Let’s get straight to the point. Mission mode is being delayed.
We started programming mission mode shortly after the map overhaul began development, in fact, one of the main reasons the map overhaul even exists is because of mission mode. With the first version of the map, we did not have the necessary resources to add missions because of how overloaded it was with trackage and how little industries there were.
The exact date we began development on mission mode is unknown, but I would like to assume that it was about a month after we started in with the new map, which was at the end of January. We’re moving into August now, so it’s been around five months since mission mode was initiated. Coding a big feature like this is extremely difficult, which you might find hard to believe because of the simplistic nature of Global Rails. I wasn’t working on it all of the time, but when I was, I would take several hours out of my day to do so, and it was very stressful.
Mission mode was not available in the initial release version of the new map due to time restraints, but because we still have new content planned for Clean Slate City, we thought it would be best to include them in 2.0.1. Unfortunately, after the months that we spent working on missions, today was the day it started to fall apart. After we added a third mission, the system stopped working, and we ran into a variety of seemingly unfixable issues. Trains were failing to spawn or move, assist mode was refusing to work properly, and completing missions appeared to wipe out all other copies of mission mode trains. The worst part is, we were not able to locate what was causing this, as the developer console and output were not displaying error messages or warnings of any sort.
I’ll be the first to admit, I did make mistakes, and parts of mission mode’s programming may even be considered unethical by other developers. Couple this with the fact that it was falling apart right in front of us, and you’ve got a perfect recipe for “Whoops, looks like you need to start all over!”
In case you haven’t figured it out by now, that’s exactly what we’re going to do. We will be returning to the drawing board and rethinking how mission mode will look, feel, and most importantly, work.
We hope you understand this decision, as it will result in a better game overall. Until mission mode is finished, we will not move onto Stage II of the new map.