Cities: Skylines - Natural Disasters - Dev Diary 2: Scenario editor

[co_luukas]

Cities: Skylines - Natural Disasters - Dev Diary 2: Scenario editor

Hello everyone, it’s time to give a few more details on our awesome scenario editor, and how we made it!

Firstly, as I'm relatively new to the Colossal Order team, let me introduce myself - I am Lukas, originally from Germany, however the Finns are quite nice to me. I've been with CO for a bit over half a year now, mostly taking care of UI and programming related tasks, with the scenario editor being the first big thing I am working on. It's been great!

So, what is the scenario editor going to be?
Cities: Skylines has so far been a very sandbox-y game. While that is awesome and fun for many players, the idea of offering gameplay where you can either win or lose had been around for quite a while, so that's what scenarios are all about! The scenario editor lets you pick either a map or an existing savegame and add win- and losing conditions to it.

With the "Natural Disasters" expansion, various disasters will also be available to be placed in your scenario, and there will be 5 pre-made scenarios for you to play.

Setting disasters markers to where the meteors will visit...

A few words on the development process: As Mariina felt that this should become a big feature, and wanted it to be greater and more powerful than initially planned, we we ended up scrapping the first design of the scenario editor mid-development and rebuilding the whole editor from scratch. So for the second round of developing, we implemented a trigger-based system that lets you come up with all kinds of combinations of cause and effect, which also includes additional effects such as story messages or making the player pay a fine.

It ended up being much more powerful than the first version, so I’m actually quite happy that we did it that way - I am already looking forward to seeing what kind of scenarios all you creative people out there will make with this!

Each trigger has a set of conditions that will cause it to trigger a set of effects, a simple example would be this:

In this case, only one condition has to be met, which is having played for zero weeks (= having started playing the scenario), to trigger one of the meteor strikes.

And a more complex one:

A few random conditions and effects thrown together for an example of what could be a more complex trigger. This one would give the player a cash reward and show an explanatory story message at the same time, while also chirping a chirp.

Triggers effects can also be used for winning or losing the game, so you are free to create scenarios with the most creative combinations of winning or losing conditions.
The list of things that can be used as conditions is very long already, but, to give you an idea what you can do with this, I’ll give you a few examples other than the ones you can see in the screenshots:

Possible Conditions:
- City Value
- Having a certain amount of squares of a certain zone built
- Amount of people transported with by bus, tram, metro etc.
- Citizen health
- Crime rate
- Amount of snow collected

Effects are:
- Start a disaster
- Win the Game
- Lose the Game
- Give money to the player
- Take money from the player
- Show a story message
- Chirp something

...and this is how it looks after the meteors dropped by.

So much about the scenario editor, I hope you are excited about it - I definitely am!

Cheers, Lukas

 

[readingsnail]

Great and long time no see scenario editor (i saw SC3K), and scenario editor is simple and improved than sc3k's this. i wanna download custom scenario from steam workshop!

but, condition or effect is still add things. like this

Condition
- building special power station (like a nuclear power station and hydro power station... i recommand nuclear power station. i want to simcity's diasters(yeah, meltdown, radioactive land etc. C:S nuclear power station is so boring than simcity series) or building special building.
- water comsume / power comsume
- ammount of RCI buildings (seperately RCI Building, like a only Commericial building, include)

Effects are:
- interrupted infrasturcture (blackdown, not water supply)
- forced debt
- pinned tax rate(yeah, pinned. not change until activated release trigger)
- influrance citie's happy rate
- infrasturcture effect(down/up efficiency) - include SOC
- education people's change(not going school or boom of fanatic education)
- change road's speed limit (percentage)
- NIMBY & PIMFY for all city or special district

 

[[Delta ²k5]]

Hallo Lukas, sehr schöner Artikel!

That was german - I just flamed about all those people out there which don't speak german.

/jk, just greetings

That editor seems to be very promising! By all that meteor stuff I simply have to do this..:

 

[KillerChicken]

Will there be options for volcanoes, earthquakes, and nuclear armageddon?

 

[co_martsu]

Great and long time no see scenario editor (i saw SC3K), and scenario editor is simple and improved than sc3k's this. i wanna download custom scenario from steam workshop!

but, condition or effect is still add things. like this

Condition
- building special power station (like a nuclear power station and hydro power station... i recommand nuclear power station. i want to simcity's diasters(yeah, meltdown, radioactive land etc. C:S nuclear power station is so boring than simcity series) or building special building.
- water comsume / power comsume
- ammount of RCI buildings (seperately RCI Building, like a only Commericial building, include)

Effects are:
- interrupted infrasturcture (blackdown, not water supply)
- forced debt
- pinned tax rate(yeah, pinned. not change until activated release trigger)
- influrance citie's happy rate
- infrasturcture effect(down/up efficiency) - include SOC
- education people's change(not going school or boom of fanatic education)
- change road's speed limit (percentage)
- NIMBY & PIMFY for all city or special district

Thanks for the feedback!

Hallo Lukas, sehr schöner Artikel!

That was german - I just flamed about all those people out there which don't speak german.

/jk, just greetings

That editor seems to be very promising! By all that meteor stuff I simply have to do this..:

Haha, such a fitting clip you shared

Will there be options for volcanoes, earthquakes, and nuclear armageddon?

Unfortunately you'll only get one of those options I'm afraid.

 

[kvee]

I hope this trigger works on **any** maps.
Or it would be good if I can create disaster whenever I want or disallow trigger works when I want.

 

[MultiFrapser]

Can natural disasters be random (Please say yes), and will I be able to toggle it off of I just want to do sandbox stuff (Please say yes aswell!)

 

[co_martsu]

I hope this trigger works on **any** maps.
Or it would be good if I can create disaster whenever I want or disallow trigger works when I want.

These triggers are set in the scenario editor (you can use any map or a save to set it up). The idea of the scenario is that it creates a set challenge that you can play and either win or lose it.

Can natural disasters be random (Please say yes), and will I be able to toggle it off of I just want to do sandbox stuff (Please say yes aswell!)

Natural disasters can be random when you play the game normally, if they are random or not in a scenario is up to the creator of that scenario. You can toggle the random disasters in the sandbox play as you wish.

 

[Keltia_Vikinga]

Welcome Lukas, I translated your words to FR people : http://cities-skylines-france.blogspot.com/2016/09/natural-disasters-carnet-2.html?spref=tw <--- En Français!

 

[Oppai]

Will we be able to set the intensity and choose the location of where the disaster will strike in Sandbox mode as well?

 

[Sotrax]

After "losing" the game, am I able to play on or is it a dead end?

 

[xenex]

Hello Lukas and CO.

I just signed up so I can post this. I was talking to a friend before about the disasters expansion and as we were talking a few things came up which I would like to share with CO. I am not entirely sure how you guys are implementing the disaster aspect of the game, but It would make the expansion a lot better if you guys included the following. Instead of just having the disasters be a thing that simply cost you money, make you have to rebuild and in general cause chaos for your city. (Traffic apocalypse) It would be better if there was also some planning aspects to the disasters. Sure for a meteor strike there isn't much planning you can do, it just happens and all you can do is hope you don't die and that your city can handle the outcome. But let's take something like hurricane, don't know if you guys are planning on adding this, but I'm merely using this as an example.

Hurricanes don't just happen, well they kinda do, but what I mean is in most cases hurricanes don't just appear fully formed on/over countries, usually they are formed out on the ocean and then take whatever path they take, which usually ends up with a few countries getting hit. Now many of those countries have somewhat gotten used to hurricanes and know how to deal with it's effects and outcomes. People go out and buy wood sheets and planks, board up their windows, tape their windows to minimize the amount of glass that might fly around, they might tie down things on their property, move their cars somewhere inside if possible or just to a better location, they go to the store and stock up on canned food, flashlights, batteries, battery powered radios, etc. Now all this causes the stores to be packed with people. (Think about the traffic). In some places there are even designated locations people go to during the hurricane, like schools, stadiums, etc.

Now that I have mentioned all that information, it would be cool if in the Disasters expansion you had to think and manage that aspect of a disaster too. You could start all the way from the beginning, having a district policy in which people have to abide by certain building criterias when building the buildings, it would cost you some money per building, but it would make it so people are forced to build buildings that are resistant to hurricanes. (if we keep going with the previous example, but there could also be ones for tornado and earthquakes) You would also have to designate certain areas as shelters in cause of emergencies, schools,stadiums, libraries, etc and would need to manage stockpiles at those locations, maybe having a central government warehouse type building, which has all the things necessary for during a disaster, cots, blanket, clothes, food, maybe you could introduce homeless people, so this facility is always depleting it's resource at a much slower speed, but it would make it so you have to keep an eye out on the stockpiles and not just put the building down and ignore it. If you put the building down and ignore it and the homeless people slowly use up all the resources and then a disaster happens you will be in a bit of trouble and your citizens might get unhappy at you for not being prepared.

So in essence here are the things I am proposing to be included in the Natural Disasters expansion.

-Add a district policy that affects building rules
-Make it so CIMS prepare for preparable disasters by boarding their house and tying things down, etc.
-Make it so CIMS go to stores to buy things they need to prepare. (Causes traffic and makes you need to handle your population going to the same area at the same time, public transport and bikes wouldn't help much here as people can't carry everything they need into public transport vehicle, think about wood sheets and planks etc.)
-Being able to assign certain buildings are disaster shelters, for use during a disaster. (maybe even include buildings that are just shelters, could be used by homeless people?)
-Adding a stockpile building, has has resources for during a disaster, which needs to be occasionally restocked.

Extra
-Adding homeless people. They could make use of the shelters when there isn't a disaster, which deplete the resources in a shelter and a stockpile. Maybe some of the people whose houses you keep tearing down in order to draw a new road become homeless.

The whole point of this proposal is so that there is more to disaster then it just messing your city up and costing you money. I realize it's late in the development of the expansion, but this could always be done in a patch, after the expansion releases.

 

[co_martsu]

Will we be able to set the intensity and choose the location of where the disaster will strike in Sandbox mode as well?

Maybe.

After "losing" the game, am I able to play on or is it a dead end?

When you lose a scenario it's game over I'm afraid. We wanted to add real threat of failing this time >
But if you win the scenario you can continue playing from there!

Hello Lukas and CO.

I just signed up so I can post this. I was talking to a friend before about the disasters expansion and as we were talking a few things came up which I would like to share with CO. I am not entirely sure how you guys are implementing the disaster aspect of the game, but It would make the expansion a lot better if you guys included the following. Instead of just having the disasters be a thing that simply cost you money, make you have to rebuild and in general cause chaos for your city. (Traffic apocalypse) It would be better if there was also some planning aspects to the disasters. Sure for a meteor strike there isn't much planning you can do, it just happens and all you can do is hope you don't die and that your city can handle the outcome. But let's take something like hurricane, don't know if you guys are planning on adding this, but I'm merely using this as an example.

Hurricanes don't just happen, well they kinda do, but what I mean is in most cases hurricanes don't just appear fully formed on/over countries, usually they are formed out on the ocean and then take whatever path they take, which usually ends up with a few countries getting hit. Now many of those countries have somewhat gotten used to hurricanes and know how to deal with it's effects and outcomes. People go out and buy wood sheets and planks, board up their windows, tape their windows to minimize the amount of glass that might fly around, they might tie down things on their property, move their cars somewhere inside if possible or just to a better location, they go to the store and stock up on canned food, flashlights, batteries, battery powered radios, etc. Now all this causes the stores to be packed with people. (Think about the traffic). In some places there are even designated locations people go to during the hurricane, like schools, stadiums, etc.

Now that I have mentioned all that information, it would be cool if in the Disasters expansion you had to think and manage that aspect of a disaster too. You could start all the way from the beginning, having a district policy in which people have to abide by certain building criterias when building the buildings, it would cost you some money per building, but it would make it so people are forced to build buildings that are resistant to hurricanes. (if we keep going with the previous example, but there could also be ones for tornado and earthquakes) You would also have to designate certain areas as shelters in cause of emergencies, schools,stadiums, libraries, etc and would need to manage stockpiles at those locations, maybe having a central government warehouse type building, which has all the things necessary for during a disaster, cots, blanket, clothes, food, maybe you could introduce homeless people, so this facility is always depleting it's resource at a much slower speed, but it would make it so you have to keep an eye out on the stockpiles and not just put the building down and ignore it. If you put the building down and ignore it and the homeless people slowly use up all the resources and then a disaster happens you will be in a bit of trouble and your citizens might get unhappy at you for not being prepared.

So in essence here are the things I am proposing to be included in the Natural Disasters expansion.

-Add a district policy that affects building rules
-Make it so CIMS prepare for preparable disasters by boarding their house and tying things down, etc.
-Make it so CIMS go to stores to buy things they need to prepare. (Causes traffic and makes you need to handle your population going to the same area at the same time, public transport and bikes wouldn't help much here as people can't carry everything they need into public transport vehicle, think about wood sheets and planks etc.)
-Being able to assign certain buildings are disaster shelters, for use during a disaster. (maybe even include buildings that are just shelters, could be used by homeless people?)
-Adding a stockpile building, has has resources for during a disaster, which needs to be occasionally restocked.

Extra
-Adding homeless people. They could make use of the shelters when there isn't a disaster, which deplete the resources in a shelter and a stockpile. Maybe some of the people whose houses you keep tearing down in order to draw a new road become homeless.

The whole point of this proposal is so that there is more to disaster then it just messing your city up and costing you money. I realize it's late in the development of the expansion, but this could always be done in a patch, after the expansion releases.

Hello xenex and welcome to the forum! Thank you for the feedback, it's a joy to read such thought out and well written text. I have an attention span of a CEO and you kept me reading until the end

Then to the feedback itself. The proposal goes slightly too much to micromanagement when it comes to the preparations, though it could be done with policies. However it is quite a massive feature with the visuals needed. We have taken a lighter approach for the city to prepare for a disaster and we'll be explaining how it works in later dev diaries. However I will definitely bring this feedback forward to the team, though as you pointed out, we are quite far in the development to adding anything major.

 

[xenex]

Hi martsu, thanks for the reply. Glad you enjoyed reading my bible page long post, I was afraid when when I had posted it and saw how long it ended up being, anyways.

Yeah, I can understand the ideas I mentioned may a bit too complicated (especially so late in development) , however I am happy to hear that something to do with policies might be be possible and that you guys are including some form of light preparation, as a mentioned the general idea was just to have the disasters be a little bit more then just a nuisance that slows me down and instead be a challenge, which I could choose to do some sort of preparation for at the cost of money, which may or may not end up being useful and paying for itself.

Thanks for your time, can't wait for the expansion.

 

[co_martsu]

Hi Lukas, thanks for the reply. Glad you enjoyed reading my bible page long post, I was afraid when when I had posted it and saw how long it ended up being, anyways.

Yeah, I can understand the ideas I mentioned may a bit too complicated (especially so late in development) , however I am happy to hear that something to do with policies might be be possible and that you guys are including some form of light preparation, as a mentioned the general idea was just to have the disasters be a little bit more then just a nuisance that slows me down and instead be a challenge, which I could choose to do some sort of preparation for at the cost of money, which may or may not end up being useful and paying for itself.

Thanks for your time, can't wait for the expansion.

Sorry I didn't introduce myself, I'm Mariina, the CEO at Colossal Order. I answer semi regularly here on the forums and it's nice to meet you! Lukas and the rest of the team need to do actual work so I take liberties to answer on their behalf.

I absolutely agree with you on the disasters! We don't want them to be only about destroying the city but add features that allow you to prevent or at least mitigate the problems. I mean there's not much you can do if a meteor strike hits (no Bruce Willis to save the city), but certain disasters can be avoided by careful planning.

 

[metacritical]

i'm disappointed to hear that Bruce Willis will not be in the DLC!

 

[charlesnew]

Seems good. I really wonder what kinds of scenarios people will come up with in the Workshop.

 

[xenex]

i'm disappointed to hear that Bruce Willis will not be in the DLC!

I'm sure we can get someone to mod him in.

 

[co_martsu]

i'm disappointed to hear that Bruce Willis will not be in the DLC!

I know, it's a deal breaker for many

Seems good. I really wonder what kinds of scenarios people will come up with in the Workshop.

I hope there will be a lot of them, and I would like to see scenarios with and without disasters. I think it will be a lot of fun!

 

[metacritical]

I know, it's a deal breaker for many

Indeed, surely his singing career counts as a natural disaster or is it too late to add it now? ;p