An Open Letter Regarding the Review System

Game Dev Tycoon
#1

I decided to make a new thread for this because my ‘edit’ in kristof’s thread wound up being almost a page in and of itself:

Using a ratio of D/T points to determine a good or bad game does not make much sense, you get punished for trying to be ‘different’ even if all your programmers are good enough to pull off something different, and after a nondescript point in the game it can become near impossible to maintain a proper ratio of D/T (usually at some point after year 42 but i have caused it to happen early)

(design slowly creeps up over tech because you’ve exhausted all the ‘new’ stuff you researched, even disabling design related features in the game still result in a mediocre review), play even longer still and it becomes near impossible to keep ‘one upping’ yourself, you’ve researched everything and now the reviewers think your games are old and stale,)

when and how all of this happens is random because it depends on what point you start making 10/10 games, those are what end up coming back to bite you later, as long as your games get bigger and the ratio stays ‘correct’ it hums along fine, but finally you run out of new junk to toss in to keep it going so your engine becomes stale even if its the hottest stuff out, your games keep selling good but the reviews are 5/10 no matter what, they still sell like a ‘hot’ game though since your so huge you can’t fail at that point, but all those meh reviews are depressing

Eventually the design points catch up to the tech and they wind up near equal = lousy game, nothing can be done to offset this, even if you totally scrap the story/level design/world design in and action game the points still wind up almost 50/50 at some point in time (not to mention instead of having fun making games the way YOU want to you wind up trying to appease some algorhythm by throwing the baby out with the bath water)

the game gives you an ‘illusion’ of choices but really if you don’t keep it by the numbers you lose (by lose i mean have no fun, after 250 hours i could see through it and saw how it was, killed the fun for me, randomizer brought some of that fun back, also activating sequels/multi platform early makes it interesting too.)

Basically we need to rethink how GDT judges a games quality, the points system does not hold up, it works for the 42 years of the main game but any vet who puts in alot of hours will start seeing the cracks in the foundation (im not the only one whos bummed about this).

The game would pur along fine if the whole point system vanished, however i would want to put ‘something’ back in its place so you still have a chance at failure

(the game without the points system would judge a game based on Genre + Topic + Platform + Target Audience = ???, problem is someone could quickly learn the formula and never ever make a stinker once they learn all the hints)

Perhaps marketing could play a bigger part in selling a game? i mean i never actually use it since my games sell fine without it, so maybe it needs to take a front row seat? the more the hype = the more it sells = the more hype = higher the reviews (which is realistic, overhyped games get high scores all the time…perfectly common occurrence in the industry)

Basically you got a game where you make games but what makes a good game in the real world does not reflect in this game, in the real world creativity and quality programming = good game, if your missing either one the players will be miserable and have no fun either because the game has a lousy story or it crashes before they get to see the story.

Valve software amassed a fortune with one game. Try pulling that off in GDT, you’ll bleed to death unless you make a game immediately as soon as the game starts ($8,000 a month to sit in a garage? should be like $800 a month…how does a garage with an IBM pc cost that much? maybe he should sell that delorean, its covered over for a reason…the only way its leaving that garage is if you push it out :stuck_out_tongue:  )

I would appreciate constructive comments, blind fanboy-ism does not improve the game, i like to see improvements, i consider that the sincerest form of flattery when someone cares enough to make something better.

There it is, take it or leave it.

5 Likes
#2

Auto-like just because of the amount of time it must’ve taken to write all that.
I would like more ways to market my games so +1 there.

I would like a modified review system as well… Not so sure how to set it up though…
Just in some way that allows me to continue playing after researching everything and making the ultimate engine that only lasts for 4 or 5 games before all the reviews go down to 4’s and 6’s.

#3

Well what it is for those who may not read of all of that, the games still sell fine after 70 years but the reviews slowly recycle lower and lower (but the games keep selling 1 kajillion copies, you become too big to fail)

So its a depressing quirk with the review system, competing with yourself results in poor reviews but people still buy the games. (you don’t lose but you don’t have fun either, getting a 10/10 is fun, it cheers me up, i like to win in games, thats where fun comes from ya know)

I almost didn’t post all of this because i don’t want a flame war. (man that is a wall-o-text isn’t it haha)

1 Like
#4

just one quick comment because it is a common complaint from players who read the wiki (remember, the wiki was written by players, not us):

The importance of a T/D ratio is absolutely overstated in the wiki. In reality, it has very little effect.

But yes, it does become very hard to create top games as you move into the late- late game. We recommend a maximum of 42 years time span for a reason. I appreciate the feedback though, this is definitely something we will look into improving in the sequel.

2 Likes
#5

I never actually bothered with the wiki all that much since general observation started showing the inner workings, i never believed it was all ratios but i don’t have much else to go on since anytime you bring it up everyone yells 'you just don’t know how to play or ‘you should read the wiki’…sigh

honestly i believed it has to do with the player setting the bar too high against himself since it seems to happen early if you get a string of 10/10’ers (i managed to get a 9/10 first game and that really threw it out of balance, a washing machine on a rampage haha)

Either way its depressing when it happens.

(the randomizer mod and kristof’s competitor mod add quite a bit to the experience). I like to take my time so cramping the game into a 42 year run i wished i could make a crude console in the garage stage like Jobs and Wozniak did. (i know only 42 years? haha…but the game does move rather fast so 42 isn’t that long for me, sometimes i change things up and i have stayed an entire game in the garage, my highest earnings was 7 billion in cash or so before i cleared my save)

(Also how the game handles years and time, you’ve heard this one before though, even with the example code you showed us it still would be better if the way the game handled time was from a set point of years like simcity for example, for example count up from 1977 into infinity, simply ask the player to select a start year either 77, 84, 91 or 96 which represent 4 distinct eras of gaming)

As for GDT2 don’t think of it as being typecast with the same game, remember these words of wisdom from Walter Matthau: “You gotta stick with what works”, if GDT is successful, and i believe the response of fans in this forum indicates it is, i would stick with what works then, i got 500 hours from a game i paid $7.99 for (love me some steam sales)

(there are people who haven’t even played skyrim that much, im one of them, i got more hours in this game than morrowind/skyrim combined and those are some of the best games ever made so i would say you guys hit a homer and took out the scoreboard on its way into orbit)

2 Likes
#6

Glad you enjoy the game :smile:

The reason it becomes hard to get top scores is that in the late-late game you simply run out of improvements you can make to your games. The market will, after a while, expect better games than what was released in the past. You can likely still make decent scoring games but getting that 8, 9 or even 10 will be hard.

Adding some mods that add late-game engine items would help. The normal game experience was simply not designed to be played for that long (hence the normal 35 year or max. 42 year settings).

2 Likes
#7

Thats what i thought, thats why i said the review system needed some improving (obviously its quite impractical to make a lifetimes worth the upgrades so you design the review system to go by something other than the upgrades)

Maybe the game could review based on Genre + Topic + Platform + Target Aud + Sliders + (insert repeatable mini-game that simulates programming?) = win?

The mini-game could be something fun and simple but if you mess up it can drastically effect the quality of the game and result in a metric ton of bugs? So then you get a severe time penalty because of all the bugs and if too much time goes by excitement wains, money is lost and if too much time goes by you lose your audience because the platform has moved on and or is obsolete?

you could add a mechanic where if there are too many bugs the game fails to work at all therefore is a total loss until you fix it enough.

Basically a situation where if you mess up so gloriously its simply cheaper to scrap the game and start over (realistic it happens often for real)

edit: (yes i enjoy the game, anyways back to the game for now! haha)
edit2: ( @PatrickKlug i like this forum system you guys use too, i have no quips with it, its very polished and smooth, its the forum of the future™)

#8

I never read the wiki for this game and probably never will…
I enjoy the game a lot but it’s just a little depressing that the game ends up in a stale-mate…
The game is still a great arcade-style game but I would like and hope that the sequel will be much larger and longer than this game with much more interaction with the outside world than just the random interviews.

2 Likes
#9

(wall-o-text warning, what can i say? i got a little foghorn leghorn in me, i say, i say i resemble that remark!)

The key to a long life game (i rate them in hours like a light bulb), the key is making sure to maintain the illusion of choice & consequence, as long as it ‘feels’ like your accomplishing and/or you could possibly falter something it will remain entertaining.

The games illusion of choice & consequence begins to breakdown after the 42 year mode reaches its conclusion.

(cut content here since i sort of repeated myself)

*everything after this will about the time system as patrick is well aware of the issue with reviews losing their glow after so many years. (the cheat mod can put a band-aid on it by simply locking the reviews to 10/10 but that also sort of kills it for obvious reasons, unless you pretend to pay the reviewers off… :stuck_out_tongue: )

the other quip would be time it just feels uncomfortable since one of the selling points in the game is ‘start in the 80s’ yet it 80s is represented as year = 0 to 6 (for 42 year mode)

(*simtower used a similar time system but time was not as critical as it is in this game, time is everything in this game, you have a shadow on your back as soon as you start the game, its a race to get good or be broke as a joke)

If the game statically placed all its events in stone, set them to static years and then when one makes a new game they get to simply drag a slider to select the start year (if you select 1977 without any mods you simply wind up with silence until 1981 with unveiling of the new ‘PC’ platform and then august 1982 with the unveiling of the Grovodore 64) (the slider could span from 1972 to 2228 once you activate the modapi, because 256 years should be enough for anybody.)

(i had to scrub 15 consoles because i had no ‘time’ for them to fit in, they weren’t proper to the era so i had to let them go which is a shame, fyi its very bad to put too many consoles at any one time in the game, it causes the game to enter an ‘unwinnable’ state, because your market share gets slashed with each platform = too many platforms = video game crash of '83 = can’t get $5 out of your game because only 2 people end up owning the platform you made it for, i found that out the hard way when i first started on my mod back when the api first came out)

#10

Half-Life 3 con- wait I mean, Game Dev Tycoon 2 confirmed.

4 Likes
#11

I was just thinking of what other kind of games would be capable of sucking away 500 hours of my life.

I wished there was a really good record company simulator like game (i’ve seen maybe one or two flaky ones come along but man…lousy don’t describe it), i can’t help but think thats right up these guy’s alley, i have no idea what Greenheart is looking to be known for, they got one homer on the scoreboard and thats more than can be said for most others.

Don’t let those millions go to your head boys, you’ll wind up like valve i think that pompous breeze of cash caused them to forget about a certain game series they were working on (half-life is a fitting name, my social security will expire before Episode 3 ever gets released, talk about your longest cliff hangers ever :stuck_out_tongue: )

#12

3+2=5
Half-Life 5 Confirmed.

1 Like
#13

Yeah…he just claimed that there will be a sequel…I WANT IT

1 Like
#14

Quick! Where’s the pre-order!!

#15

Can you hear that @PatrickKlug? thats the sound of money in the form of a pompous breeze. :stuck_out_tongue:

You know you got something when people are saying ‘shutup and take my money’ :smile:

Get your swimsuit and prepare to pull a Scrooge Mcduck. (don’t try it with coins but paper dollars should be quite subtle). Just think, when you release GDT2 you can be eccentric, buy a spacestation, then you can go to space release a bag of money and swim in it…IN SPACE.

Everything is better in zero-g. Its statistically proven.

As for this thread, if i can come up with any fresh ideas for ‘revenge of the sequel’ i will post it on this thread

===Some ideas===

You could add the option to ‘port’ games to other systems (as in older games, being able to use your back catalog for something other than sequels, like an ‘updated’ HD version of a classic for systems that don’t have it yet, seems weird releasing a Part 2 on a system that never had a part 1)

Also you could allow people to set a price for their games (i am aware the exp pack mod has something sort of like it but this is something that needs the ‘official’ touch), the price could effect the review scores, a $5 game has more ‘slack’ than a $60 game which has to be A1.

Being able to ‘learn’ as you make games would be good too (your guy makes 70 games on various systems and his skills still have to be leveled up by wasting a ton of research points, they don’t seem to get very high on their own otherwise, one would think he would get better just from doing the same thing 24/7, i mean he sits there for 42 years and never even takes a whiz)

More realism perhaps? (as a game gets programmed it would be humorous if soda cans and snack food wrappers slowly accumulated around your workstation until the game was done :stuck_out_tongue: )

EDIT: Also fix MMOs please, kthxbye (i won’t go into detail as im sure im not the first, and i won’t be the last to say it, they simply don’t work, unless you like to watch your company go down the swirling throne of doom trying to keep an MMO alive for 15 minutes)

EDIT2: Thought of another one, Allow GRID to be customized, allow the player to name it whatever they want and pick from a handful of logos, also some customization to the studio itself, perhaps a company logo, might even allow furniture to be moved about in a simple fashion (use layered images perhaps? doesn’t have to be incredibly detailed).

1 Like
#16

I really love gdt…im a game developer myslf so this sort of games are really fun to play