy game I purchased and played was C&C Red Alert in the 90's. That said I do understand that my opinion "might" be a "bit" biased, but nevertheless please do continue reading. I of course cannot speak for everybody, but Im a bit of perfectionist when playing games. This basically means that the more there will be tweaking for the player to do in small amount of passing in-game time, the more it starts to feel like a work instead of a fun game. Don't get me wrong since I kind of like tweaking, but if there will be something to tweak all the time then it starts to feel like that the game isnt advancing at all. In this sense id rather make the tycoon part of the game more "big picture" -like and let the player only tweak things between predetermined amounts of time, between turns. It doesnt mean that if you make it turn-based that then the game has to be less detailed, it only takes away the need for the player to tweak stuff between short amounts of time.

Im not saying that the tycoon part of the game shouldn't be any challenging, because it most certainly should be challenging. But what i am saying is that I reckon that there is a possibility that this game would not gain anything from going real-time, instead it would perhaps only make it seemingly challenging game by making things needlessly complicated.

[Der Bayer]

Hey guys,

I always thought this game will be turn-based, as it is (in my head) a lot easier to make. But reading that Automation might be realtime makes me even more excited! Though I cannot imagine how every detail will work, I think this is a more modern gameplay. And I suppose the devs have spent more time thinking about the mechanics than me, so I fully trust in them. I definitely see the advantages of realtime gameplay as there are some things I don't like about turn-based games. These arguments sure are a bit one-sided, though I would not have a problem with Automation being turn-based:

You always have to do all the "work" at one point, so 10 problems occur at the same time. It is much better when they occur one after another. Ok, you have unlimited time, but you can have that by pausing a realtime game as well.

If you sorted out your problems and just want to let one year pass, you always have to click a dozen (or more) times. In realtime you can just lean back and watch.

If you want to see the effects of some changes you made, you always have to wait a fixed amount of time. In realtime, you can tweak and optimize much faster.

Turn-based is a problem for multiplayer games, as you always have to wait until the other players are ready. Realtime with fixed speed or "democratic speed setting" is much more dynamic and, I guess, fun to play. The speed setting allows for highly diverse multiplayer experiences. Especially if you want one match not to be longer than 3-4 hours, this is a must. Turn-based games, if they are quite complex as Automation hopefully will be, will take really long to be completed. I don't see any other working approach for a multiplayer mode that does not demand 10 hours or more.

If you take games like Detroit, they needed to be turnbased, because the feedback you need is hidden in the depths of the game and it just took it's time to find and analyse it. If the feedback is given in a better way, you can save a lot of time and thus make realtime possible.


Greets
Martin

[FordManFromHell]

Though I cannot imagine how every detail will work, I think this is a more modern gameplay.

This seems to be the common assumption, that real-time gameplay is more modern thus more smarter than turn-based gameplay. There are also comments that turn-based gameplay is dead. To my mind these assumptions however are invalid and do not in it self prove anything. Look at the Steam's top played games list http://store.steampowered.com/stats/ there is Civ5 which was released back in 2010 and still it just keeps on hanging at the top ten list. Another example might be GMG's top sellers list: http://www.greenmangaming.com/ (right of the screen) XCOM: Enemy Unknown at the top of the list. So at least gamers themselves doesnt seem to think that turn-based games would be dead or in anyway inferior when compared to real-time games.

And I suppose the devs have spent more time thinking about the mechanics than me, so I fully trust in them.

Yeah, im not saying I would not trust the devs. But I would like to hear some points from them about why this game absolutely needs to be real-time (if it even needs to be).

I definitely see the advantages of realtime gameplay as there are some things I don't like about turn-based games. These arguments sure are a bit one-sided, though I would not have a problem with Automation being turn-based:

Yes it is pretty much about personal preference, and everything you listed goes pretty much into that said (personal preference) category, so that’s a two way street.

However the reason why I brought this whole thing up is because I personally think that the RT -system is more complex than the TB -system. I also think that there is no point in adding overly complicated system to a game if it does not benefit anything from it.

[Daffyflyer]

From a development point of view, real time isn't really a great deal harder than turn based, if at all, in calculation terms it all works the same way, except those turns happen to be constantly ticking by, and only <1 sec long for example.

In our personal experience, some of the most enjoyable "Tycoon Games" have been real time, for example Transport Tycoon, Roller Coaster Tycoon, Railroad Tycoon etc. And on the whole, they deal with it well, and in fact would not be very easy to make enjoyable in a turn based fashion.


Regarding the fact that there will almost always be something to be done/tweaked, consider that if you're running a vast multinational you'll be running multiple factories building many different cars for many different markets, so I'd imagine most of the time you'll be working on something, either building factories and working out plans to move into new markets, designing new cars, keeping an eye on sales and making tweaks to your business strategy accordingly, choosing research paths, working out how to optimize production (which factory to make which cars for example), upgrading facilities etc.
You won't always have to be doing something, but that kind of constant scheming and expansion will serve you well in building a successful company.

Transport Tycoon/OpenTTD is in fact is a good model for that kind of gameplay, whenever you have the money to do so you're either expanding your network or improving the efficiency of your existing network, the only times you aren't doing anything is when you're waiting for money to come in, or if you're just sitting back to relax a bit.

In terms of the game stopping for key events, that is something we might consider as an optional mechanic, but I'd say by default it'd just notify you of the event and it'd be up to you to pause the game if you wanted to. (As Killrob outlined, our current idea is that in single player you'd be able to pause/speed up time as you wished, ala Sim City, The Sims or Cities in Motion). Note that we WOULD have it auto pause when designing cars etc, as that could take anything from a few mins to a few hours depending on how much tweaking you wanted to do etc. (Hell, I know of players who've spent 30min+ building one engine to get it exactly how they want it)


Also I agree heartly with all the points Der Bayer makes, all of those are strong reasons that we've had in mind ourselves, particularly the Multiplayer aspect, as turn based Multiplayer can be quite frustrating at times, mostly when 7 of you have nothing to do in a turn but that one last guy wants to spend 15mins designing a car, and infact shuffling the design aspects into a turn structure without annoying players would be hard.


Lastly, the other reason is that its the style of game we enjoy and wish to create, whilst I love games like Civilization etc. I've been particularly inspired by the fun me and Zeussy have had playing OpenTTD over the years, and want to somewhat recreate that feel for the Car Industry with Automation.

[Killrob]

Good point, however the game could be allowed to pause even in the middle of the month IF some important event occurs that needs the players attention. I belive there was at least one game that I have played which had this kind of system, but I cant remember what game it was (perhaps it was Motorcity?). Also I cannot see any reason why the game couldn’t advance in weeks instead of months (not saying it should though).

If you increase the granularity of the time units you make it more like real-time with every step you take, a real time system just has very small (short) turns and someone is pressing the next turn button for you automatically. There is a simple reason for why the turn-based system with interruptions would not work in multiplayer though: it would mean that some players sit there waiting for the slow as bastard to finally finish his break-point event which only he got. In singleplayer it would work though and, as you say, has been shown to work well numerous times. On the other hand: how is that any different from pausable, break-point supporting real-time? I don't see the difference: it is setting the progression of time to infinity (i.e. very very high) while NOT paused. You would still get your monthly resume and break-points for special events.

Well first of all I havent played the Anno series, actually now that I think of it the last real-time strategy game I purchased and played was C&C Red Alert in the 90's. That said I do understand that my opinion "might" be a "bit" biased, but nevertheless please do continue reading. I of course cannot speak for everybody, but Im a bit of perfectionist when playing games. This basically means that the more there will be tweaking for the player to do in small amount of passing in-game time, the more it starts to feel like a work instead of a fun game. Don't get me wrong since I kind of like tweaking, but if there will be something to tweak all the time then it starts to feel like that the game isnt advancing at all. In this sense id rather make the tycoon part of the game more "big picture" -like and let the player only tweak things between predetermined amounts of time, between turns. It doesnt mean that if you make it turn-based that then the game has to be less detailed, it only takes away the need for the player to tweak stuff between short amounts of time.

Im not saying that the tycoon part of the game shouldn't be any challenging, because it most certainly should be challenging. But what i am saying is that I reckon that there is a possibility that this game would not gain anything from going real-time, instead it would perhaps only make it seemingly challenging game by making things needlessly complicated.

I still do not see how a pausable real-time game means that you don't get as much time tweaking things? And if you speak of the multiplayer part then how on earth are you going to make it turn-based without turning it into a complete snore-fest (well, you got nothing to do this turn... or the next... so better enjoy sitting on your but doing nothing while Sir MacSlowArse it taking his 25min to design his single-carby ecobox). It is not that we do not like turn-based games, actually one of my absolute favorite games Jagged Alliance 1&2 are turn based and they are frickin brilliant. We just don't see 1) how it would play ANY different from a turn-based game in singleplayer (if you want) and 2) how you'd make multiplayer work in turn based mode at all.

There is another component to that too: skill. Especially in multiplayer (I'm speaking for myself but I assume Andy and Cas agree on that point) the best player should win... not the one that bored the others to death. In a real time setting you need to make decision fast and accurate, and the one doing it the best will have a deciding edge over his competition. In real life there is no such thing as a perfect engine... not even optimal ones, and a real-time setting will contribute to making this a big factor in the game as well. It's not about who builds the perfect car, but who builds the least flawed one with the resources given to him (in which time is one of them).

I don't buy into the real time is more modern either, that's probably what analysts tell you... but analysts are generally not gamers and don't have a clue. Real-time and turn-based systems are both superior in their respective application... and while classic tycoon games used to choose a turn-based structure, I don't see it being superior for Automation, quite the contrary.

Cheers!

[Daffyflyer]

There is another component to that too: skill. Especially in multiplayer (I'm speaking for myself but I assume Andy and Cas agree on that point) the best player should win... not the one that bored the others to death. In a real time setting you need to make decision fast and accurate, and the one doing it the best will have a deciding edge over his competition.

Yup, 100% agreed on that, running a company is about making good decisions on your feet, and in this case good designs. Whilst there will indeed be the option of quite slow game time modes, the victory will still most likely go to the player that makes the smartest use of time to run his or her company.

I don't buy into the real time is more modern either, that's probably what analysts tell you... but analysts are generally not gamers and don't have a clue. Real-time and turn-based systems are both superior in their respective application... and while classic tycoon games used to choose a turn-based structure, I don't see it being superior for Automation, quite the contrary.

I'd not even say that classic tycoon games used a turn based structure, when you consider Transport Tycoon, Sim City etc I'd say the classic tycoon game field is probably approaching a 50/50 split. Also remember that a lot of the stuff we can do real time these days would have been more difficult to do in the early to mid 90s that was the heyday of tycoon games, turn based would have had definite edge in terms of ease, paticularly as to make a real time game that feels good you ideally need to graphically show quite a few things happening in real time. (Turn based is more forgiving of showing spreadsheet like data in game IMO)

[FordManFromHell]

On the other hand: how is that any different from pausable, break-point supporting real-time? I don't see the difference: it is setting the progression of time to infinity (i.e. very very high) while NOT paused. You would still get your monthly resume and break-points for special events.

If one would design game from ground up to be a turn-based game with -possible- interruptions between turns (if something important happens), it would still clearly differ from a real-time game. I see you are thinking the model you are having in your head about this game’s real-time tycoon system, and just slapping turn-based gameplay on top of that with as many interruptions that this real-time game would have that is currently in your head, and saying that it would not make a huge difference. And that is not what I ultimately meant.

You guys are talking awful lot about multiplayer, and it might be true that there is no way in hell that Automation could be playable in MP as turn-based system, so I will give you that. But to speak the truth, I generally don’t give a flying duck about multiplayer, the odds are very high that I wont ever even press the in-game MP menu (there is a slight change for a miss click though). Not trying to provoke anyone here, just said my thoughts about MP in general.

I still do not see how a pausable real-time game means that you don't get as much time tweaking things?

I have not said anything like that. My point was pretty logical, I said that in terms of in-game passing time, the TB is more easier for the player to comprehend than the RT, and that if a game does not gain anything from that more complex system, then I don’t see any point adding it to a game. HOWEVER, now I actually do understand why you don’t even consider making this as a turn-based game, it is strictly because of the multiplayer, since there is no way in hell it could be done in TB way. So that is the “gain” that you will get from going real-time.

So yes, now I do understand that because of the multiplayer, there is absolutely zero change for this game to become turn-based.

Thank you and sorry

[Daffyflyer]

Beyond multiplayer and all the other things we've talked about is the simple fact that we like real time strategy and tycoon games, much as you like turn based ones. In the end, real time is the option we decided we favor for this project.

[FordManFromHell]

Beyond multiplayer and all the other things we've talked about is the simple fact that we like real time strategy and tycoon games, much as you like turn based ones. In the end, real time is the option we decided we favor for this project.

Yes I sadly realized that from the attitude that was all over your answers. But to tell you the truth, this was the first true “oh shit” moment when I realized that this game is going to be real-time. As an old Detroit and Motorcity player I just didn’t see this coming. At all. I once tried a game called The Corporate Machine, it was a real-time business strategy game "in which the goal is to create a corporation in one of four industries (automobiles, aircraft, computers, or soft drinks) and eventually dominate your rival companies" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Corporate_Machine. Im pretty sure I stopped playing it after an hour or so and never ever tried it again, its sad really because I really, really tried to like that game. I just hope that this game stays as far away from that abomination as possible, but so far there are already two main things that resemble me from that awful, awful game: globe view combined with real-time.

I do not consider myself as a person who is "against Fallout 3 because it is completely different from Fallout 1&2" (if you know what I mean), and keep on ranting about something just because it is different than what we had before. That said I would have never ever imagined that I would say this under any circumstance about any game, but now I will say it for the first time in my life: My expectations for this game has decreased dramatically to a point, where I almost regret purchasing the Forced Induction Edition instead of the Naturally Aspirated Edition. Im sorry to say that but I belive this is the correct channel to give feedback about this game, plus that is how I truly feel.

EDIT: However I still am going to try to play the finished game and try to enjoy it. Hopefully I will enjoy it, well at least I have engine designer and car designer but to speak the truth, even together they arent really a "game".

EDIT2: Perhaps you should consider bringing this fact out more clearly that this game is going to play in real-time?