The future direction of this game/series?

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    I don't know if anyone has started a similar topic, at least I didn't find any. If there has been one, please direct me to that topic. Thanks.


    I started playing this series from Train Fever era, and watched it grow to the current state. I'm surprised to see (from steam chart) that right after TPF2 released, there were 23k players, which even surpassed the player number of CSL at the same time. Now it's just 4k players everyday, but it's not bad consider there hasn't been any major updates for a while.

    I could clearly see the improvements from TF to TPF2, but something is confusing me as well: What's the expectation for the devs and players hold for the "final state" of this game? What's the expectation for this series?

    There has been many other city/transport building/simulation games:
    CSL and SC4 focus on many aspects of a single big city (although it's your choice to just build several small towns on the map) with good micromanagement tools .
    CIM focus on the local transport of a single city with good public transport simulation .
    The old rail tycoon focus on economics and rail transport on a large scale, where there's almost no detailed local development.It has good economic simulation .
    The Japanese A-Train series focus on economics and land transport on a smaller scale, somewhere between CIM and RT (more towards CIM). It has good railway simulation .

    And here comes TPF. Its map size and transportation methods allow simulation of regional transport to a degree . Its cities allow micro management to a degree . The industry system allow economics simulation to a degree .

    Everything is to a degree , and the only thing I can say good is probably the graphics.

    I understand that there has to be compromises, and I know this small dev group is working hard. However in most updates the focus seems to be on graphics rather than game play. Many game play related factors seem to be hard coded in the game and could not be modified.

    The above ideas are mostly my personal views, and are subject to discussion. It seems like the devs are working on the Mac version now, and COVID is probably also the reason for the lack of updates. But I would still like to know if there's a fussy goal for the devs about where this is going, even if it's just planning to be a screenshot generator.


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    I did post the same content in steam forum, just in case more people might see.

    I suppose its hard to say. They just make do with what they have. Unlike tripple A games by huge publishers who can reallocate vast amounts of ressources at short notice, Urban Games and its publisher probably don't have that luxury. So in my limited exprience they iterate on their knowledge and technology the old fashioned way. Which takes longer, and sometimes you lower the versatility of some of the features.


    Where this game does shine brilliantly is not in its simulated form. I feel like it does so as virtual sandbox space for building your dream model rail road. Thats also where the strength of the supporting community lies. Creating assets and maps for all kinds of model railroad. Of course I do also enjoy the fact that I can liven up the scenery by using some of the implemented gameplay loops as public or goods transport. But you have also some limitations there. The more you rely on the simulation, the more the performance of your map is inhibited.


    So quo vadis Urban Games? Hopefully to some more improvements. The performance has increased greatly with the last patch. At least for both, my Laptop and my Desktop PC. What they want to achieve. The best possible of two worlds. The Sim players and the Model builders.

BlueBrixx