Rec Center Tycoon News

Hey everyone!
I just wanted to give you guys an update on the next upcoming patch.

I mentioned last month that this next patch would be a little late due to getting PRK eye surgery which put me out of work for a few weeks, slowing down development. My vision has recovered & I'm back in full swing now but it's going to take a couple more weeks until the next patch is ready.

I've put a lot of work into it so far and it's shaping up well.

One of the major things I've focused on this patch is performance optimisation.
A common issue that affects many users with low-end hardware is framerate dips, particularly while the Research & Staff menus are up. In the current Steam build my own uncapped framerate goes from 1300 fps to around 500 fps with the Research menu open. This can be the difference between 60 & 30 fps on low-end hardware.

The good news is that in the latest upcoming patch I've re-coded the entire Research window & now performance barely dips at all.

I've also discovered another great optimisation method for "combining" things like floor tiles so that instead of drawing hundreds of tiles individually, they are combined into a image and drawn as one image.
So for example a large Rec Center that currently draws 500 individual floor tiles, will now always only have the performance impact of drawing a single floor tile, no matter how many actual tiles there are.
This will drastically increase performance, particularly in large late-game Rec Centers.

This patch should result in the biggest performance increase so far with some users getting up to 100% higher framerates.

There are some other additions coming too but I'll talk more about those when the patch is ready for release.

Thank you for your patience! :)
Jarrod

Hey everyone it's update time again!

Sorry it was a few days later than usual this time but I got a good amount done.

The main highlights of this patch are:

Mess Tracking:
Click on a bin to see some stats about how mess is being handled throughout your Rec Center, like the ratio of mess thats being dropped on the floor vs being put in bins. This will help you optimise bin placement for greater coverage to keep your Rec Center clean.
This is important because you'll need to prove you can run a clean business to unlock the Childcare technology!

Childcare Facility:
Busy customers are now able to pay an hourly price to leave their children in your childcare facility, should you choose to build one.
This will make your Rec Center more appealing to certain people and provide a small boost to daily customers.
Set your own custom Childcare hours & keep the children happy with the new equipment being added.
To unlock this tech, first research Entertainment II, then prove you can keep a clean Rec Center by ending a day with at least 70% of all mess going into bins on a busy day with 50+ customers.


The full patch notes are:

- Childcare Facility:
New Zone: Childcare
New Floor Tile: Colored pattern
New Objects: Kids Tables
New Object: Ball Pit
New Object: Game Console
New Object: Book Shelf

- See details about mess around your Rec Center by targeting a bin
- Buy Menu tabs revamped
- Several equipment & general sprites have been redrawn & improved
- Improvements made to grid display
- Countless minor optimisations to background processes, improving overall framerate by up to 15%, this will be more noticeable in late-game when you have a very large Rec Center with lots of customers & employees.

Minor changes & bug fixes:
- Swimmers are now around 20% less likely to start drowning
- Increased range of bins by 15%
- Customers' chance to leave a review now decreases the busier your Rec Center gets, this is to reduce review spam in late-game
- Customers can no longer stay on computers for hours after closing time
- Fixed bug causing event customers to make twice as much mess
- Fixed crash that may occur when a cook can't find any stock to use
- Fixed crash affecting old saves when entering Research menu
- Fixed minor issues with object depth causing some visual bugs
- Fixed minor bugs with customer AI
- Fixed bug causing customers in their swimwear to walk around endlessly
- Removed weird 'orbs' that appear when zoomed out in Utilities mode
- Many more minor adjustments & fixes


What's coming next patch:

Daily Business Reports
I plan to add a business report that you can read at the end of each day that tracks a large amount of stats. These reports will be saved into a large array and you'll be able to view & compare each days data with any previous day.

Reviews Overhaul
In the next update I want to overhaul the way customer reviews work, expanding the info you receive from each review.
For example, instead of just giving an overall rating out of 5 stars, you'll receive an out of 5 rating on other things too like cleanliness, value for money, how much stuff there is to do & how crowded the place is etc..

Heavy optimisation of menus (Most prior optimisation has been to background processes)
I've figured out a couple methods of massively reducing resources consumed by menus to make them barely impact performance at all so I plan to rework many performance intensive menus over the next week or two. So expect more large performance gains next update!


One last thing to note is that next update might be a little later than usual because I'm getting laser eye surgery in a few days & I need to avoid looking at close up screens for about a week after.

Let me know what you think of these changes & I hope you enjoy! :)

Hey everyone, it's update time!

I've just uploaded patch 0.3.2 and I wanted to give a small overview of the additions.

The biggest changes this patch are:

- Food Quality System:
An employees 'Cooking' Skill now affects the quality of food being served in addition to the speed of cooking. Poor quality food now increases the likelyhood of food poisoning and can lead to bad reviews. Good quality food now leads to a customer mood boost and better reviews.
You can see the quality of the food in a cafe or catering table by selecting it.

- Customer AI changes:
Customer AI during events/parties has been altered significantly to make reviews more accurate & allow for future additions & changes.

- Framework upgrades:
I've made many upgrades to hidden background systems, for example the way reviews & events are handled have had overhauls. These changes aren't visible in-game but they make things more stable, less prone to bugs & and easier to add to and change in the future.

- Jukebox:
Spice up your parties & events a little by adding some music! Your party guests will surely appreciate it. Unlocked via 'Radio' technology.

Minor changes & bug fixes:
- Computer hardware costs reduced by 20-30%
- Computer game costs reduced by 10-20%
- Highly upgraded computers can now yield better profits
- Improvements made to reviews to make opinions conflict less
- Customers will ease up a little with harsh reviews overall
- Reduced volume of certain sound effects to make them less annoying
- Fixed potential crash when trying to hire an employee on hard mode
- Fixed possible crash if hiring caterer without a Buffet Table
- Fixed numerous customer directional issues
- Improvements made to save system to prevent corruption & crashes
- A few new emotes, sprites & graphics added
- Minor performance optimisations

Hello all!

I've uploaded a new patch today that includes a feature that many have requested since launch which is Sandbox mode!

This new addition allows you to choose custom settings when making a new game.
I've attached a screenshot below that will give you a good idea how it works.



While in-game you can mouse-over the checkboxes when setting up sandbox mode for a detailed description of what each checkbox does but I'll give you a rundown here:

- Starting Money
Set your initial starting money anywhere between $1,000 & $10,000,000,000

- Free Points
Choose how many stat points you want your manager to start with, up to 100.

- Tax Rate
Set your tax rate from between 0% - 50% if you like an extra challenge.

- Disable Challenges
This removes the little challenges required to unlock each new technology in the research tree.

- Instant Research
As you might guess this removes the time it takes to research a new technology, you gain it instantly upon purchasing it.

- All Research Unlocked
This option starts the game with the entire research tree completed & negates the previous two options.

- Disable Random Events
Things like random power surges, heatwaves & computer viruses are disabled.

- Disable Checklist
This disables the checklist that appears when you start a new game to help teach you how to build your Rec Center. Disabling this is only recommended for experienced players.

These options allow the player to make a new game as difficult or easy as they want.
Please note however that Steam Achievements (When they're added :P) won't be unlockable in sandbox mode.

Here's a full list of notes:

- Sandbox mode added
- Employee AI now starts before customer AI, preventing some glitches
- Fixed bug causing reception & cafe lines to occasionally freeze
- Fixed some tooltip typos
- Fixed bug causing plants to decay too slowly
- Fixed minor bug with reseting your managers talents
- Fixed bug causing some players to be overcharged with tax

Hey guys, it's time for another update!

Patch 0.3.0 has just released & I want to talk about some of the new things that have been added.

2 new technologies have been added to the Research menu.
They are:
- Market II
This includes a new zone & item: the Shop.
With this tech, you are now able to sell things in your Rec Center like supplements, gym gear & swimming gear to make a nice little profit.
- Bulk Buy
This reduces the price you pay for stock by 50%. This is a significant upgrade because it means you will earn higher profit on things like the Vending Machine & Cafe.

Also you are now able to click on customers to see what their most recent thoughts are, what they've liked/disliked.

Here's a full list of patch notes:
- New Tech: Merchant II
- New Tech: Bulk Buy
- New Zone/Object: Shop
- It's now possible to see a customers most recent thoughts & opinions on your Rec Center
- Small changes & fixes to the way events are handled
- You can now have a higher amount of concurrent customers
- Customers are slightly less annoyed by crowds
- Fixed bug causing Janitors to stop working if there are no stock shelves in late-game
- Computer per hour cost now saves correctly
- Power Switches On/Off state now saves correctly
- Reworked the way membership signups work to be more realistic
- Fixes made to the saving/loading directory system
- Fixed bug causing NPCs to occasionally get stuck when unpausing
- Fixed potential crash on startup in late-game
- Additional performance optimisations
- More minor bug fixes & improvements

So what next?

Sandbox mode is finally coming in the next patch!
I'm planning to add it as a separate difficulty option that will start the game off with a large amount of money & all technologies researched.
Let me know in the comments below if you think sandbox should include any other changes.

Also continued work on events & and food system overhaul.