Alpha 2.3 - Amsterdam and Advanced City Options

This update adds Amsterdam as a playable map and advanced city options to make each playthrough even more unique. Also a reminder that the game's price will be increasing next week and the demo has been updated to the latest version.

Amsterdam, Netherlands

Let's start with Amsterdam, a city famous for its coffee and canals! This map has three traits - Bicycle Paths, Coffee Shops and Relaxed. Its focus is on lots of fun but limited time.

Bicycle Paths make the new Motored Bicycle transport option 100% more effective. The Motored Bicycle is stealable unlike the Scooter and Car, so you have to consider that before purchasing one.

Coffee Shops adds the Consume Coffee action to certain eating establishments, which provides a large amount of fun for a relatively low cost.

The Relaxed map trait means you lose 10 hours each week from everyone taking longer to do things. It's quite a big hit, which is designed to encourage the player to seek out time-efficient actions like Consume Coffee to recover needs faster.

The Canal is Amsterdam's unique location and contains the Canal Cruise as another source of large amounts of fun. Here you can buy a Large Vase to start collecting Tulips. Considering the first ever economic bubble started in the Netherlands over Tulips, I thought this was a fitting collectible to add to the game.

Advanced City Options

Advanced city options are an addition I'm excited about. Once you think you've mastered the game, it's time to dive into these settings to create a very different playthrough. They are meant for advanced players only, since they can severely unbalance your life if you're not careful.

The simplest option is the currency setting, which is more of a cosmetic change to go with the new Amsterdam map. The other options make the game significantly easier or harder, depending on the life goals you have chosen.

You can set the Central Bank to be very incompetent or very vigilant. Above you can see the difference between the two extremes. In the top image with the incompetent Central Bank, the economy went from 15% to -5% inflation over a few years, which is absolutely insane. Remember your rent, wages, real estate, share portfolio etc are affected by this as well. The bottom image shows a much more competent Central Bank, and the economy is more stable (although not completely controllable).

You can also lower or raise your overall income tax rate by adjusting funding levels for different services. For example, setting the Police Service to be completely defunded will save you some taxes over your lifetime. However, this means criminals operate with impunity and your house has a 50% chance to be robbed pretty much all the time. They will even steal your casual clothes.

The Education and Healthcare funding levels can be similarly adjusted. The scales work exponentially, so the further you go from the default values in either direction the more extreme the experience. Defund everything and your taxes will be much lower, but be prepared to be constantly robbed while paying your massive education loan and avoiding getting sick at all costs. Overfund everything and your taxes will be much higher, can you afford rent from your remaining paycheck while studying your inexpensive degree?

Combined with the existing traits system, there are many possibilities for different playthroughs.

What's Next?

There are more advanced city options I want to add for an even crazier life. I'll also be experimenting with advanced character options. The work to move all translatable text into data files continues as well.

Alpha 2.3 Changelog

• Added Amsterdam map, street names and associated products
• Moved Celebrity Concerts to be city-specific
• Added map traits Bicycle Paths, Coffee Shops and Relaxed
• Added Motored Bicycle to Shopping Mall
• Fixed Electric Scooter reducing travel time more than stated
• Added Tulip collectibles
• Implemented event Mega Sale in Amsterdam
• Converted some popups into non-popups
• Made Custom Game default to random avatar
• More hard-coded English into data files
• Added Advanced Options page
• Added currency selection option
• Relabel Privilege for Traits and Education to Privilege Cost
• Added Central Bank Vigilance advanced option
• Slightly increased default health tax rate
• Added Police, Health and Education Funding advanced options
• Changed low health medical bill to a debt payment
• Added winning custom game internal check
• Changed Sold Objects in Income Statement to use object's financial type instead
• Slightly increased chance of corporate bankruptcies