Hello there, city-builders! As usual with a great new expansion comes also some sweet, sweet free content. We've got libraries, bus line customization, citizen job titles and a new policy to help with cities that are highly educated but still love to have that good old industry around!
Library
Libraries are fun! They are useful for many purposes. Some go there to read the newspapers while others search source books and instructions for their school work and hobbies. Of course, there is also the music department for those who just want to relax with some new and old tracks. Many libraries also carry a wide selection of comics from near and far and sometimes you'll find titles there you can't find in a store due to unavailability! The Public Library is a new city service. It provides both entertainment for its neighborhood and a small chance for children, teens, young adults and adults to be educated further. When a young adult or adult enters the Public Library, there is a chance that they'll gain an education level when they leave. The chance is quite small so the Public Library is not able to cover the entire education needs of a city, or even a fledgling town for that matter. And the chance gets smaller the higher in education level is in question. But still, building Public Libraries is useful since they will compensate with entertainment what they lack in pure education power!
A Public Library.
Academic Library
Academic Library is a new unique building. It is a grand building and its architectural style has been influenced by the French neoclassicism with Gothic and Renaissance elements for good measure. Its collections are universal, not limited by subject, format, or national boundaries and it includes research materials from all parts of the world and in hundreds of languages. The Academic Library serves all walks of life, from members of the local government to the members of the public.
The Academic Library.
Bus line customization
As a new feature we have added the possibility for you to customize the vehicles used by the bus lines. Now you have a chance to have full control over what kinds of vehicles travel the bus routes in your city! And it's quite easy to use. Just open up the Public Transport - Lines Overview panel, check the line you want to customize and then click the button under the title "Model". Here you can scroll through the available models and select the one you want to operate on that specific bus line. Also, you can choose to have random bus models to operate on the line instead of a specific one (also, "Random" is the default setting).
Bus line customization, now with the ability to select which type of bus model is used on the line. Each line can have a different bus model.
School Bus
As part of the free content we present the classic yellow American-style school bus. The School Bus becomes part of the bus model collection and with the new bus line customization option, it can be used on any bus line in place of the game's original bus model.
The iconic American-style school bus.
Citizen employment details
Citizens now have job titles! That's great! You can see their job titles by clicking the citizen and opening up the citizen panel. Next to the workplace reads their current job title. We have provided a selection of job titles that suit most of the different businesses in the game, from burger joints to office buildings.
Citizens now have a job title next to their workplace.
However, there's more! The job titles are moddable in the Asset Editor. Job titles are tied to the workplace buildings. For example, when you go to the Asset Editor and open a City Service or other building type placed by the player (this does not work for zoned building), you are able to write job titles in the "Workers" section found in the Properties panel. Here you can specify job titles not only by education level but also by gender (this is especially helpful for languages where the male and female forms of the words are different, such as actor and actress, for example). After you've added the new job titles for the building, you can save it the same way you'd save any custom asset and use it in the game. And the citizens who go to work in said building, would adopt the job titles written in the properties.
You can now modify buildings in the Asset Editor by adding new job titles for the people working there.
Industry 4.0
The future of industry is automation. The new revolutionary technologies alter the nature of the workforce in production facilities, shifting the need from common factory workers towards highly educated specialists. Factories are overhauled with the latest technology, robots and other machinery that performs the manual labor previously done by humans. And now, the need for highly educated maintenance crews, machine specialists and robotics technicians rises drastically. Industry 4.0 is a new, free policy. It has been designed to help with cities that have a highly educated population but still want to take advantage of normal, zoned industry. After all, industry is one of the driving forces what comes to the city earning its taxes.
Education system update
In addition to the new Industry 4.0 policy, part of the free update is the education system update. Previously education was more, let's say "flexible", where citizens were able to gain education levels they required regardless of what school was in question as long as they met the school's age requirements. If the citizen was an uneducated adult, they could gain an (elementary school) education level by going to the university. They would also be counted as graduated from the university even though their education level was just "Educated" and not "Highly educated". The same system also applied to teens and young adults where they would gain the first education level in high school. This resulted in discrepancy of education information displayed to the player. For example, the game would state incorrectly the amount of actual university students studying in universities as well as how many actual university students were graduated because it counted also the young adult/adult citizens studying in the university for the first or second education level as being university students and graduates.
The education system "flexibility" also created what is known as the "Over-Education Problem" where uneducated adult citizens were able to freely gain "Educated" or "Well educated" levels of education from high school and university which eventually led to the declining of uneducated workforce. This in turn resulted in workplaces with large numbers of low-skilled jobs to shut down and become abandoned because the workforce was almost entirely at the very least on the level of "Educated" or more.
Now, with the new changes the citizens attend the correct school type at the correct age, to gain education levels. This means that teens who have not attended elementary school are not eligible for high school and young adults/adults who have not attended high school are not eligible for university. Teens can no longer gain elementary education in high school and young adults/adults can no longer gain elementary and/or high school education in university. This ensures a more balanced distribution of educational levels in the adult population and also gives greater control to the player how they want to educate their citizens. It also means that there are more citizens to fill the different education level positions in the various businesses in the city.
Fire behavior update
In the free update we also provide the players the possibility to turn off the spreading of fire. This applies to all kinds of fires from forest fire to building fire. When this option is turned on, it prevents large scale forest fires by not allowing fire to spread from one tree to another. It also prevents fire from spreading from trees to buildings and from buildings to buildings and so on. However, if the player turns on random disasters, this option is disabled. Also, setting random disaster probability to more than zero or playing a scenario turns the option off.
The fire behavior update also brings change to how fire behaves with Parklife and Campus buildings placed on paths. Normally these buildings can catch on fire only if they are placed on roadside. However, buildings placed alongside paths can also catch fire if the player has Natural Disasters installed and has unlocked helicopters and has turned random disasters on or is playing a scenario.
So, here we are, at the end of this one road. We've talked about campus areas, the academic year, faculties and varsity sports. We've taken a look at the new maps coming with the expansion and checked through the policies, too, without missing all the cool free content. So, what do you guys think? Are you excited for Cities: Skylines - Campus? It's going to be out soon so get those city-builder hats ready and be prepared to start building!
EDIT: Job titles modding works only with buildings that are placed by the player, not with zoned buildings as it was originally said in the dev diary.
Library
Libraries are fun! They are useful for many purposes. Some go there to read the newspapers while others search source books and instructions for their school work and hobbies. Of course, there is also the music department for those who just want to relax with some new and old tracks. Many libraries also carry a wide selection of comics from near and far and sometimes you'll find titles there you can't find in a store due to unavailability! The Public Library is a new city service. It provides both entertainment for its neighborhood and a small chance for children, teens, young adults and adults to be educated further. When a young adult or adult enters the Public Library, there is a chance that they'll gain an education level when they leave. The chance is quite small so the Public Library is not able to cover the entire education needs of a city, or even a fledgling town for that matter. And the chance gets smaller the higher in education level is in question. But still, building Public Libraries is useful since they will compensate with entertainment what they lack in pure education power!
A Public Library.
Academic Library
Academic Library is a new unique building. It is a grand building and its architectural style has been influenced by the French neoclassicism with Gothic and Renaissance elements for good measure. Its collections are universal, not limited by subject, format, or national boundaries and it includes research materials from all parts of the world and in hundreds of languages. The Academic Library serves all walks of life, from members of the local government to the members of the public.
The Academic Library.
Bus line customization
As a new feature we have added the possibility for you to customize the vehicles used by the bus lines. Now you have a chance to have full control over what kinds of vehicles travel the bus routes in your city! And it's quite easy to use. Just open up the Public Transport - Lines Overview panel, check the line you want to customize and then click the button under the title "Model". Here you can scroll through the available models and select the one you want to operate on that specific bus line. Also, you can choose to have random bus models to operate on the line instead of a specific one (also, "Random" is the default setting).
Bus line customization, now with the ability to select which type of bus model is used on the line. Each line can have a different bus model.
School Bus
As part of the free content we present the classic yellow American-style school bus. The School Bus becomes part of the bus model collection and with the new bus line customization option, it can be used on any bus line in place of the game's original bus model.
The iconic American-style school bus.
Citizen employment details
Citizens now have job titles! That's great! You can see their job titles by clicking the citizen and opening up the citizen panel. Next to the workplace reads their current job title. We have provided a selection of job titles that suit most of the different businesses in the game, from burger joints to office buildings.
Citizens now have a job title next to their workplace.
However, there's more! The job titles are moddable in the Asset Editor. Job titles are tied to the workplace buildings. For example, when you go to the Asset Editor and open a City Service or other building type placed by the player (this does not work for zoned building), you are able to write job titles in the "Workers" section found in the Properties panel. Here you can specify job titles not only by education level but also by gender (this is especially helpful for languages where the male and female forms of the words are different, such as actor and actress, for example). After you've added the new job titles for the building, you can save it the same way you'd save any custom asset and use it in the game. And the citizens who go to work in said building, would adopt the job titles written in the properties.
You can now modify buildings in the Asset Editor by adding new job titles for the people working there.
Industry 4.0
The future of industry is automation. The new revolutionary technologies alter the nature of the workforce in production facilities, shifting the need from common factory workers towards highly educated specialists. Factories are overhauled with the latest technology, robots and other machinery that performs the manual labor previously done by humans. And now, the need for highly educated maintenance crews, machine specialists and robotics technicians rises drastically. Industry 4.0 is a new, free policy. It has been designed to help with cities that have a highly educated population but still want to take advantage of normal, zoned industry. After all, industry is one of the driving forces what comes to the city earning its taxes.
Education system update
In addition to the new Industry 4.0 policy, part of the free update is the education system update. Previously education was more, let's say "flexible", where citizens were able to gain education levels they required regardless of what school was in question as long as they met the school's age requirements. If the citizen was an uneducated adult, they could gain an (elementary school) education level by going to the university. They would also be counted as graduated from the university even though their education level was just "Educated" and not "Highly educated". The same system also applied to teens and young adults where they would gain the first education level in high school. This resulted in discrepancy of education information displayed to the player. For example, the game would state incorrectly the amount of actual university students studying in universities as well as how many actual university students were graduated because it counted also the young adult/adult citizens studying in the university for the first or second education level as being university students and graduates.
The education system "flexibility" also created what is known as the "Over-Education Problem" where uneducated adult citizens were able to freely gain "Educated" or "Well educated" levels of education from high school and university which eventually led to the declining of uneducated workforce. This in turn resulted in workplaces with large numbers of low-skilled jobs to shut down and become abandoned because the workforce was almost entirely at the very least on the level of "Educated" or more.
Now, with the new changes the citizens attend the correct school type at the correct age, to gain education levels. This means that teens who have not attended elementary school are not eligible for high school and young adults/adults who have not attended high school are not eligible for university. Teens can no longer gain elementary education in high school and young adults/adults can no longer gain elementary and/or high school education in university. This ensures a more balanced distribution of educational levels in the adult population and also gives greater control to the player how they want to educate their citizens. It also means that there are more citizens to fill the different education level positions in the various businesses in the city.
Fire behavior update
In the free update we also provide the players the possibility to turn off the spreading of fire. This applies to all kinds of fires from forest fire to building fire. When this option is turned on, it prevents large scale forest fires by not allowing fire to spread from one tree to another. It also prevents fire from spreading from trees to buildings and from buildings to buildings and so on. However, if the player turns on random disasters, this option is disabled. Also, setting random disaster probability to more than zero or playing a scenario turns the option off.
The fire behavior update also brings change to how fire behaves with Parklife and Campus buildings placed on paths. Normally these buildings can catch on fire only if they are placed on roadside. However, buildings placed alongside paths can also catch fire if the player has Natural Disasters installed and has unlocked helicopters and has turned random disasters on or is playing a scenario.
So, here we are, at the end of this one road. We've talked about campus areas, the academic year, faculties and varsity sports. We've taken a look at the new maps coming with the expansion and checked through the policies, too, without missing all the cool free content. So, what do you guys think? Are you excited for Cities: Skylines - Campus? It's going to be out soon so get those city-builder hats ready and be prepared to start building!
EDIT: Job titles modding works only with buildings that are placed by the player, not with zoned buildings as it was originally said in the dev diary.
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