City Game Studio News

[p][/p]

[p]Default version of the game, we want to make sure to have a chance to discover bugs and adjust the balancing, to give you the best game experience possible.

Access the Unstable branch on Steam by right clicking City Game Studio in your Steam library, and then select ‘Properties’. In the new window, select ‘Betas’. The Unstable branch should now be available for you to choose from.

Please leave any feedback you may have in the appropriate channel in our Discord, or in the subforum on Steam.

As always, remember to be considerate towards players not partaking in the Unstable, in case they want to avoid spoilers.

Please make sure to make backups of your save files before playing.[/p]

[h2]Changelog - rc3[/h2]
[h3]Bugfixes[/h3]

• Fixed slider mouse input positioning issues preventing accurate adjustment

[h3]Updates & DLC[/h3]

• Redesigned the game update interface
  
• Redesigned the game DLC interface

[h3]Optimization[/h3]

• Replaced the `call` function with direct function calls (250% performance improvement)
  
• Optimized label refresh to only update visible labels
  
• Optimized the bouncing animation (switched from animation node to process)

[h3]Notifications[/h3]

• When unlocking a new game engine component, added a button to navigate directly to the game engine update panel

[h3]Studio[/h3]

• Added a grid overlay when furnishing studios

[h2]Previously[/h2]
[h3]Rendering[/h3]

• Use higher resolution for platform sprites (1024px instead of 512px)

[h3]Platforms[/h3]

• Add the Steam Frame
  
• Balance the Nintendo Switch units sold
  
• Balance the PlayStation 5
  
• Balance the Xbox Series X
  
• Adjust the end of life of the first Steam Machine

[h3]Interface[/h3]

• Added the GOTY award to the "Misc" filter in the shop menu
  
• Added a way to access the devkit panel from the bottom menu
  
• The email panel now uses more colors to help you manage messages

[h3]Custom-platforms[/h3]

• Add a copy-protection parameter to avoid the 1983 market crash

[h3]Quality of Life[/h3]

• The game now remembers the sorting filter when opening the game genre panel
  
• The game now remembers the sorting filter when opening the platform panel

[h3]Optimization[/h3]

• Reworked the tips thread to stop once completed
  
• Optimized startup time (39% faster on high-end computers, 55% faster on low-end computers)

[h3]Clean-up[/h3]

• Removed 108 unused textures
  
• Closed all open I/O operations

[h3]Modding[/h3]

• Add a new parameter when creating a new difficulty (copy_protection_costs)
  
• Add a new parameter when adding a new platform (copy_protection)
  
• Add a new parameter when adding a new platform (backward_compatibility)
  
• Add a new parameter when editing an existing platform (backward_compatibility)

[h3]Staff Panel[/h3]

• Added a new filter to display employees not assigned to any studio

[h3]Balancing[/h3]

• Added a new threshold for additional cost reduction on custom platform manufacturing

[h3]Misc[/h3]

• Add support for 3440 x 1440 resolution

[h3]Bugfixes[/h3]

• Fixed fullscreen mode (Windows only)
  
• Digital store: Fixed an issue where updating the assigned studio for a digital store feature wouldn't update the in-development panel
  
• Fixed a rare crash when closing in-game messages
  
• Fixed achievement unlocking incorrectly when releasing games on competitor-made consoles instead of own consoles
  
• Fixed the progress bar for manufacturing cost reduction on released custom platforms not progressing correctly
  
• Fixed an issue preventing GOTY awards from being placed
  
• Added migration to update the count of GOTY awards won
  
• Fixed mouse wheel scrolling the page when adjusting sliders

Hello everyone!

Happy New Year, we're still in January so I'm allowed to say it, it's the law!
I know there's some really crazy stuff happening in the world, so I'm burying myself in work to avoid thinking about it too much. And the result is a new little version with quite a few changes!

[h3]This Week's Recap[/h3]
I was supposed to work on notifications, but I didn't do it the way I thought I would. Actually, I got tons of feedback over these past few days and it allowed me to prioritize essential elements that will greatly improve your gaming experience. First, the emails, I added colors to help you distinguish them better. It's not much but it makes a nice difference, thanks for the suggestion!

Then the devkits. Until now it was a somewhat hidden menu, but that was without counting on your feedback that pointed out this state of affairs. So now, sending devkits is part of the game's main interface, and it's much easier to find this essential panel when you're manufacturing consoles.

Other important details like the fact that the game will now remember the sort order of consoles and genres so you don't have to make the same gestures over and over again. But I want to tell you about the bulk of the work.

I spent a few days reworking the game launch. Actually, I came across feedback from 2019 that mentioned City Game Studio taking a long time to start. And when checking on my machine, it took about 15 seconds to launch. Let's just say an eternity, so I worked on that.

Instead of loading everything at once, loading now happens on demand. This might introduce some bugs, but that remains to be proven because I think I tested the changes thoroughly. I took the time to delete over a hundred textures that were no longer used, while reworking the management of a thread (there are still a few in the game) that was running all the time for no reason. And I also closed all the I/O that weren't properly closed, which could cause a small memory leak indeed. And with all this work, the game now launches in about 7.5 seconds on my machine.

I wanted to see what it would do on an older machine, and we go from 31.5 seconds to about 13.2 seconds on average. All without blocking the operating system. So it's a small victory and I'm pretty proud of myself for that!

[h3]What's Coming[/h3]
I still plan to rework in-game notifications to make them more effective. So that's not changing. But I also plan to work on the save system. Last time I worked on it I focused on optimization, meaning loading a game is faster than before. And today I'd like you to have a more modern autosave system.

I'll tell you more when it's done, and I don't think I'll have time to do everything in a single week.

So, in these uncertain times I wish you good health, take care of yourselves, for real! And if all goes well we'll catch up next week!
Xavier aka Binogure

[p][/p]

[p]Default version of the game, we want to make sure to have a chance to discover bugs and adjust the balancing, to give you the best game experience possible.

Access the Unstable branch on Steam by right clicking City Game Studio in your Steam library, and then select ‘Properties’. In the new window, select ‘Betas’. The Unstable branch should now be available for you to choose from.

Please leave any feedback you may have in the appropriate channel in our Discord, or in the subforum on Steam.

As always, remember to be considerate towards players not partaking in the Unstable, in case they want to avoid spoilers.

Please make sure to make backups of your save files before playing.[/p]

[h2]Changelog - rc2[/h2]
[h3]Interface[/h3]

• Added the GOTY award to the "Misc" filter in the shop menu
  
• Added a way to access the devkit panel from the bottom menu
  
• The email panel now uses more colors to help you manage messages

[h3]Quality of Life[/h3]

• The game now remembers the sorting filter when opening the game genre panel
  
• The game now remembers the sorting filter when opening the platform panel

[h3]Optimization[/h3]

• Reworked the tips thread to stop once completed
  
• Optimized startup time (39% faster on high-end computers, 55% faster on low-end computers)

[h3]Clean-up[/h3]

• Removed 108 unused textures
  
• Closed all open I/O operations

[h3]Bugfix[/h3]

• Fixed mouse wheel scrolling the page when adjusting sliders

[h2]Previously[/h2]
[h3]Rendering[/h3]

• Use higher resolution for platform sprites (1024px instead of 512px)

[h3]Platforms[/h3]

• Add the Steam Frame
  
• Balance the Nintendo Switch units sold
  
• Balance the PlayStation 5
  
• Balance the Xbox Series X
  
• Adjust the end of life of the first Steam Machine

[h3]Custom-platforms[/h3]

• Add a copy-protection parameter to avoid the 1983 market crash

[h3]Modding[/h3]

• Add a new parameter when creating a new difficulty (copy_protection_costs)
  
• Add a new parameter when adding a new platform (copy_protection)
  
• Add a new parameter when adding a new platform (backward_compatibility)
  
• Add a new parameter when editing an existing platform (backward_compatibility)

[h3]Staff Panel[/h3]

• Added a new filter to display employees not assigned to any studio

[h3]Balancing[/h3]

• Added a new threshold for additional cost reduction on custom platform manufacturing

[h3]Misc[/h3]

• Add support for 3440 x 1440 resolution

[h3]Bugfixes[/h3]

• Fixed fullscreen mode (Windows only)
  
• Digital store: Fixed an issue where updating the assigned studio for a digital store feature wouldn't update the in-development panel
  
• Fixed a rare crash when closing in-game messages
  
• Fixed achievement unlocking incorrectly when releasing games on competitor-made consoles instead of own consoles
  
• Fixed the progress bar for manufacturing cost reduction on released custom platforms not progressing correctly
  
• Fixed an issue preventing GOTY awards from being placed
  
• Added migration to update the count of GOTY awards won

Hello everyone!

This is the very first devlog of 2026!! Time really flies, doesn't it?
But hey, even though it's the holiday break, I'm still hard at work on City Game Studio, fixing bugs and adding new ones obviously!

[h3]This Week's Recap[/h3]
A change that should have been made ages ago: adding a new filter in the employee panel so you can display only employees who don't have an assigned studio. It's super handy, and it really improves the gaming experience!

On top of that, there's some balancing for your consoles. I've added a new tier for manufacturing cost reduction. If you reach 100 million units sold, production costs will be reduced by 50%, which is pretty awesome!

Moving on, it's mostly bug fixes, and fairly important ones at that. One concerns a Steam achievement that was unlocking at the wrong time - now fixed. Another concerns Game of the Year, or rather the awards. Basically, even if you won Game of the Year, you couldn't place any awards. This bug is fixed, sorry for not catching it sooner and thanks for reporting it!

Another bug, specific to Windows, concerns fullscreen mode. I had to recompile City Game Studio's engine to support non-exclusive fullscreen mode. I've run some tests, and it looks promising! Let me know on your end if everything's working well!

[h3]What's Coming[/h3]
I've started thinking about some useful changes. For example, when you receive an in-game notification mentioning a new game engine feature. It would be nice if that notification had a button that redirects you to the game engine screen. And since we're talking about game engines, it would be great to have a list of existing game engines (especially your competitors') on the right side of the screen so you can compare in real-time.

That's what's coming next week, but I have other little things planned. Like adding options for the banker, or reworking the difficulty settings to give you more control without having to use mods.

Anyway, I won't say more, thanks for reading!
See you next week!
Happy New Year and take care
Xavier aka Binogure

[p][/p]

[p]Default version of the game, we want to make sure to have a chance to discover bugs and adjust the balancing, to give you the best game experience possible.

Access the Unstable branch on Steam by right clicking City Game Studio in your Steam library, and then select ‘Properties’. In the new window, select ‘Betas’. The Unstable branch should now be available for you to choose from.

Please leave any feedback you may have in the appropriate channel in our Discord, or in the subforum on Steam.

As always, remember to be considerate towards players not partaking in the Unstable, in case they want to avoid spoilers.

Please make sure to make backups of your save files before playing.[/p]

[h2]Changelog - rc1[/h2]
[h3]Staff Panel[/h3]

• Added a new filter to display employees not assigned to any studio

[h3]Balancing[/h3]

• Added a new threshold for additional cost reduction on custom platform manufacturing

[h3]Bugfixes[/h3]

• Fixed fullscreen mode (Windows only)
  
• Digital store: Fixed an issue where updating the assigned studio for a digital store feature wouldn't update the in-development panel
  
• Fixed a rare crash when closing in-game messages
  
• Fixed achievement unlocking incorrectly when releasing games on competitor-made consoles instead of own consoles
  
• Fixed the progress bar for manufacturing cost reduction on released custom platforms not progressing correctly
  
• Fixed an issue preventing GOTY awards from being placed
  
• Added migration to update the count of GOTY awards won

[h2]Previously[/h2]
[h3]Rendering[/h3]

• Use higher resolution for platform sprites (1024px instead of 512px)

[h3]Platforms[/h3]

• Add the Steam Frame
  
• Balance the Nintendo Switch units sold
  
• Balance the PlayStation 5
  
• Balance the Xbox Series X
  
• Adjust the end of life of the first Steam Machine

[h3]Custom-platforms[/h3]

• Add a copy-protection parameter to avoid the 1983 market crash

[h3]Modding[/h3]

• Add a new parameter when creating a new difficulty (copy_protection_costs)
  
• Add a new parameter when adding a new platform (copy_protection)
  
• Add a new parameter when adding a new platform (backward_compatibility)
  
• Add a new parameter when editing an existing platform (backward_compatibility)

[h3]Misc[/h3]

• Add support for 3440 x 1440 resolution