Deeper Economy Management

[Dogukan91]

Hey, this game is an amazing city-builder game. We all know that much. But whenever I play it, I think of its huge potential as an economics simulator. Since late 1990s, spatial economics, economic geography, clustering, industrial policy management, urban economics etc became a lot more important.

Currently, the only dynamics in the game is a land-value based system, ease of export infreastructure and a basic education system.

I can't really elaborate too much on various other parameters that could be included to make economics management more detailed but wouldn't it be interesting if industry, finance, labour pools, specialization effects were more detailed and industrial networking-managing was more important with various bonuses?

I guess in terms of game-play effect, it wouldn't mean much more than increasing income. But just like disasters, it could act as a game-mode with more detail policies where you manage some regulations regarding the city and cannot simply remove buildings you don't like, environment effects are a lot more important, maybe a mechanism where you try to remain in control etc....

I know I haven't really formulated a detailed proposition but I was wondering if people would be interested in a more detailed simulation mode that could be optional? It would add more challenge to the game for sure as well.

 

[28rommel]

I would be happy if the developers just better explain how the current economy/money-making mechanisms work.
There is currently a very poor explanation as to how things are exactly taxed.

For example:
What exactly determines the tax base (amount) for the generic industrial sector?
How exactly does producing your own goods in-house (those produced by a player's generic industrial structures), give you an economic advantage versus just allowing the system to import them from outside the city ?
Etc, etc.

 

[Turjan]

I have the suspicion that there isn't any real economy behind the game. You can change things in the budget, you get a short term effect, and a short while later, the game just levels things out again. Just ignore it.

 

[28rommel]

I have the suspicion that there isn't any real economy behind the game. You can change things in the budget, you get a short term effect, and a short while later, the game just levels things out again. Just ignore it.

I hate to say it, but I think you are correct.
Just as long as you don't add too much (structures with) ongoing upkeep expenses at any given time, the game then suddenly seems to "level things out again," and you can continue to play.
Kind of sad. Strange really.

 

[Sun_Wu]

The problem as I see it, is that such a deeper system will dramatically slow gameplay, indeed one hour per year only works out to ten seconds a day and that'd probably be on the high end for running such calculations unless you managed to make the game highly multithreaded. the issue with making it highly multithreaded is that then the people with dual core processors would be in serious trouble for performance.

 

[muttonnoir]

Sounds like you want an economic simulation. That is a very niche market- The game is a very general "jack of all trades, master of none" catch all in order to appeal widely. Yes folks with a particular hobby horse/specialist area of interest can be frustrated by the lack of depth in that particular area but sometimes we can become blinkered and head off down a very specialist rabbit hole- only to find we're in their- alone!

 

[Dogukan91]

Sounds like you want an economic simulation. That is a very niche market- The game is a very general "jack of all trades, master of none" catch all in order to appeal widely. Yes folks with a particular hobby horse/specialist area of interest can be frustrated by the lack of depth in that particular area but sometimes we can become blinkered and head off down a very specialist rabbit hole- only to find we're in their- alone!

Well I'd love an economics simulator but the game focuses on city-management. So within those limits, I believe there are possible things to do to flesh out certain aspects without necessarily changing the game.
The problem is that, somehow, a better handling of economy of a city needs to be worth it, which is not the case because there are many factors that make money management very easy.

In the most basic form, you could think of agglometaration economics, organized industrial zone effects, import-export linkages, specialized skill pools created in education systems and industries that are more linked to each other, effecting revenues of based on networks.
These can be simulated in this game, and can be made a game-mode of its own with a bit of more realistic management aspect based on regulations and expectations. In real life, you cant simply raze an house for instance to improve the city, there are many trade-offs...etc

To some extend, it some things could be modelled which I believe would take this game to a next level without a whole change to the thing. I am not suggeting the game to turn into "capitalism lab".

 

[muttonnoir]

Absolutely nothing wrong with your suggestions but remember that to focus on those elements some other aspect/game development will have to be sacrificed and that other new development might actually have wider appeal to players. Also need to keep in mind which demographic CO are aiming the game at. "Big picture"

 

[Promethian]

Absolutely nothing wrong with your suggestions but remember that to focus on those elements some other aspect/game development will have to be sacrificed and that other new development might actually have wider appeal to players. Also need to keep in mind which demographic CO are aiming the game at. "Big picture"

Incidentally Paradox is releasing a city building game with a much deeper economic simulation this spring. It is called Surviving Mars.

 

[Turjan]

Just to add what I said earlier, I made a screenshot of the budget and taxation graphs of my current city, with population for comparison.

It looks as if I were a genius at matching my expenses to my tax income, with just a little leftover. In reality, I ignore the whole economical side and build whatever I want.

 

[28rommel]

It looks as if I were a genius at matching my expenses to my tax income, with just a little leftover. In reality, I ignore the whole economical side and build whatever I want.

Wow.
Thank you for posting that Turjan. That is quite an eye-opener.
One question ..... When you say that you just went along with playing the game and "built whatever I wanted," did that also include the placement of "Unique Buildings ?" I am somewhat afraid of building these, because it's hard for me to understand how I can pay for their ongoing upkeep expense. They don't seem to have a "definite" answer as to how they generate income (more taxation), so I hesitate to place them in my city. Some of them even have a very large upkeep expense.
What do you say about this, and what do you suggest?

 

[Fox_NS_CAN]

Wow.
Thank you for posting that Turjan. That is quite an eye-opener.
One question ..... When you say that you just went along with playing the game and "built whatever I wanted," did that also include the placement of "Unique Buildings ?" I am somewhat afraid of building these, because it's hard for me to understand how I can pay for their ongoing upkeep expense. They don't seem to have a "definite" answer as to how they generate income (more taxation), so I hesitate to place them in my city. Some of them even have a very large upkeep expense.
What do you say about this, and what do you suggest?

I often felt the same way. And while I don't have concrete info, I generally found that placing UBs didn't break the bank. Sometimes it might dip, but I always seemed to manage.

Save your game, place some, and wait and see what happens. (I wouldn't try all of them at once!)

 

[Turjan]

Yes, it dips for a moment, but then it "evens out" magically. You can have a more severe negative effect if you plop them all in one place. I once activated a whole bunch of very costly policies just for giggles, and this shredded my budget for ages, but after I burned through about 10 millions (which I had on the bank), my cash flow suddenly went positive.

The city in the graph I posted has lots of "bridges to nowhere" and a few superfluous public transport lines at the moment. I have switched off railway stations and unique buildings in areas without any growables though. The game wasn't originally structured for that many unique buildings as you can place now with all the DLC. Nevertheless, I haven't seen any negative effect so far with just plopping stuff down. Don't expect any great positive cash flow - my night time cash flow is notoriously negative - but it evens out in the end. Or, in other words, my fabulous proifitability was gone at some point, but it never turned into a prolonged slog. You see the dip when placing a new unique building, but that's just for a few weeks.

I tried setting the budget of unique buildings to 50% in my current city for a while. You don't even see the effect in the graphs.

What I meant with the image may even be a bit more visible in my first city. Look at the first part of the graph:

You get positive effects (typically, cities with only bus and metro are cash cows, given how the cost and income structure of public transport ist set up), but negative effects seem to get abolished at some point. I had started with lots of train lines in that city, which is ridiculously expensive, but at some point I succumbed to fixing the vehicle numbers by building metro lines and used a "cheat" building for deathcare.

The return to positive cash flow doesn't seem to be true for cities that are pretty much completely destroyed by a devastating disaster, or I wasn't patient enough.

I would be interested if the graphs look similar for all of you.

 

[28rommel]

I often felt the same way. And while I don't have concrete info, I generally found that placing UBs didn't break the bank. Sometimes it might dip, but I always seemed to manage.
Save your game, place some, and wait and see what happens. (I wouldn't try all of them at once!)

Yes, it dips for a moment, but then it "evens out" magically. You can have a more severe negative effect if you plop them all in one place.

... I have switched off railway stations and unique buildings in areas without any growables though. The game wasn't originally structured for that many unique buildings as you can place now with all the DLC. Nevertheless, I haven't seen any negative effect so far with just plopping stuff down. Don't expect any great positive cash flow - my night time cash flow is notoriously negative - but it evens out in the end. Or, in other words, my fabulous proifitability was gone at some point, but it never turned into a prolonged slog. You see the dip when placing a new unique building, but that's just for a few weeks.

I tried setting the budget of unique buildings to 50% in my current city for a while. You don't even see the effect in the graphs.

Thank you Fox and Turjan for the advice and your own personal experiences with Unique Buildings.

 

[Fox_NS_CAN]

Don't expect any great positive cash flow - my night time cash flow is notoriously negative - but it evens out in the end. Or, in other words, my fabulous proifitability was gone at some point, but it never turned into a prolonged slog.

I find that too... earlier on I seem to get large surpluses $25,000 or more weekly. As the city grows, it usually seems to slowly go down, more like $2k-$5k per week or so, but I usually have $10M-$15M in the coffers, so the occasional dip into the red doesn't matter too much.

 

[Fox_NS_CAN]

I understand the concern about UBs though; I have often thought that many of the UBs were way overpriced for upkeep.
Like Turjan said though, it seems to magically work out.

 

[28rommel]

I find that too... earlier on I seem to get large surpluses $25,000 or more weekly. As the city grows, it usually seems to slowly go down, more like $2k-$5k per week or so, but I usually have $10M-$15M in the coffers, so the occasional dip into the red doesn't matter too much.

Yes, that is exactly what happened in my city. Quite large weekly profit number near the beginning of the game, and then around $1K to $3K profit from about mid-game and onwards. I currently have 31 million in my bank account (coffers), so I too can absorb temporary losses from "the swings" discussed in this thread.

I understand the concern about UBs though; I have often thought that many of the UBs were way overpriced for upkeep.
Like Turjan said though, it seems to magically work out.

Ok .... So I just finished playing for about 3 hours, and what I did was place the Unique Building (UB) called the "Stadium" in my city (Note that this is not the "Football Stadium" that comes with the free DLC called "Match Day"). From the entire list of UB's that come with the base game only, the Stadium has the second-highest ongoing upkeep expense ($4,000 upkeep/week). I had about 8 UB's in my city before placing the Stadium, but they all had upkeep expense that were much lower.

Anyway, after placing the Stadium I immediately started to incur a weekly loss of about -$2K to -$2.5K. As the in-game months went by, that number very slowly moved closer and closer to zero. It took about 1.5 to 2 in-game years for my budget to start to show a green/positive weekly profit, once again. I would estimate that I lost a total of about $150K to $200K from my bank, during the entire loss period. But as Fox has indicated, if you have a sufficient amount of money in your bank/coffers, then it's not a big problem. You just need to be patient and not panic (no need to adjust other items in your budget panel, simply because you are temporarily losing money). And as others have stated in previous posts, don't place too many UB's at any given time; best to plop-down one at a time, especially if their upkeep expense is high.

Conclusion: Yes ... anything you build, will eventually "magically work out," and then once again you will see a positive weekly profit for your budget.

 

[Promethian]

Its likely less "magically work out" and more "the positive effects gradually take effect eventually becoming a net gain." Especially since tourism is likely a matter of attracting so many tourists over time so it takes a while for them to trickle in after placing the UB. Though that factor is thrown a bit with the Space Elevator since tourists can spawn from it directly.

I do really appreciate this test of the Stadium. Based on the numbers on the wiki it should be horribly ineffective but this indicates otherwise. I have personally tested the lower cost UBs that seem efficient based on the wiki numbers and they definitely made me a profit. They also became profitable quickly. This just further indicates to me that the UBs do have a positive effect but take time to fully come around.

 

[Turjan]

The total income from tourists may cover your expenses for the International Airport and maybe one or two unique buildings, but that's about how far that goes. From the official numbers, tourism is always a loss.

 

[28rommel]

I do really appreciate this test of the Stadium. Based on the numbers on the wiki it should be horribly ineffective but this indicates otherwise. I have personally tested the lower cost UBs that seem efficient based on the wiki numbers and they definitely made me a profit. They also became profitable quickly. This just further indicates to me that the UBs do have a positive effect but take time to fully come around.

Promethian,
I just want to make it clear that when I said that I started, once again, to show a profit (after placing the Stadium).... that I am barely showing a green/positive number for profit. So far, I am unable to get back to the "normal" 1K to 3K weekly profit, that I was used to.
Also, I do show a loss (red/negative number) when it gets cold (temperature drop) and my energy consumption goes up (due to the day/night cycle "thing"). I'm hoping that with more in-game time that passes, I can get additional ("normal") profit in my city. I will give everyone a further update on this, in a week or so.

One thing I am curious about, is that in another thread we discussed the placing of the Space Elevator. In that thread, I believe you said that when you purchased the Space Elevator, you noticed an increase (a positive effect) in your overall profit (supposedly due to the increase in tourists spending). The Stadium is one of the six Unique Buildings required that you first place, before you can even purchase the Space Elevator (This is what I am currently starting to work-up to, as it is my very first Monuments goal to place the Space Elevator). So did you not go through the process and the personal experience of placing the Stadium in your own city, before you placed the Space Elevator ? If so, what did you experience when placing the Stadium ?

Or did you go about some other round-about method for placing the Space Elevator, without the experience of having the Stadium in your city ? (I believe that a player can technically place all 6 required UB's in your city, then immediately place the Space Elevator, then immediately delete the 6 UB's and still have the Space Elevator.)