If I allow a train with a passenger wagon to accidentally pull into a station that ISN'T designed to transport passengers, it will automatically add passengers to that station's cargo list and passengers will start to arrive at it. Because no other passenger-carrying vehicles will ever reach that station, they sit around for ever. If you keep an eye on the station list window in order to find any stations that are becoming crowded, it's very distracting to have two thousand passengers sitting on a station that will NEVER transport them.
What I would like to see is a small cross by each cargo type under the station "ratings" lists. Clicking that cross will remove that cargo type from that station forever (or at least until another train with a passenger wagon comes along to that station) and hence stop passengers accumulated at that station.
Friday, April 14, 2006
Replace Trains windows linked to train lists
If I have the "Replace Trains" window up (or any type of replace vehicle window), I should be able to click a train icon in the list on the left (which shows how many of each type of train I currently have) and get either:
a) if there is only a single vehicle of that type, that particular vehicle's window appearing.
or
b) a list of just those types of vehicles in the same way that stations allow you to bring up only a list of the vehicles that are servicing that station.
a) if there is only a single vehicle of that type, that particular vehicle's window appearing.
or
b) a list of just those types of vehicles in the same way that stations allow you to bring up only a list of the vehicles that are servicing that station.
Thursday, February 17, 2005
Feature Request - Train overspeed + damage
How about the realistic acceleration providing a large speed boost to trains as they come downhill (as gravity would) but that actually goes past the trains max speed. But if they go too fast for the train, the reliability drops fast?
Maybe to counteract this effect, the player would have to apportion speed limits to certain parts of the track (indicated by some sign by the side of the track). This speed limit could be configurable or (probably easier and more sensible) a restriction to the trains maximum speed.
Then players could "take a chance" on the overspeed... if it's only a few mph for a few tiles they pretty much get away with it because it's only temporary but on long downhill runs, the train could go way too fast for the tracks (i.e. have a crash/derailment), defined by the type of track it's running on (e.g. maglev would be okay up to several hundred mph but rickety old normal track lines would send the trains off the rails at that speed) or will need to be restricted to it's max speed.
You could even have it so the more heavily loaded the train, the faster it accelerates downhill, so that nice two-carriage run down from the slopes crashes and burns when you try to cash in on its popularity by adding more carriages because, whoops, you forgot about the speed limit...
Maybe to counteract this effect, the player would have to apportion speed limits to certain parts of the track (indicated by some sign by the side of the track). This speed limit could be configurable or (probably easier and more sensible) a restriction to the trains maximum speed.
Then players could "take a chance" on the overspeed... if it's only a few mph for a few tiles they pretty much get away with it because it's only temporary but on long downhill runs, the train could go way too fast for the tracks (i.e. have a crash/derailment), defined by the type of track it's running on (e.g. maglev would be okay up to several hundred mph but rickety old normal track lines would send the trains off the rails at that speed) or will need to be restricted to it's max speed.
You could even have it so the more heavily loaded the train, the faster it accelerates downhill, so that nice two-carriage run down from the slopes crashes and burns when you try to cash in on its popularity by adding more carriages because, whoops, you forgot about the speed limit...
Feature Request - Alliances
"Alliances" in multiplayer. You can ally with certain other players within the game, but not the AI players, and then you can transfer money between yourselves, request changes to the other players vehicles (e.g. you perform an action much like you normally would but because it's your friends vehicle in question, they get a Yes/No dialog before the change actually occurs).
Alliances would be public knowledge within the game (shown by some sort of icon) and it could even be an option when allied to "merge" and then you both take control of a single conjoined company. Allied players can request help, talk in private etc. An allied company can go out of business but if it does, the allies have a chance to help it out with some cash or, if it goes bankrupt, get the first-choice of taking it over.
Allied players can use each other's depots and copy orders from their allies (so they can send an extra bus to their ally's failing route).
Allies could also part-buy a piece of bridge/tunnel or an industry if none of them can afford it. Buying the bridge/tunnel/industry with a certain option on will let the players all chip in a particular amount and they then "own" that amount of the relevant part. Then they can share it as usual (for road bridges/tunnels at least) but if any of them want to destroy it, they have to get a 50% or more vote to do so.
As part of Allies idea, an Age-Of-Empires style "ping" would be nice, where you can bring attention to a certain part of the map by clicking a special command and then clicking on the map. All allies hear a sound and get a cross appear on their map to show that someone wants attention at that point on the map. This is also useful without allies, to point out trouble spots or towns that are currently being discussed etc.
Alliances would be public knowledge within the game (shown by some sort of icon) and it could even be an option when allied to "merge" and then you both take control of a single conjoined company. Allied players can request help, talk in private etc. An allied company can go out of business but if it does, the allies have a chance to help it out with some cash or, if it goes bankrupt, get the first-choice of taking it over.
Allied players can use each other's depots and copy orders from their allies (so they can send an extra bus to their ally's failing route).
Allies could also part-buy a piece of bridge/tunnel or an industry if none of them can afford it. Buying the bridge/tunnel/industry with a certain option on will let the players all chip in a particular amount and they then "own" that amount of the relevant part. Then they can share it as usual (for road bridges/tunnels at least) but if any of them want to destroy it, they have to get a 50% or more vote to do so.
As part of Allies idea, an Age-Of-Empires style "ping" would be nice, where you can bring attention to a certain part of the map by clicking a special command and then clicking on the map. All allies hear a sound and get a cross appear on their map to show that someone wants attention at that point on the map. This is also useful without allies, to point out trouble spots or towns that are currently being discussed etc.
Feature Request - Difficulty/Patch "Profiles"
Basically, saveable profiles of the options so that you can load, for example, a "classic TTD" profile and all of the options not available in the original TTD are turned off.
Feature Request - PNG/bitmap import into scenario editor / map generation
PNG import into scenario editor - being able to import a DEM (digital elevation model) or equivalent file format to "build" the land instead of having to craft it. DEM's are used all over the place for landscape modelling. Alternatively, you could have a simple grayscale bitmap import depicting height. Then we could have scenarios where the map represents a real town, a country, a continent, the world or even the Mons crater on Mars.
Feature Request - Tooltip
How about some tooltips on the list of patches so that people can know exactly what each one does and also tooltips on townnames etc. that temporarily bring up the town details without having to close the window (just let go of RMB and it disappears), stuff like that?
Feature Request - Tutorial / Final Objectives.
How about actually having a "tutorial" mode whereby you are led through creating railways, stations etc. in the usual "click here and then click there" way. This will help bring many new players to the game, surely? I know that I would be intimidated by the game if I hadn't played it before.
Coupled with that idea, you could have a "objective" mode where you basically have pre-designed scenarios which increase in difficulty with clear objectives and a clear order. You wouldn't be able to progess to the next until you had completed one.
You could start with a few tutorial modes, maybe one for each type of transport. They could build up from, say, "build a train link between X and Y" to "earn 1 million pounds in fifty years" to "buy every company on the map and pay off the loans" to "survive until year 2000 with 8 strong AI players starting off at the same time". This way the game has a clear beginning and pseudo-end and you could play the game also as it is currently is but call it "free play" or something. It would feel much more like an achievement to play through something and reach the end. You could even combine two or three objectives into one "mission", so that once you'd earnt a million pounds, say, you then had to carry on and buy everyone out but you wouldn't know until you'd completed the first half.
In the later "missions", you could be given a dying company against strong players and be asked to make it profitable, or have to survive several combined disasters, such as your main profitable industries being sabotaged or an UFO invasion.
I think this would keep people playing on the game, with clear objectives and a much greater sense of achievement. You could reward each early "mission" with being able to buy new types of transport or later "missions" with being able to get a greater time to complete the next objective in, or be able to access "top-end" vehicles and even otherwise unobtainable vehicles like a Concorde, which could be "unlocked" in freeplay mode (obviously, you could include a sign cheat for those who just want to play with everything anyway).
Coupled with that idea, you could have a "objective" mode where you basically have pre-designed scenarios which increase in difficulty with clear objectives and a clear order. You wouldn't be able to progess to the next until you had completed one.
You could start with a few tutorial modes, maybe one for each type of transport. They could build up from, say, "build a train link between X and Y" to "earn 1 million pounds in fifty years" to "buy every company on the map and pay off the loans" to "survive until year 2000 with 8 strong AI players starting off at the same time". This way the game has a clear beginning and pseudo-end and you could play the game also as it is currently is but call it "free play" or something. It would feel much more like an achievement to play through something and reach the end. You could even combine two or three objectives into one "mission", so that once you'd earnt a million pounds, say, you then had to carry on and buy everyone out but you wouldn't know until you'd completed the first half.
In the later "missions", you could be given a dying company against strong players and be asked to make it profitable, or have to survive several combined disasters, such as your main profitable industries being sabotaged or an UFO invasion.
I think this would keep people playing on the game, with clear objectives and a much greater sense of achievement. You could reward each early "mission" with being able to buy new types of transport or later "missions" with being able to get a greater time to complete the next objective in, or be able to access "top-end" vehicles and even otherwise unobtainable vehicles like a Concorde, which could be "unlocked" in freeplay mode (obviously, you could include a sign cheat for those who just want to play with everything anyway).
Feature Request - CPU Usage
Showing CPU usage in the about box (to see how a
code change affects the CPU usage). This could even be
a plain graph, like the in-game graphs.
code change affects the CPU usage). This could even be
a plain graph, like the in-game graphs.
Feature Request - Game speed indicator
An indication of how much faster the game is actually
running than "real speed" when it's in fast forward... this
could be a percentage of the "real speed", for example.
Also, a quake-like "Turtle" icon appearing in the corner of
the screen if, at any time, the game is running slower
than what you would consider "real speed", i.e. if the
game slows past the point that a normal computer
running at normal speed would show. Useful for
diagnosing network de-sync's if a computer is too slow or
if the game is being run on an old computer.
running than "real speed" when it's in fast forward... this
could be a percentage of the "real speed", for example.
Also, a quake-like "Turtle" icon appearing in the corner of
the screen if, at any time, the game is running slower
than what you would consider "real speed", i.e. if the
game slows past the point that a normal computer
running at normal speed would show. Useful for
diagnosing network de-sync's if a computer is too slow or
if the game is being run on an old computer.
Feature Request - map overlays
An option inside the map viewport that lets you click
more than one map-type, e.g. to overlay industry and
competitor maps over each other, possibly by shift-
clicking the appropriate buttons?
more than one map-type, e.g. to overlay industry and
competitor maps over each other, possibly by shift-
clicking the appropriate buttons?
Feature Request - Block a tile.
An option to tell vehicles not to pass a certain square. Say you have a bus route that, later on, a competitor runs a train line over a piece of the road. Although there are alternative routes, the bus might take the route with the train crossing, leading to the risk of an accident.
If you could "mark" certain squares as no-go areas (from an option in the build toolbars, shown with a "no entry" red icon overlaying the square's graphic) that no vehicle of yours will go over in any circumstance, that would be useful. Obviously your competitors would not know where your no-go areas were, or be affected by them.
On roads, it would work like the construction squares when you fund road reconstruction. On railroads, the square itself would act as if it had no rails on it and would also turn any signals pointed towards it red. On water, it would act as if an object were on that tile. I don't think it would work (or be required) for air vehicles and they could ssafely ignore it (however, being able to mark an airport as "closed" would be very useful for upgrading airports).
When there is a collision between trains, you could "close" off the tiles leading to it to prevent further collisions or trains waiting to use that path. When there is a rail crossing over a road, you can stop your vehicles wandering over it. I can see it being quite useful.
If you could "mark" certain squares as no-go areas (from an option in the build toolbars, shown with a "no entry" red icon overlaying the square's graphic) that no vehicle of yours will go over in any circumstance, that would be useful. Obviously your competitors would not know where your no-go areas were, or be affected by them.
On roads, it would work like the construction squares when you fund road reconstruction. On railroads, the square itself would act as if it had no rails on it and would also turn any signals pointed towards it red. On water, it would act as if an object were on that tile. I don't think it would work (or be required) for air vehicles and they could ssafely ignore it (however, being able to mark an airport as "closed" would be very useful for upgrading airports).
When there is a collision between trains, you could "close" off the tiles leading to it to prevent further collisions or trains waiting to use that path. When there is a rail crossing over a road, you can stop your vehicles wandering over it. I can see it being quite useful.
Feature Request - Overtaking
When a road vehicle overtakes another, it passes
through the traffic on the other side of the road. If it did
this, it should "blocK" the oncoming traffic (or have an
accident, but I hardly think that's fair) from carrying on
until it can return to the other side of the road, or give
up and turn round. Also, if it breaks down when it
overtakes, it should block the oncoming traffic until it can
repair and find a way back onto it's side of the road (or
give up an turn road.
through the traffic on the other side of the road. If it did
this, it should "blocK" the oncoming traffic (or have an
accident, but I hardly think that's fair) from carrying on
until it can return to the other side of the road, or give
up and turn round. Also, if it breaks down when it
overtakes, it should block the oncoming traffic until it can
repair and find a way back onto it's side of the road (or
give up an turn road.
Feature Request - "Join" stations
How about an option that lets you click on two stations
and then joins them into one? Obviously they'd have to
be within max_station_spread of one another and serving suitably
different transport types (e.g. not an airport in both of
them, but okay if there's only one airport between them... obviously following multistop rules so you can, e.g. join two bus stations).
This will save those people who try to spread their
stations out by creating/deleting bus/truck depots a lot
of time. The orders for the vehicles could just be
changed so that any vehicles with an order for either
station has that order changed so that it becomes an
identical order for the "merged" station. You could make
it so that the first station clicked is the station whose
name gets given to the merged station.
and then joins them into one? Obviously they'd have to
be within max_station_spread of one another and serving suitably
different transport types (e.g. not an airport in both of
them, but okay if there's only one airport between them... obviously following multistop rules so you can, e.g. join two bus stations).
This will save those people who try to spread their
stations out by creating/deleting bus/truck depots a lot
of time. The orders for the vehicles could just be
changed so that any vehicles with an order for either
station has that order changed so that it becomes an
identical order for the "merged" station. You could make
it so that the first station clicked is the station whose
name gets given to the merged station.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)