Handy hints you'd like to share!

[unmerged(243766)]

Thus far I've only been playing the tutorial level and I've been ignoring a lot of the messages so that it doesn't end while i'm still trying to find my feet. I tried jumping in with the first level and either I missed a step or it just totally overwhelmed me. I expected a nice small town, maybe a college and a train station and stuff. Instead I got a huge map with 3 bus lines that are in dire need of help AND need joining up.

Stupidly I added stops at regular intervals to service the whole route that the bus was taking. 20 something stops later I realised that may have been a boo boo as i needed more buses to handle the load, which cost more money which then got caught in traffic.

Also I've found that with the game in its vanilla state and with traffic as it is, the only real way to make any money is to invest heavily in the metro. It'll cost a bomb to install but it can carry a lot of people & not be limited by traffic that always seems to appear ONCE I add a bus line on that bit of road. The one I had running on the tutorial level with three stations (Train station, Obilisk and College) was running at $1200 a month income and $120 a month expenditure. Conversely my trams were at roughly I:E 2:1.

Also note that to go from level 1 metro to level 2 needs quite a bit of space. Same for 2-3. Make sure you leave enough room when trying to transition.


Get your tram lines off of the roads if and when it is at all possible. The traffic will ruin a perfectly good route otherwise.

Save often! While underground I clicked the space bar to pause and the game froze. Lost all my work albeit on the tutorial level.

To summarise:
1. Early on don't place a stop everywhere you might eventually want one.
2. Metro costs lots but it's well worth it.
3. Plan your Metro routes before just clicking, depth transitions take space.
4. Get the trams offroad.
5. Save your gorram game!

 

[Madpainter]

Short lines that work together seems to work for me.

 

[delling]

Metros cost much less above ground, elevated metros fit perfectly over the 'big' road (the one without the divider).

 

[Gummi]

Metros, use them!

Just max out on debt and build a good starting metro network. It's guaranteed to give profits. (or even better, just wait without building anything, until there's economic crisis, and get the loans with really low interest)

And a hint derived from previous sentence.

Don't be afraid of using loans, especially during economic crisis. The build costs are lower also when a crisis hits, so use it, max out your loans and expand.

 

[Wakeupcall]

Metros, use them!

Just max out on debt and build a good starting metro network. It's guaranteed to give profits. (or even better, just wait without building anything, until there's economic crisis, and get the loans with really low interest)

And a hint derived from previous sentence.

Don't be afraid of using loans, especially during economic crisis. The build costs are lower also when a crisis hits, so use it, max out your loans and expand.

Bad logic in game, in credit crisis in RL money gets more expensive to borrow. During good times money is cheap and easy to get usually causing the inevitable bust

 

[unmerged(272700)]

Wakeupcall, its been a long time since I took my Macro Economics course, but I'm not entirely sure your statement is true. Especially in a managed economy (talking about real life here). Of course each nation is different and has different banking policies. But here, in the US, when the economy is stagnant and not doing so well, the Fed (Alan Greenspan / Ben Bernanke) will lower the interest rate. This stimulates trading between banks and causes a number of things. In general it lets banks offer loans at lower rates... to increase the attractiveness for people to borrow money and buy things... to stimulate the economy. So as far as that goes, I'm not sure the game is using bad logic. I think in some cases it makes sense. Of course I recognize that the game may not be based on the banking system in the US. That would be awfully presumptuous on my part. But it could be that other systems around the world do the same thing.

Either way, I can appreciate the tip that Gummi has provided. It may be useful for some people to consider the timing of getting loans.

 

[unmerged(243766)]

I've found that managing your loans can be quite integral to a winning strategy.

I had a loan at 11% (needed it when starting the scenario) but as soon as the economy bombed and interest rates were ranging from 2-5% I took out a new one just to cover my old one and paid the old one off. Saving myself a cool 5k in the process.

So my latest tip, consolidate your loans when the economy is in the toilet.

Also as Gummi said everything is cheaper when the economy is weak. So not only can you borrow money for less but you can build more with the same amount of money.

So when the economy is pants and loans are cheap, max out and expand.