Optional Realistic Build behavior ....

Topic: Optional Realistic Build behavior .... (Read 2935 times) previous topic - next topic

Optional Realistic Build behavior ....

May 08, 2010, 01:01:02 am

Hi,

after i have finaly sucess in DL from V7.3

i come with an suggestion i have made first
in the German forum, I was told there i should like to address Simutrans Experimental with this

Like to have a realistic behavior for build operations.
Which means:
No ZeroTime build of anything!
All is build in realistic time ....
You musst first plan a railway line , then come the workers, clean the planed way (remove trees, flaten terrain, build tunnels,lay reils , put on the electric lines (if the reail have it ..)
and so one ..
For buildings the same ..
Not more "klick" and the building is here ...
This give particularly in later games a interesting difficult to plan a new line in existing ways without interuppt to much with the existing lines.

I know this will for many user a to much overdriving of the realism of a transporting game.
But for me the build off all kind of things is going to easy and to unreal.
Hope this found a group a funy idea

Regards
R-T

Re: Optional Realistic Build behavior ....

Reply #1 – May 08, 2010, 02:55:28 pm

R-T,

thank you for the suggestion. I have considered this myself before, but it is not high on my list of priorities because it would take a very large amount of work to make it work properly, and I am currently focussing as much as possible on simply getting the gameplay balance right, and also on getting out a good and balanced pakset to work with it (Pak128.Britain-Ex).

However, this idea will remain on the long-term maybe list :-)

Re: Optional Realistic Build behavior ....

Reply #2 – May 08, 2010, 06:20:03 pm

I think this would require a lot of thought. In practice I always end up building a lot of "test lines" and doing land modification, clearance, etc. -- at extra cost, mind you -- in any case. So I think this would add little or nothing to the gameplay. And if done incompetently it would make it much harder to make a decent line at all.

The simplistic way to do it would be to only permit building when time is not paused, which would have minimal effect on gameplay.

Re: Optional Realistic Build behavior ....

Reply #3 – May 08, 2010, 11:41:42 pm

The solution to Neroden's issue is theoretically simple, but is likely to be tricky to implement: allow a player to lay down plans of ways, buildings, etc., in the same way as ways and buildings are laid down now, except that the player is not charged for laying them down, they have no effect in the game, and they are graphically differentiated from real ones somehow. The cost of constructing what is planned is shown. Once the player gets the plan right, the player can select to build what is planned, and the ghost buildings, ways, etc. turn into a construction site until the thing is built.

There are many, many very difficult implementation issues around the whole scheme, but one further conceptual difficulty is what to do with way intersections: if one is building a new way that intersects with an old way, can vehicles use the old way at the point of intersection during construction? If not, this is likely to cause significant problems for players. If so, how to represent the construction of the intersection?

Re: Optional Realistic Build behavior ....

Reply #4 – May 11, 2010, 03:09:56 am

the intersection problem you mention is a bit too much micromanagement i think. at the layer of abstraction we play at, we can ****ume that the trafic is routed around the construction site, e.g. by temporary bridges etc.

Re: Optional Realistic Build behavior ....

Reply #5 – May 11, 2010, 04:51:12 am

Quote from: jamespetts – on May 08, 2010, 11:41:42 pm

The solution to Neroden's issue is theoretically simple, but is likely to be tricky to implement: allow a player to lay down plans of ways, buildings, etc., in the same way as ways and buildings are laid down now, except that the player is not charged for laying them down, they have no effect in the game, and they are graphically differentiated from real ones somehow. The cost of constructing what is planned is shown. Once the player gets the plan right, the player can select to build what is planned, and the ghost buildings, ways, etc. turn into a construction site until the thing is built.

There are many, many very difficult implementation issues around the whole scheme, but one further conceptual difficulty is what to do with way intersections: if one is building a new way that intersects with an old way, can vehicles use the old way at the point of intersection during construction? If not, this is likely to cause significant problems for players. If so, how to represent the construction of the intersection?

This is a great idea. You could have a button that moves the player into planning mode... which could be a sort of sandbox (with a limited amount of memory, so that the player can't build so much it becomes a drain on the processor trying to do so much doubled in memory, or something), and when the player is happy, click the "Commit" button to lay down the actual lines.