http://www.projectautomata.com/1008/announcing-the-alpha-demo/
I've got to go to bed so no time for a real writeup, but:
1. All three major OSes - Linux, Windows, Mac
2. Basically you rent/buy or build factories and supply industry chains → cities. Convois are handled automatically
3. In early alpha
Very interesting. I kinda like it but not totally sure how I feel.
There is a tutorial.
seems for each factory you need to build fields or collector buildings. Then you need to connect the factories to other factories. Then automated transportation happens. Sort of the opposite of Simutrans. lol
It seems very simple in its mechanics and could lack depth because of it. The first thing I thought of was Offworld Trading Company (http://store.steampowered.com/app/271240/), but lacking many features in terms of complexity.
Looks quite pretty and is probably great for mobile gaming. Has anyone poked their head into the demo?
I only get a black screen instead of the map, I only see menues and the like.
It works for me (Linux, NVIDIA). It looks nice at first sight, somewhat like a new "Industry Giant".
I have run across posts by the author on reddit where they describe the graphics as being very preliminary and not intended as permanent. :shrug:
Gameplay does seem a bit light, although it does have some potential. :)
It's amusing, but very easy, it can become a cool game with the right design choices.
The graphics looked like crap here and the interface is too big. It looks like they've built it only for HiDPI.
Performance is terrible, the game is quite simple but it uses a lot of resources and makes the fans blow strong as the temperature rises. So no, it's terrible for mobile gaming.
I've had time to play some more time and the game has potential only if transportation play a more important role.
In fact, like some of you said, the game just focus in the part that ST doesn't focus. You have natural resources and you plant fairly complex industry chains to give service to cities. But transportation topology doesn't seem an issue, at least with the simple map you can play in this alpha version. Neither you can have storehouses to organize goods flux. You merely plant industries and sign contracts and then transportation happens more or less automatically. Another positive issue is that you can see the ingredients, the stock and the time it takes for a unit of product to be produced once the corresponding units of raw material are at the industry.
I'd like some parts of this game to be part of ST. In ST, there should be natural resources, demands that really affect grow rates, etc. and the player should design a network of industries and transportation to satisfy that demand. Now, it's the computer who decides where to put the industries, with whom sign the contracts, etc. And if you don't supply a city, it isn't really a big deal...
I think that ST is super complicated as it is (though I play experimental) and giving even more responsibilities could easily be overwhelming.
It would be nice to get a little bit more depth in industry:
- clustering of resource production ( I think that this one is quite important as it will make the game feel much more realistic),
- industry built based on the growth of the cities (like with power stations, eg every city bigger than 1k should have a market or a shop etc.)
- limits in city growth when some industries are not supplied ( for example only half growth if market or builders yard is not supplied in a city that is bigger then 5k, no growth at all if builders yard is not supplied within 50km etc.)
Hi guys, I'm Alex, creator of Project Automata.
First, many thanks for opening a thread about our game :)
Wanted to dispel some doubts, especially the ones about the mechanics, but I think I can sum them all up by saying that the demo and all the assets you see are from a pre-alpha demo, so most (if not all) are placeholders. We are still refining the gameplay, adding new assets and perfecting the experience.
This is an example of how buildings will look like soon:
(https://slack-imgs.com/?c=1&url=https%3A%2F%2Fbot.gyazo.com%2F7a74169aabdfb4aacac8100a5450759b.png)
The new and improved coal gatherer.
As for the mechanics, please note that while OTTD was one of the inspirations, it wasn't the main one. PA is not exclusively a logistic game; the main focus is gathering and production, after understanding town needs.
Please make as many questions as you want, I'll reply as soon as I can.
We're also on Greenlight (http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=768984021) and in a few hours (5pm CET) we'll be launching our kickstarter campaign, with a lot of information.
Thanks again for thinking of us!
Update! Kickstarter launched!
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/dapperpenguinstudio/project-automata-a-world-of-industry-awaits
Thanks for the comments Mals, the extra info shows the game will be challenging.
I just wonder why for some industries you can assign more trucks, but not for others. I guess it's just a missing feature for now or I missed something. And the menus could adjust on smaller screens.
Some things from Simutrans that I missed on Project Automata were Backspace to close all windows and right click on titlebar to minimise/collapse the window.
I think you're using an old version. Would recommend redownloading the game, so you are playing on the latest (0.4.4.5).
We are currently working on collapsable windows, like in OTTD :)
Yes, it was an old version. Though I could not really see much effect on the number of trucks running.
Now I just miss a monthly report of the total winnings and losses and the same per industry. This way it's easy to find which factories are giving you the most profit.