3 questions on the inner workings of the game

[Diablo123]

1) In the game, your company has a monopoly on public transportation. What's stopping you from increasing ticket prices to just below that of private transportation? Surely it would take more than 6 dollars to take a cab to work? So why not charge 5.90 for a bus ticket?

Your company reputation would go down, but so what? Demand should still remain even if reputation goes down, because people still need to travel to school and work. Just charge slightly below private transportation.

2) Are the AI-citizens intelligent enough to always pick the more economical route to their destination?

2b) Do they know they can transfer to a fast service at a nearby bus stop, instead of waiting at the same bus-stop? What is their walking limit for route transfers?

3) When you want to construct a station, a white circle pops up. What exactly does the white radius mean? Are citizens in highlighted green buildings likely to walk to that station (assuming there is a viable line to their destination from that station)? What abour orange buildings then?

 

[Zarine]

1) people think of at least 3 things before taking public transportation :
cost, time and your reputation.
I have no clue about the formula but with high price, your reputation will drop so you'll loose on cost and reputation + some people won't pay for the ride.
Keep in mind that many people use their feet because the formula tell them it's better than what you offer.
Maybe they use attractiveness too.

2) they don't compare only the cost as I told before. The same as people in real life taking their car to go to work... everyone knows that buses are cheeper than car...

2b) if they made the math and said that the bus is the best option, they won't take the nearby metro because it's less good for them. For transfer, as far as I can tell if the circle of the station got the other station in it they will come even if they have to make 50 kms to cross the street.
So they can take a bus doing A-B-C-...-Z, exit at the C station to take the metro doing C-M-Z.

3) it's the radius of attraction. My best guess would be that when calculating the global cost (with the formula in part 1) they first start by foot. If they enter in a circle during his walk, it calculates if the lines at this station are good for him.
So the bigger = the best chance to attract lots of people. A building in green (inside the circle) would mean that everyone in this building will always consider taking the lines at this station.
Maybe the color define a bonus given to the station when considering the stop (so a luxury stop attract more than a sign stop)

 

[knul]

1) In the game, your company has a monopoly on public transportation. What's stopping you from increasing ticket prices to just below that of private transportation? Surely it would take more than 6 dollars to take a cab to work? So why not charge 5.90 for a bus ticket? Your company reputation would go down, but so what? Demand should still remain even if reputation goes down, because people still need to travel to school and work. Just charge slightly below private transportation.

First, money is very abstracted in this game, so don't take the ticket prices at face value.

Still, you're quite right. It's possible to charge very high prices and people will still use your transport. For example you can charge $20 for metro tickets and still have lots of customers with the right network.

2) Are the AI-citizens intelligent enough to always pick the more economical route to their destination?

No idea, but from what I've seen the richer pops (business people) are more willing to accept high prices than poorer ones (dropouts).

3) When you want to construct a station, a white circle pops up. What exactly does the white radius mean? Are citizens in highlighted green buildings likely to walk to that station (assuming there is a viable line to their destination from that station)? What abour orange buildings then?

AFAIK it's indeed the service area. From experience, pops at the outer ranges of this circle are less likeley to use your transport than those closer. In higher densitty areas it's advisable to overlap the circles a bit.

 

[unmerged(169164)]

1- The game is not about money making, the goal is not about extracting as much money as possible from captive customers. It is about providing a high quality service of transportation to all citizens. The game comes with an original approach compared to the rest of the production: there is no trapped customery you can milk as much as you wish as customers in the game have their own means of transportation (private car, taxi, walking; I'd have liked bicycles as I saw they are included as decorum)
So if they do not like your network because the service is poor, they simply do not use it.

In the game, it materializes into building a transportation network that works on a nominal capacity (70~85pc of the potential load computed by adding all the stops: so a well balanced network is one for which vehicles fills around 70 pc of the stop load at every stop)

Once you figure out how to achieve this kind of network, depending on circumstances, the network works in undercapacity (110~130pc of the network capacity) or overcapacity(40~50pc of the network capacity)
Overcapacity happens usually during economic downturns whereas undercapacity happens during economic booms.

The game provides you with a set of tools to manage the inflow of passengers to the network, mostly by turning the network more or less accessible/attractive.
There seems to be circonstancial loads (peak hours) to deal with.

Once with such a network, hiking up prices comes with penalties as it impacts on the general usage of the network by customers. This can cause losing money.

2- Does not work this way. Potential customers all come with different expectations on a public transportation network.

Pensioners for example do not mind the time spent on transportation and they prefer close to each other stops rather than walking etc

Each category comes with frequently travelled to locations (hence a good network is one that allows them to move to all these locations, networks can be specifically designed to meet the wants and needs of a category)

 

[Diablo123]

1- The game is not about money making, the goal is not about extracting as much money as possible from captive customers. It is about providing a high quality service of transportation to all citizens. The game comes with an original approach compared to the rest of the production: there is no trapped customery you can milk as much as you wish as customers in the game have their own means of transportation (private car, taxi, walking; I'd have liked bicycles as I saw they are included as decorum)
So if they do not like your network because the service is poor, they simply do not use it.

In the game, you need money to be able to provide good service. Earning money isn't easy in the game. The game designers added a flexible ticket pricing. The problem is, since you're the only public transport company, you should be able to charge very high prices. After all, my assumption is that people will still use the service to go to work and school, since those are important activities.

If the game designers made it such that having high ticket prices will decrease demand for your services, then it seems unrealistic because you're the only public transport company and they need to go to work.

If the game designers made it such that having high ticket prices won't affect demand, ie the same volume of ppl will still continue taking your buses, then the mechanism is worthless. There's no reason not to raise ticket prices.

 

[unmerged(169164)]

The problem is, since you're the only public transport company, you should be able to charge very high prices. After all, my assumption is that people will still use the service to go to work and school, since those are important activities.

If the game designers made it such that having high ticket prices will decrease demand for your services, then it seems unrealistic because you're the only public transport company and they need to go to work.

Where does this come from?

It was stated that the company competes with the potential customers' personal means of transportation. It is all about convincing people to surrender their habits to use the public transportation.

So where does this come from? People keep going to work if the offer is not satisfying. They do it either by using their own car, a taxi or on foot. There is no captive customers pool in this game.

Maybe you dont like this idea and would prefer trapped customers to milk but that is not the angle of the game.

At this point, it would be fair and square to assume your position instead of clinging to assumptions that have no ground in the context of the game.

The last point is that a player starts with a capital, and that a satisfying network works near its full capacity brings a lot of profit per month. Money is not an issue in terms of satisfying the customers. The design and the management of the network are.

 

[Diablo123]

So where does this come from? People keep going to work if the offer is not satisfying. They do it either by using their own car, a taxi or on foot

What if blue collar workers, students, dropouts etc can't own a car, can't afford to take taxis every day, and their daily destination is half the city away? Would they walk if you charge extorbitant prices as well?

You seem to think that in the game personal means of transportation is viable for poor people. If it is, then that's an important point of unrealism. If it is not viable, then the option for poor people is to use public transport, go on foot, or change jobs. Do they go on foot? Do they change jobs to a nearer workplace? Or do they just continue taking public transport?

 

[unmerged(169164)]

Just like the Internet, tv remote controllers and all, mass transportation was invented and strongly developped from a world with no mass transportation.

The game starts off in a period when mass transportation is non existent: it did not prevent people from going to their job before that.

Life existed and was organized before the spread of mass transportation.

 

[douglasrac]

Do they go on foot? Do they change jobs to a nearer workplace? Or do they just continue taking public transport?

They use a much better system. Teletransportation!
If someone in CiM do not have a car and cannot go by public transportation by any reason (no lines available, prices, etc) he instantly appears in the spot he needs to go.
That's your competition. Free teleport.

 

[Diablo123]

They use a much better system. Teletransportation!
If someone in CiM do not have a car and cannot go by public transportation by any reason (no lines available, prices, etc) he instantly appears in the spot he needs to go.
That's your competition. Free teleport.

Yup, this sort of gives the game a reason to be played, though at a high cost of realism. I'm not complaining though, it is a good game if you can just suspend disbelief and don't question too much.

I don't really believe lower class people took taxis to their workplaces or school before public transportation...Seems more likely they switched to a closer workplace then go on foot.