ROADS. Road Type Manager to create your own road types or import / adjust road type presets. Customizable road width, road materials. Random road smoothness adjustable per marker for a natural realistic look. Angle Threshold for optimized low poly roads with minimal loss of detail in curves. Automatially follow the terrain contours with adjustable contour threshold to realistically simulate both highways passing through undulated areas and mountain roads following the original terrain shape. Add / Insert / Remove markers at any stage of the development process.
Tilting / banking in curves. Add bridges, sidewalks.
Closed roads ideal for race tracks. Support for unlimited number of side objects like guard rails, barriers per road object.
Why Early Access? “We held back on launching Automation into Early Access until the game had a solid, fleshed-out core which the main tycoon part of the game will be based on. We also wanted to make sure we can offer enough content and polish to warrant presenting and selling the game to a larger audience. Previously we offered an early access version of the game via our website, but this sales platform and distribution channel has been outgrown by the steadily increasing interest in the game, becoming complicated to manage for a small team like ours. Finally launching the game on Steam Early Access makes possible to speed up development with any additional income, allowing for quicker content addition (car bodies, engines, etc.) than otherwise possible. It also allows us to get additional manpower to the team to tackle the huge job of game balancing and AI programming.
Last but not least, with the major milestones of completing the car designer and engine designer under our belt, the implementation of multiplayer features means using the Steam API for network communications, saving us a lot of double work associated with developing our own networking code first.” Approximately how long will this game be in Early Access? “Completing the game and adding all content promised will likely take anywhere between one to two years. This may seem like a lot, but a complex game like Automation takes a small team a long time to make to the standard we do.
Rest assured that we are confident of finishing all the promised features of Automation, even if it may take quite some time. We're not known for being good with estimates, but always deliver and are good at avoiding feature creep. Our development process focuses on milestone builds that introduce new features every 3-4 months and are both beta-tested and reasonably polished-up. Any major problems with these milestones are addressed quickly in hotfixes before we move on to the next milestone.
Quick Facts About Development:. Fully independent developer.
Small 5-person team. 3 years of full-time development so far. First public demo released April 2012. Funded by preorders, 14000 sales before Steam Early Access. Modular development approach: 3 main parts, 2 are feature complete. Major updates every 3-4 months. Focus on transparency, community contact and open discussion.
Frequent YouTube & Facebook development updates ” How is the full version planned to differ from the Early Access version? “In Early Access our efforts go towards adding more detail to the tycoon and management part of the game. Once the campaign mode is fully playable, more content is added (engine types, car bodies, scenarios, multiplayer modes) and the game is polished up and balanced before it being considered complete.
Since Mid 2015, a portion of our team has been focused on porting Automation over to Unreal Engine 4, and the next major update release will be on Unreal, giving huge improvements in graphical quality, performance, UI design and general playablity, as well as giving us the developers the tools to develop Automation better, faster, and maintain it far into the future.” What is the current state of the Early Access version? “The current Early Access version of the game has the following, fully functional and playable, yet content incomplete features:. Car Designer. Engine Designer. 'Lite Campaign' simple Tycoon mode.
Car/Engine Sandbox Mode. 60+ Scenarios and Tutorials. 35+ Base Car Bodies. Tons of in-game videos and descriptions Please Note: The current Steam Early Access launch version contains a simplified 'Lite Campiagn' version of the Tycoon gameplay. Future updates will add more detail and complexity to these aspects of the game. ” Will the game be priced differently during and after Early Access? “Yes, by buying into Early Access you save around 15% and get the warm feeling you are helping a niche independent game dev.” How are you planning on involving the Community in your development process?
“We already do, we have a great active forum community, and we have an amazing core testing team recruited from the testers. If this really is the game you always dreamed of, you can help us make it.”.
21 December Another year of Automation development comes to an end and we’re ending it with a big milestone release. Here comes the first open beta version of the Car Designer Revamp! The Templar EsVedra Superluxe, by foodliker Among other things, this means a complete overhaul of many of the game mechanics determining the car stats. The biggest changes were made to the secondary stats like Practicality, Utility, and Offroad, which received a complete rewrite and a lot more detail. The UI and user feedback has been improved as well, giving you more info on what areas for improvement could be.
That is important, because with all these changes, including a complete rewrite of how the suspension tuning is handled, you need more information on what is going on in order to make better decisions. In this video update many of the changes are discussed and explained in some detail: Apart from this major overhaul, this update also prepares us for implementing the Lite Campaign V3 into the UE4 version. During the course of this update many changes have been made to make possible a car building AI, which indeed generates cars for every demographic throughout the years.
At the moment of writing this it may not be the most competent yet and requires more fine tuning, but the basics are there and being able to just quickly regenerate the 1500-2000 cars you’re competing against in sandbox mode, is just so much better than hand-building them all over the course of a month. With a group of 10 people. The AI is an absolute necessity for any proper, dynamic campaign!
At this stage the new version is still pretty rough and not all planned features are implemented, but will serve as a solid foundation for implementing the remaining features planned for this update, do balancing, and test for bugs the coming weeks, before embarking on the big task of bringing an epic campaign to UE4. The Kasai Quero S, by R-dJ Please note that due to the massive changes to the car calculations and car data structures, unfortunately, your old cars will not be compatible with this new version! BUT you will be able to switch back to the default branch without it breaking and there will still be your old cars. To get this latest version, you need to opt in to the open beta branch of the game.
Do so by right-clicking the game in your Steam Library, Properties, Betas, select the openbeta branch - it doesn’t require any password. We will be around only sporadically over the holidays and out of office until the 3rd of January, starting into what will be an exciting year for Automation including some surprises.
Thank you all for being with us on our Automation journey in 2017, we wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! Current Release Status The current release contains the Car and Engine design aspects of Automation along with a simplified 'Lite Campaign' version of the Tycoon gameplay. Future updates over the next 12 months will focus on adding more detail to this side of the game, as well finishing our work porting Automation over to Unreal Engine 4, giving major improvements in graphical quality, performance, playability and UI Design. Read the Early Access description for a full overview of what is finished so far, and check out out for regular development news updates. About This Game.NEW UPDATE. The 'Lite Campaign' simple Tycoon mode has now been released! Automation will allow the player to become an armchair CEO - to build their own car company from the ground up.
Create and run anything from a boutique supercar manufacturer to a mass-market multinational mogul. With powerful tools like the Engine Designer, the player can create cars and their engines in mind-boggling detail. The grand campaign will start in the year 1946 and run until 2020, with the main goal being to build a successful, renowned car company from scratch. All types of car manufacturers can be led to success if managed properly; building the right image over the years is key. The player’s tasks are to design engines and cars, to manage factories, production, Research and Development, as well as advertising campaigns.
In game, time advances at the pace the player chooses and pauses automatically for events and occurrences. Automation is comprised of three major game components - the Engine Designer, the Car Designer and the Company Manager. These components are naturally strung together by the game’s goals, made to be user-friendly and intuitive to use.
A multitude of tutorial missions, videos, and descriptive texts help car novices become experts. Almost infinite options give the player all the creative freedom to create unique cars with vastly different engines. KEY PLANNED FEATURES FOR THE COMPLETED GAME:. Extremely Deep, Technical, Creative – Experience unheard-of creative freedom in a highly technical, realistic gameplay experience revolving around building a car company from scratch. Go ahead and build your dream-car company!. Dynamic World Markets – Master realistically modeled dynamic markets, distribution, and demand.
Try to cater to the needs of over 40 different target groups and their needs, or find your safe-haven niche in a cutthroat economic environment. Flexible Car Designer – Design the cars you would have in your garage. Choose from diverse chassis types and materials, engine placements and drivetrain setups, gearboxes, suspensions, brakes, tyres, and finish off you design with fully customisable body types, looks and styles. Highly Detailed Engine Designer – Delve into endless possibilities combining different 4-stroke petrol engine configurations, internals, head types, forced induction systems, fuel systems, headers and mufflers.
All based on different 4-stroke petrol engine configurations: Inline 3, 4, 5, 6, V6, 8, 10, 12, 16, Boxer 4, 6. Dynamic Engine Sounds - Turn up the volume and blast out the awesome fully adaptive, unique engine sounds that directly reflect your design choices. Grand Campaign, Scenarios, Sandbox – Aim to dominate the world markets with your superior design skills in the grand campaign, play a quick scenario challenge, or just tinker away in sandbox mode to create the most insane engines ever. Complex, yet Easy to Learn – While the game is highly technical, it is made easy to learn by means of well-illustrated in-game tutorial videos, detailed descriptive texts, as well as a multitude of tutorial scenarios. Network Play – Play cooperatively with your friends or take your intuition for the perfect car design and challenge up to 7 human competitors in epic, multi-session network games. Community – Join one of the most awesome and helpful communities out there, share stories about your exploits, talk to like-minded people, discuss your IRL car projects and engage in community challenges.IMPORTANT NOTE:. The current version contains a simplified 'Lite Campaign' version of the Tycoon aspects.
More detailed Tycoon gameplay will be the focus of future major updates. Please read the Early Access description above for an overview of what is done so far. We are also in the process of porting the game to Unreal Engine 4, and you can expect major improvements in performance, UI design, visual quality, and stability in the next major update.