I know not everyone is going to agree with me but gearboxes as they currently appear in the game feel to me like the red headed stepchild that no one likes but everyone is too polite to tell them where to go.
As a component they have considerably fewer variables (sliders) then engines and chassis which makes you feel like you can't really make much difference with them anyway. They also have a lot less in the way of things to research which makes designing them feel like an annoyance you have to go through to keep your numbers up rather than a rewarding experience that will eventually lead to cool new stuff like turbo's and superleggera bodes.
Following are my three suggestions. All of which I think will improve game play overall whilst making gearboxes feel like they belong.
1) Delete them from the game:
Instead of designing a separate gearbox, simply add the "gear box design: specs" window into the vehicle design screen and roll it's costs into the costs of the vehicle design.
2) Make them more important:
Remove the choice of which wheels are driven from a chassis design option to a gearbox design option, keeping the engine placement as chassis design option (possibly both chassis and gearbox?).
So, for chassis design, where you currently select "Drive train" you would now select "Engine placement" with the options of: Front, Front Mid, Rear Mid and Rear. The gearbox would then determine if it was the front, rear or all four wheels that were driven. This would also introduce the option of part time AWD as an option for the gearbox giving the player something else to research towards.
It could also be worth having check boxes in the gearbox design screen for selecting which engine locations the gear box is compatible with. How many engine locations you can select would depend on your gear box design skill giving you another reason in spend money on increasing your gearbox design skill. Obviously, selecting multiple locations would increase the design cost but probably not the production cost.
3) Make them more important and flexible:
So this one would require the most work and it combines both the above ideas and expands on them. I think option 2 is my least favourite but it is an important logical stepping stone towards this idea which is easily my favourite and I would say definitely the most realistic.
So, the idea here is that when you design your gearbox, rather than choosing how many gears it has, if it has an overdrive or LSD or which wheels it drives you choose the range of options available for a car using that gear box. You then decide which of those options you are going to apply to the vehicle when you design it.
So, lets say we want to build a MR sports car and a FR coupe using as few different parts as possible. We have to build different chassis for each because of the different engine placement but if we design our gear box right we can use the same one in both. So we set to work, we know we need the gearbox to be usable with a front engine and a rear mid engine so we select those two options, the front engined car is going to be a little cheaper so we decide to design the gearbox to be able to have a minimum of 4 gears (for the coupe) and a maximum of 5 gears (for the sports) and give it the option for overdrive as well. Both of these cars are going to be rear wheel drive but we think we might make a rally option later on so we select RWD and AWD options.
Now, we can use this gearbox in and front or mid rear engined car and when we do we can choose to have either 4 or 5 gears and have the option of giving the car overdrive as well. We can also choose to drive the rear wheels or all four is we wish.
Note: to my mind the focus (on speed, fuel efficiency etc) should not be a part of the gear box design with the option. Why? This is clearly simulating designing a gearbox and then adapting it to the specific car you're fitting it to. With that in mind it makes sense that the gearing focus would be decided on when the gearbox was adapted to the car it was being installed in rather than way back when it was designed.
So what would stay on the gearbox screen?
All the usual 4 quality sliders as well as the shifting ease and dependability sliders. The performance and fuel sliders should go because they are adjusted to suite the car (and as such should just be superseded by the same sliders in the vehicle design screen). The "Type" would function as it currently does, so you choose if you're making an auto or manual box and that's that. Now, instead of choosing how many gears you have, you choose the minimum and maximum with a broader spread requiring a higher gearbox design skill and costing more money. The "Gear for" and "Gear ratio" options go the way of the dodo as well (for the same reason stated above). The Overdrive, LSD etc check boxes stay. Lastly, there would need to be extra check boxes for FWD, RWD, AWD and maybe a few other more exotic later game drive types, the more you select the higher the skill you need and the more it costs.
What needs to be added to the vehicle design screen?
Basically a window with a series of drops downs and check boxes. You would have a drop down to choose how many gears you want, which wheels you want to drive and what "geared for" focus you want. You'd then have a check box for each of the Overdrive/LST type options you gave this gearbox to decide which ones you wanted to use on this car.
One more note, when designing the gearbox you would have a "Design Project Cost" that is a single figure as it currently is but the "Estimated Unit Cost" should show a maximum and a minimum option.
That was pretty long and wordy. I hope it made sense.
After thought, with option 3 it would probably be worth adding in a "torque limit" slider to the gearbox design screen. Turning it up lets the gearbox be coupled with bigger engines but increases it weight. This would help prevent people from eventually designing one super gearbox and using it in everything.
As a component they have considerably fewer variables (sliders) then engines and chassis which makes you feel like you can't really make much difference with them anyway. They also have a lot less in the way of things to research which makes designing them feel like an annoyance you have to go through to keep your numbers up rather than a rewarding experience that will eventually lead to cool new stuff like turbo's and superleggera bodes.
Following are my three suggestions. All of which I think will improve game play overall whilst making gearboxes feel like they belong.
1) Delete them from the game:
Instead of designing a separate gearbox, simply add the "gear box design: specs" window into the vehicle design screen and roll it's costs into the costs of the vehicle design.
2) Make them more important:
Remove the choice of which wheels are driven from a chassis design option to a gearbox design option, keeping the engine placement as chassis design option (possibly both chassis and gearbox?).
So, for chassis design, where you currently select "Drive train" you would now select "Engine placement" with the options of: Front, Front Mid, Rear Mid and Rear. The gearbox would then determine if it was the front, rear or all four wheels that were driven. This would also introduce the option of part time AWD as an option for the gearbox giving the player something else to research towards.
It could also be worth having check boxes in the gearbox design screen for selecting which engine locations the gear box is compatible with. How many engine locations you can select would depend on your gear box design skill giving you another reason in spend money on increasing your gearbox design skill. Obviously, selecting multiple locations would increase the design cost but probably not the production cost.
3) Make them more important and flexible:
So this one would require the most work and it combines both the above ideas and expands on them. I think option 2 is my least favourite but it is an important logical stepping stone towards this idea which is easily my favourite and I would say definitely the most realistic.
So, the idea here is that when you design your gearbox, rather than choosing how many gears it has, if it has an overdrive or LSD or which wheels it drives you choose the range of options available for a car using that gear box. You then decide which of those options you are going to apply to the vehicle when you design it.
So, lets say we want to build a MR sports car and a FR coupe using as few different parts as possible. We have to build different chassis for each because of the different engine placement but if we design our gear box right we can use the same one in both. So we set to work, we know we need the gearbox to be usable with a front engine and a rear mid engine so we select those two options, the front engined car is going to be a little cheaper so we decide to design the gearbox to be able to have a minimum of 4 gears (for the coupe) and a maximum of 5 gears (for the sports) and give it the option for overdrive as well. Both of these cars are going to be rear wheel drive but we think we might make a rally option later on so we select RWD and AWD options.
Now, we can use this gearbox in and front or mid rear engined car and when we do we can choose to have either 4 or 5 gears and have the option of giving the car overdrive as well. We can also choose to drive the rear wheels or all four is we wish.
Note: to my mind the focus (on speed, fuel efficiency etc) should not be a part of the gear box design with the option. Why? This is clearly simulating designing a gearbox and then adapting it to the specific car you're fitting it to. With that in mind it makes sense that the gearing focus would be decided on when the gearbox was adapted to the car it was being installed in rather than way back when it was designed.
So what would stay on the gearbox screen?
All the usual 4 quality sliders as well as the shifting ease and dependability sliders. The performance and fuel sliders should go because they are adjusted to suite the car (and as such should just be superseded by the same sliders in the vehicle design screen). The "Type" would function as it currently does, so you choose if you're making an auto or manual box and that's that. Now, instead of choosing how many gears you have, you choose the minimum and maximum with a broader spread requiring a higher gearbox design skill and costing more money. The "Gear for" and "Gear ratio" options go the way of the dodo as well (for the same reason stated above). The Overdrive, LSD etc check boxes stay. Lastly, there would need to be extra check boxes for FWD, RWD, AWD and maybe a few other more exotic later game drive types, the more you select the higher the skill you need and the more it costs.
What needs to be added to the vehicle design screen?
Basically a window with a series of drops downs and check boxes. You would have a drop down to choose how many gears you want, which wheels you want to drive and what "geared for" focus you want. You'd then have a check box for each of the Overdrive/LST type options you gave this gearbox to decide which ones you wanted to use on this car.
One more note, when designing the gearbox you would have a "Design Project Cost" that is a single figure as it currently is but the "Estimated Unit Cost" should show a maximum and a minimum option.
That was pretty long and wordy. I hope it made sense.
After thought, with option 3 it would probably be worth adding in a "torque limit" slider to the gearbox design screen. Turning it up lets the gearbox be coupled with bigger engines but increases it weight. This would help prevent people from eventually designing one super gearbox and using it in everything.