City Game Studio News

Hello everyone!

This week I worked hard, pretty much like every time, but I didn't do exactly what I had planned. Well actually I did, but I ended up doing a bit more than what was planned.

[h3]This Week's Recap[/h3]
Last week I told you about the constructive feedback I received to improve City Game Studio, so I got to work on it. First I fixed the few English mistakes in the translations. There must have been about thirty errors across more than 1700 entries. After this pass I think we should be good!

Since I was working on the English translations, I took the opportunity to make an adjustment regarding currencies. Or rather, how money is displayed in the game. You see, in French or in the vast majority of languages, the $ is displayed after the numbers. But in English it's the opposite. So I had to do a pass through the entire game codebase to make this change, and I took the opportunity to make it dynamic. Basically, I normalized the way the game displays money, which means that instead of having two formatting steps, one for the numbers and another to display the currency, there is now just one formatting step that does both in a single pass. And naturally this has a positive impact on performance. It's not much, but on weaker machines it should make a small difference.

Given that we're approaching March 9th, the date on which v1.26 will be released, I did a pass on your bug reports. And there were a few, notably one concerning the banker. Actually, when you sold your game engine while you were in the middle of updating it, your employees would end up stuck working on an engine that no longer existed. Well, that's fixed.

Another problem concerns emails. The new notification that lets you open the game engine panel had a bug. Actually, if you only had that notification in your email inbox, the inbox was supposed to close and be replaced by the game engine panel. Except since the game is already displaying the game engine panel, there's a security mechanism that prevents closing the inbox. Which means the inbox would get stuck and could only be closed by pressing the Escape key. Well, this bug has been fixed, but on top of that it also fixed other bugs of the same kind, involving race conditions. Which means you should no longer have panels that stay frozen and can't be closed. It was fairly complex to resolve, but in the end it makes the game much more stable.

Oh, and I reworked the background of small studios a bit. I felt like it, I wanted you to have scenery that makes you want to dive into City Game Studio. So I hope this little change will please you. It's very visual especially compared to the other changes.

[h3]What's Coming[/h3]
As I was saying, we're approaching the v1.26 release, so I won't be adding new features, but mainly fixing bugs. Either bugs that prevent you from playing, or user experience bugs, like adding filters on certain components.

In any case, I still have plenty of tests to run. Given the changes this version contains, I'll have to test on lots of different machines, and that's what's going to keep me busy during the coming week.

Well, that's already it, thank you for reading me,
See you next week
In the meantime take care of yourselves
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 - rc8[/h2]
[h3]Localization[/h3]

• Fixed grammar and idiomatic issues in English translations
  
• Currency symbol now correctly placed before the amount for English translations.
  Required a significant refactor to normalize usage of the `format_currency` function,
  resulting in better overall performance by avoiding redundant string formatting.

[h3]Bugfixes[/h3]

• Fixed employees not being released when selling an engine via the banker
  
• Fixed the mail panel not being closable without pressing Escape when opening the engine panel from the last email in the mailbox
  
• Fixed panels occasionally failing to close (now works reliably 100% of the time)
  
• Fixed pillar collision shape to avoid visual glitches

[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]Updates & DLC[/h3]

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

[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
  
• When unlocking a new game engine component, added a button to navigate directly to the game engine update panel
  
• Added a grid overlay when furnishing studios
  
• Redesigned the exit menu while in-game

[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)
  
• 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)
  
• Optimize the function 'compute_employee_happiness' since it takes up to 2300 ms (with hover 1000 employees). It takes now ~66 ms. This function is used every 3 seconds in the game, it used to update the staff happiness.

[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
  
• Add the studio size to the studio name

[h3]Balancing[/h3]

• Added a new threshold for additional cost reduction on custom platform manufacturing
  
• Balance the DLC, it was a real exploit allowing you to make 1000% profits on any game

[h3]Save Game[/h3]

• Redesigned the save game panel
  
• Added ability to name save games when duplicating
  
• Added ability to name save games when creating new slots
  
• The game now warns and asks for confirmation when overwriting existing saves
  
• Added ability to load save games while already in-game
  
• Added caching system for save game listing (internal optimization, not for browsing)

[h3]Steamdeck[/h3]

• The twitch configuration panel was not taken into account correctly when playing on the Steam deck
  
• Improve compatibility with micro-transactions (automatically open the steam deck keyboard)
  
• Improve compatibility when making paid updates (automatically open the steam deck keyboard)
  
• Improve compatibility when renaming buildings (automatically open the steam deck keyboard)
  
• Improve compatibility when filtering game from the history panel (automatically open the steam deck keyboard)
  
• Improve compatibility when releasing a game to rename the game (automatically open the steam deck keyboard)

[h3]Studio director[/h3]

• Balancing the genre the studio director uses. Unless the player specifies a genre, then the studio director will check for the studios happiness when picking a new genre. Meaning, you're going to make games for genre you don't master even if the settings says otherwise in order to keep your staff happy.

[h3]Misc[/h3]

• Add support for 3440 x 1440 resolution
  
• Removed a yield while loading scenes (fixed memory leak and other issues)
  
• Configuration files are now only written when changes are detected
  
• Remove an in-game vanilla event which is breaking the coffee-machine. Mods event can still break object.

[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
  
• Fixed slider mouse input positioning issues preventing accurate adjustment
  
• Fix a crash when updating a "green" game
  
• Cannot use the mousewheel to update the micro transactions price
  
• Fix an issue with the double slider (renting studio)
  
• Fix an issue with some savegames where the game price is not taken into account (due to the studio director)
  
• Fix an issue with the studio director where it ports games that has not yet been released.
  
• Fix an issue with the fanbase change label, it always shows 0 (which is not correct)
  
• Fix an issue when a savegame keeps hint, it might crash the game (at start up)
  
• Add a missing font size (godot 2.1 manages font size individually)
  
• Fix an issue with the cheat-code console (cannot set employee happiness)
  
• Fix an issue with the devkit panel (cannot close it)

Hey everyone!

I'm happy, even though I caught the flu this week I still managed to make good progress on v1.26! I managed to progress so well that I was able to do everything I wanted. Let me tell you all about it right now.

[h3]This Week's Recap[/h3]
Last week I told you I was going to improve Steam Deck support, and so I did a complete pass on all the game's interfaces to make sure each field was visible, and that when you had to enter text it automatically brought up the Steam Deck's virtual keyboard. Well, it took me some time, but it's done and I think I didn't forget anything! Steam Deck players are first-class citizens, or at least I'm doing everything I can!

I've had quite a bit of negative feedback lately, some more constructive than others, and it turns out that one piece of feedback in particular made me realize it was so valid that I implemented it immediately. The random event where your coffee machine breaks is now removed from the game. Actually, if at the beginning (in 2019) City Game Studio wanted to be like Game Dev Tycoon, and therefore have random human-scale events. Today that's no longer the case. City Game Studio starts from a garage, or a small studio, but ends up as a multinational worth several billion. And at that scale, having a coffee machine break, well we don't really care. So there you go, that random event is history.

The studio director had a problem. When you used it, it would always use the same game genre until it exhausted your studios, to the point where some employees would start leaving the company. So that's not very cool, so I reworked that, and now the studio director will change genres if the studio is tired of always making the same type of game. And that's really convenient for you. Even more autonomy from the studio director.

I know some of you use DLCs, or paid updates to accumulate maximum liquidity. Honestly, kudos to you for finding this exploit, we're finding fewer and fewer of them, and that one has been balanced too. So enjoy v1.25.0 to accumulate liquidity, because v1.26 fixes this problem.

[h3]What's Coming[/h3]
As I told you, there's been quite a bit of constructive feedback on the game, and I think I'll seriously tackle the English translation to make it more natural. Most of it was done years ago and since then my English has clearly improved.

I know it's not super exciting, but English-speaking players represent more than 30% of total players, which means I don't want to ignore them, quite the opposite!

V1.26.0 already has lots of great things, great optimizations and I still want to do more, so we'll see if I can keep up the momentum and make the game start even faster.

Well, that's all for me, thank you for reading
See you next week,
In the meantime, take care of yourselves
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 - rc7[/h2]
[h3]Studio director[/h3]

• Balancing the genre the studio director uses. Unless the player specifies a genre, then the studio director will check for the studios happiness when picking a new genre. Meaning, you're going to make games for genre you don't master even if the settings says otherwise in order to keep your staff happy.

[h3]Steamdeck[/h3]

• The twitch configuration panel was not taken into account correctly when playing on the Steam deck
  
• Improve compatibility with micro-transactions (automatically open the steam deck keyboard)
  
• Improve compatibility when making paid updates (automatically open the steam deck keyboard)
  
• Improve compatibility when renaming buildings (automatically open the steam deck keyboard)
  
• Improve compatibility when filtering game from the history panel (automatically open the steam deck keyboard)
  
• Improve compatibility when releasing a game to rename the game (automatically open the steam deck keyboard)

[h3]Bugfix[/h3]

• Fix an issue with the cheat-code console (cannot set employee happiness)
  
• Fix an issue with the devkit panel (cannot close it)

[h3]Balacing[/h3]

• Balance the DLC, it was a real exploit allowing you to make 1000% profits on any game

[h3]Misc[/h3]

• Remove an in-game vanilla event which is breaking the coffee-machine. Mods event can still break object.

[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]Updates & DLC[/h3]

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

[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
  
• When unlocking a new game engine component, added a button to navigate directly to the game engine update panel
  
• Added a grid overlay when furnishing studios
  
• Redesigned the exit menu while in-game

[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)
  
• 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)
  
• Optimize the function 'compute_employee_happiness' since it takes up to 2300 ms (with hover 1000 employees). It takes now ~66 ms. This function is used every 3 seconds in the game, it used to update the staff happiness.

[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
  
• Add the studio size to the studio name

[h3]Balancing[/h3]

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

[h3]Save Game[/h3]

• Redesigned the save game panel
  
• Added ability to name save games when duplicating
  
• Added ability to name save games when creating new slots
  
• The game now warns and asks for confirmation when overwriting existing saves
  
• Added ability to load save games while already in-game
  
• Added caching system for save game listing (internal optimization, not for browsing)

[h3]Misc[/h3]

• Add support for 3440 x 1440 resolution
  
• Removed a yield while loading scenes (fixed memory leak and other issues)
  
• Configuration files are now only written when changes are detected

[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
  
• Fixed slider mouse input positioning issues preventing accurate adjustment
  
• Fix a crash when updating a "green" game
  
• Cannot use the mousewheel to update the micro transactions price
  
• Fix an issue with the double slider (renting studio)
  
• Fix an issue with some savegames where the game price is not taken into account (due to the studio director)
  
• Fix an issue with the studio director where it ports games that has not yet been released.
  
• Fix an issue with the fanbase change label, it always shows 0 (which is not correct)
  
• Fix an issue when a savegame keeps hint, it might crash the game (at start up)
  
• Add a missing font size (godot 2.1 manages font size individually)

Hey everyone!

I'm excited to announce that City Game Studio has been selected for Flash Game Vibes 2026! The festival runs from February 7th to 20th, and I'm thrilled to be part of this celebration of indie games.

[h3]Special Festival Discount[/h3]
To celebrate, City Game Studio will be 52% OFF from February 7-11!
That's just $9.59 instead of $19.99.

The soundtrack is also on sale at 40% OFF - only $1.19!

[h3]What is City Game Studio?[/h3]
It's a deep management simulation where you build your video game empire from scratch. Starting in 1976, you'll:

• Manage multiple studios across the city
  
• Create your own game engines and consoles
  
• Compete with AI rivals who can now create their own consoles (v1.24!)
  
• Hire staff, attend conventions, and dominate the market
  
• Experience 50+ years of gaming history

This game represents 9+ years of solo development, with quarterly updates based on your feedback. The latest v1.24 completely revolutionized competitor AI, they now create consoles, buy each other out, and provide real competition!

If you've been waiting for the right moment to jump in, this is it. And if you're already playing, maybe grab the soundtrack to complete your experience!

Thanks for all your support over the years. It's because of you that I can keep improving City Game Studio!

Happy gaming,
Xavier aka Binogure