I am currently working on a button-style tycoon. Around mid-way through development, I asked myself; how will my game turn out? So, I came here, to the DevForum community, to ask one, short and simple question:
If you were playing a tycoon, what details, or what content would make your experience, as the player, more immersive and inviting?
I’m asking this question, because I am aware of the omnipresent opinion on this game genre, so this thread is to make sure I don’t double-step, to allow diversity for my game.
I found tycoons that features strategy and creativity much more fun, so I suggest featuring some strategy system where the best results gives out good income.
If I knew what I wanted to see in a tycoon I’d just make the tycoon myself, no use in throwing away profitable or enjoyable ideas to someone else.
Other than that, I find that asking these kinds of questions doesn’t make for good thought fuel. The audience you’re asking is developers, not players and most of them here probably will not end up playing your game. Instead it’s more important to ask what you want to see in a tycoon.
Chances are that you’re not going to have fun developing a game that you would never play yourself or find interesting. So think about what makes your game boring and work on tackling ideas for that. If you want a second opinion, sure I suppose we can give that, but it helps to have a more focused point that you’re looking to work on, not a broad “throw ideas at me” thread.
I’m not sure you understood my question as OP. You must acknowledge that DevForum users are not exclusively developers, nor are they an average player. A player who has experience in asset/game creation, while playing a game, can see more in it then your average joe. That is because they have their own experiences with games where they are more than the player. The DevForum seems to conglomerate these people, correct me if I’m wrong.
That being said, I made this thread to get ideas from those players who are willing to help me. I never asked to give me billion-dollar ideas. Also because I have made and/or brainstormed what I think should be implemented in my game, and now I am looking for some extra and fun ideas to layer over the creation I have in mind.
Lumber Tycoon 1 & 2, Retail Tycoon 1 & 2, Cruise Ship Tycoon
Josh (Defaultio)'s full RDC speech on lumber tycoon 2 (including retrospective) is now public also, you might find it of interest
Also I should mention, tycoon’s dont have to be creative and ground breaking, if you want to make a game appealing to a child audience thats fine, you dont have to be ashamed, however if you want to go for more breakthrough-in-a-genre type games then that is fine and can have more potential if executed right
There’s really no way to interpret “what do you want to see in a tycoon” than “what do you want to see in a tycoon” and that’s why I responded the way I did. It just sounds like a thinktank of actionable ideas that I can simply use for myself. It’s also why I said you should think about what you want to see instead.
The DevForum is designed for developers, so yes the contributors here (excluding those who use the DevForum as an information source only for platform improvements, which are also tailored towards developers anyway) are developers. Sure they play games but your primary audience when posting threads to the forum for people to reply on is developers. There is no conglomeration of any kind.
And for the last thing: I’m also not saying anything about generating ideas that can significantly boost the monetisation of your game or anything. Regardless of how trivial or major a suggestion might sound, they’re still actionable ideas that one could use themselves to improve a tycoon game they might want to make. It’s about as straightforward as I’ve made it sound.
Internalised thinking about these prospects is more helpful because you’re more likely to enjoy developing a game that you would actually play yourself. By having an MVP (minimum viable product) or a fleshed out idea, you can think about where your drop-off points might be and then brainstorm based around those points.
Second opinions are best when you have a more focused line of points you’re looking for help generating ideas around. This thread does not have a focal point. It’s just a “what do you want to see in tycoons” and that’s it, hence why I’m saying that this thread ends up as a thinktank for actionable ideas that developers could use for themselves instead of giving them to you.
I see what you’re trying to say, but this isn’t necessarily a think tank. I’m asking for a voluntary take on what I could possibly add to my game. If one does not feel like sharing an idea in the thread; they can do that. The focal point is ‘what do you want to see in tycoons’. The focal point is a discussion including voluntary opinions on content I could input into my game. The conglomeration involves the people who want to give their set opinion in this thread.
Yeah it is one. “What do you want to see in tycoons” isn’t a focal point, it’s a very generalised question that can have any number of answers catering to any number of types of tycoons, whether it follows the standard “expectations” of a tycoon or something else. When I’m talking about a focal point, I’m talking about honing in on very specific details or questions that we can use as thinking material.
First and foremost, we don’t know the theme or anything about the current tycoon you’re running with which is important towards providing suggestions. If we don’t know what you’re making at least even roughly, then these suggestions aren’t very useful to you or anyone else because then it’s just throwing things down mindlessly without knowing what we’re making suggestions towards.
Suggestions should always be accompanied by some source material as a point of reference. What are you making? Any number of tycoons can exist: enemy survival, food tycoons, mining industries, forestry, generic tycoon 400 with droppers and base building or some unique idea. We don’t know anything about what you’re making, so there’s no focus on the topic to begin with.
As far as focus points go, beyond providing an actual theme to go off of, your questions can also focus in on hard specifics of your game which makes things infinitely more valuable because you can get targeted suggestions. Here are some points you can use for brainstorming:
Forms of cash collection. Standard tycoons have you just buy droppers and step on a pad to collect cash. Think it’s boring and want to build up on that? Put that down as something you’d like a suggestion on. Cash collection ties heavily into what kind of tycoon you’re making, so therefore you create a focus funnel by introducing the topic of your tycoon and how you’re currently thinking of handling cash collection. Developers can give feedback on it.
Forms of base building. Generic tycoons entail a preconstructed base by the developers and players just step on the pads in order to piece together what the developer made. This is pretty much the formula irrespective of anything else. Does this fit your view? If not, how about allowing players to build their own structures? What should they work towards?
Forms of gameplay. What is the sense of progression or enjoyment that a player can get out of a tycoon besides building structures or piecing together someone else’s creation? What kind of gameplay features might sound interesting to incorporate into your tycoon? What is the long term benefit of playing your game? Is there saving and progression to look forward to? Will bases grant gameplay benefits as they build up, place structures or anything like that?
There’s a lot of different ways you can get a more targeted and useful topic than just asking what people want to see in a tycoon. I don’t think you see what I’m trying to say until you understand the usefulness of honing in on specific points over the grand picture - it helps a lot to funnel as much as you can as well as provide existing information to help in getting feedback/suggestions/second opinions.
The definition of ‘focal point’ is variable. It can mean multiple things concerning discussion, whether it’s a generalized focal point or a specific one.
Yes, this thread is generalized, and set up to receive general answers. But I really don’t see a problem with that. You can’t tell another developer what does or doesn’t help them, or what can be a nuisance. Different strokes for different folks. So far, the users that have responded to this thread have helped me get a general idea of what I could input into my current tycoon, but also in future tycoons.
Something that I would like to see in a tycoon is the game itself following a similar theme like Lumber Tycoon 2 which isn’t you working up to one goal specifically and getting tired, but you can do other things and explorations to achieve that goal.
In this context I’ve made it as clear as I can in what I mean by focal point. A generalised, unspecific topic is the opposite of focused. You can have multiple focuses, but there is no real focus here - let alone any information to help develop a good focus or point of reference for better suiting suggestions.
The only thing I am encouraging here is having a more to-the-point thread that actually highlights specific pain points about a tycoon to receive feedback on and in turn explaining my stances as they get responded to. I’m not really telling you how you should run your thread, simply offering very strong advice that I know has helped me and a number of other developers better tackle brainstorming around points of their game.
Like you don’t seem to agree with my advice, I don’t agree that leaving out important information about your current ideas and not honing in on specific pitfalls of tycoons makes for a good space to get suggestions and feedback in. We’ll have to agree to disagree here.
My best advice to you is in my previous post, and that’s where I leave it. Good luck on your game!
I would have to agree that you have left this thread open for interpretation, and you haven’t given the details that are not needed, but would likely benefit us.
Now, for the original content .
Anyways, you have made it clear that this tycoon is going to have buttons to build items. So, in this case, you have two options:
Have so many buttons that do so many different things that players will feel like they have some choice in the matter. Walls and droppers are generic, what about cannons and creatures, whether it be defenses, or possibly drones that support friendly buildings. Just because it hasn’t been done before doesn’t mean it’s impossible.
An option that likely needs a bit of Option 1 sprinkled into the recipe, you could have destructible buildings, each with certain amounts of health. This will mean that you are basically having the play style of the Engineer class from Team Fortress 2. For those of you who are not familiar with the game, the Engineer class can build sentry guns to help his team, dispensers that provide health and ammunition, and teleporters to get people to the battlefield. However, this means that the Engineer must maintain their buildings. You could do this with a bit less micromanagement.
You could also adopt the “Manager and Workers” style, which requires micromanagement at first to “wake up” your workers, but you can hire managers later to reduce the amount of time you have to spend micromanaging your workers.
Isn’t the whole point of the forum to be a giant resource for reference. If people can use the ideas that I’ve come up with, and “steal” them, then I am more than fine with that.
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