I'm really ecited about the potential that CitySim[1] has, now that I've taken it on for a project to turn it into a game. Last post I talked about what makes a game, and that is goals. City simulation games can be rather unique, in that you can really continue to play indefinately. If you want, there really doesn't have to be an "end goal" in sight. And yet, if you just build a city with no goals, it can seem pointless. Like two sides of a coin, it can come down to a coin toss on preference.
So, I've decided to take on both sides of the coin. I plan to do that with scenarios and badges.
When you choose to start a new game, you will have the choice of choosing a scenario or free play. If you choose free play, you will be able to build any city you want with any personal goals in mind. Free play will have a few options, such as if natural disasters can happen or not, and you can earn badges for various milestones of your city. Badges will include reaching a certain income, population, education, etc., though there are a few that you can only obtain through completing the scenarios. Essentially, in free play mode, your city can go on forever, with no particular end goal, earning various badges. Scenarios, on the other hand, will have specific goals for you to obtain, and will end the scenario once you have obtained that goal.
While I am still figuring out all of the scenarios, I have a few solid things in mind. For one, if you run out of money for a certain period of time, you will go bankrupt, and the scenario will end. In trying to keep with the overarching feel I want for the game (a relaxing time killer), there will be no time limit to complete these scenarios. E.g., get a population before x number of years, etc. It is my plan to make 9 scenarios, with the first three being 100k, 500k, and 1m people in your population, sort of as a prep for future scenarios. I have a fun idea in mind for the final scenario, which is to build a special building, a launchpad for a space ship, and send an astronaut to space! Not sure of all the intricate details just yet, but overall it will be a very expensive building to maintain, which means you will need a robust income while it prepares for launch.
In the grand scheme of things, the overarching feel that I want for the game is relaxing. In keeping with that, I have decided not to do things like taxes, where you are constantly adjusting things to keep everything in balance. Instead, each structure has a set income/expense based on it's level, and levels go up with time and dependencies. By dependencies, I mean that some things, like industrial and commercial zones will require that there are enough people to support the jobs, so it will go up. Likewise, if pollution, crime, traffic, etc. are too high, residential areas will not level up. You will not have to manually respond to a fire by sending the fire trucks. You simply have to build fire departments, and they will take care of fires. If there is crime, you don't have to click on criminals or direct squad cars, instead, you will just build a police department which will respond to criminal activity on it's own. Overall, the interface design is mobile friendly and simplified.
I have added "assistants" to the game, which will pop up to tell you things you need to know. A fire cheif will pop up and tell you that you don't have enough fire departments. A police officer will report to you the current crime rate. A secretary from the utility company will let you know if there is a lack of power or water. All of these "assistants" will help you know what to focus on in the game, but hopefully will not be too intrusive, as I plan to limit their ability to give you input.
Now that I have a pretty good idea of the direction I want to take the game, I've started adding things like icons and people, as well as things needed for badges. I already added a pollution variable to the different zones, and I fixed the yellow "highlighter" affect that covered all the roads, as well as fixed a few issues with leveling up and the display of the proper image for the buildings at different levels.
All that to say, I'm having fun!
Linux - keep it simple.