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Experimental Branch - Embracing Passions

The passions system is a major new feature which will expand the gameplay possibilities while helping to keep things manageable. Since there are lots of big changes, I'm starting an experimental branch on Steam to iron out any issues. There's also a new channel on the Discord for discussing experimental features.

If you'd like to help test it out, right-click the game on Steam -> Properties -> Betas -> Private Betas -> enter the access code:

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[h3]What Is A Passion?[/h3]

A passion is a long term hobby or interest that your characters want to get invested in. Some examples are child adoption, painting or thievery.



When a character embraces a passion, related activities and educations are added to various sites. For example if you embrace thievery, then the possibility to commit petty theft opens up.



You could also then choose to take on the goal of robbing a bank. A goal is a special activity with a set of possible outcomes - the weighting of each outcome is influenced by doing other related activities.



To increase the chance of a successful bank robbery, you would observe staff routines and scout escape routes until the odds are acceptable.



For a bank robbery in particular, you want to make sure the chance of catastrophe is very low since the consequence is an extremely long prison sentence. Then again, maybe you're willing to sacrifice that useless character with a work allergy for the chance to improve the household's financial position...



Multiple household members can embrace the same passion and contribute to the same goal.



Another example is adopting a child, an expensive process that takes 1-2 years in real life. To represent this, you have to do home safety checks and attend seminars throughout the year before being allowed to meet a potential adoptee.



Then again you could always offer a "donation" to the adoption agency to improve your outcomes...



Each character can only embrace a few passions at a time. They'll need to abandon existing passions (at the cost of some happiness) to make room for new ones throughout their lives.

This system means I can add many more specific activities that wouldn't make sense in a normal gameplay context - for example illegally purchasing guns should not be an option unless you have criminal intentions.



There's lots of other changes to complement passions like the ability to manually hide actions:



Kicking characters out of your household will now put them in your friends list instead of disappearing them into the nether. This means you can use the power of friendship to commit armed robbery by inviting someone into your household temporarily, and then removing them when you're done.

Remember this is only on the experimental branch for now! I will make a separate announcement when it's released onto the main branch.

Update Notes For v0.53.31

[h3]===Version 0.53.31===[/h3]
  • Change some status effect's hunger/energy modifiers to become decay rate modifiers
  • Reduce time taken for many "paperwork-y" actions (Get Business Permit, Purchase Property, etc)
  • Add Order Salad activity to some sites
  • Report Stolen Items added Paperwork preference
  • Player business interviewing staff action changed to Conduct Interview, gives XP:People Management
  • Move top UI bar to better account for non-standard screen ratios
  • Income/XP/Time statements alternate colours between lines
  • Rent renewal popup add button for viewing/highlighting location of real estate
  • Auto actions add icon showing related player business if applicable
  • Change site activities window owned properties tab to show 2 properties per page
  • Fix adding auto action to buy the same item for different businesses on one character not registering properly
  • Fix and optimised business asset tag desire display and update issues
  • Fix timesheet opening/closing issue when using ESC key

Update Notes For v0.53.18

  • Auto actions increased bonus desire for activities that increase very low needs

Update Notes For v0.53.17

Debts are now partially repayable



The Office Park was getting a bit crowded so a Corporate Office has been added and jobs split between the two sites



Finally, there's a new Community Hall site which will be important for the next major feature I'm currently working on - Passions and Hobbies!



[h3]===Version 0.53.17===[/h3]
  • Allow partial repayment of debts when repaying early
  • Add Community Hall site
  • Add Donate To Charity, Play Basketball, Play Bingo, Volunteer Gardening to Community Hall
  • Add Corporate Office site
  • Moved some jobs from Office Park to Corporate Office
  • Changed spawn parameter for Office Park to lower density areas
  • Add Administrative Assistant, Executive Assistant, Chief Of Staff jobs
  • School Principle and Medical Director jobs adjusted XP to include XP:Administration
  • Ask Strangers For Money has Embarrassed potential status
  • Scavenge Trash Cans replaced Body Smell potential status with Food Poisoning
  • Collect Pension money received is reduced as net worth increases
  • Collect Pension and Collect Scholarship time reduced from 10 to 5
  • Double-clicking in-game search filters clears existing text
  • Search window filter text persists when opening/closing window
  • Updated legal working age and retirement age functionality to be more consistent with other activity limitations
  • Include estimated value in real estate tooltip for properties on sale
  • Fix when selected person decides to do action with activities window open, window not refreshing to prevent player from doing the same limited action twice

Update Notes For v0.53.00

This update adds fixed assets to the Furniture Store.



These assets, such as a Renovated Kitchen or Wall Aquarium, will reduce your floorspace desire.



They are attached to the property itself and won't move when you leave, so consider whether the cost is worth its usefulness.

As your net worth increases, your characters will want fancier improvements so the cost of these assets will also increase.

Business Revenue is now adjustable from the Difficulty setting screen.



There is now an auto-enrol system where your child will be enrolled in the next education at the same school after completing their current one. You can still withdraw a child from the education if you want to change schools (or for other reasons).



[h3]===0.53.00===[/h3]
  • Adjust floorspace desire calculation to better account for multiple household members
  • Add functionality for increasing price of activities, assets and utilities based on net worth
  • Add functionality for assets to decrease desire for floorspace at home
  • Add functionality for fixed assets in household that stay with the property when moving home
  • Add functionality for spending on activities to be tax deductible and earnings from activities to be non-taxable
  • Add a bunch of home makeover assets to Furniture Store
  • Add Donate To Religion to House Of Worship site
  • Ask Strangers For Money earnings are not taxed
  • Add business revenue slider to difficulty settings
  • Remove icon showing preferences for buying action in shopping window
  • Implement auto-enrol for Grade School educations
  • Extend allowed age range for Grade School educations
  • Business auto inventory purchase changed to consume fixed number of hours each month
  • Fixed new game setup children with an even-numbered age not having auto-ticked education
  • Fixed can't find Airstrip from business set/change location menu