The feeling about research

[Cerberus23]

Hey Eric,

one thing that has come to my mind every now and then when i'm about to design a new car and went over to my research guys to ask them:

"Hey guys... is there technology in the future that might be worth waiting for?"

And then i wonder... how could they possibly know?

So despite the nicety of knowing what's about to be developed in the next 20 years the overall feeling about it (since the rest of the game is so realistic with the newspaper and wars and all this) is odd.

And if something new is invented it's like you're not even part of the car industry and can't invent anything yourself - you just got to be lucky enough to have well educated researches so that they can understand what others invented so you can use it too.

Now imagine:

You go into your research lab to check on how things are working out and you can see your different design skills and three pictures with questionsmarks in each design category on things they're working on.

You don't know what it is... or when it will be researched.

So you decide to leave again and do some other car tycoon stuff.

12 months later you got a strange note in your inbox saying:

"Hey boss, we wanted to tell you that we're really close to researching something new that might help us to improve our cars. We'll get back to you once it's finished"

Another 6 months later another note saying:

"Hey boss, we made good use of our latest researchs and invented the FF Chassis which can now be used for upcoming chassis designs."

Or a completely different situation:

Suddenly a note in your inbox:

"Hey boss, [Carbrand XY] invented something called the Flat engine. We believe if we invest at least 150.000 $ in researching this we will be able to make use of their technology too."

You move to your Research Teams to find a button "Research Flat engine for 150.000$" [YES] [NO]

If you decided to allocate the money for their research you can use it immediately. If not you might able to use it 1-2 years later (unlocked via normal skillpoints) - cause the longer the technology is around the more likely your researchers are able to get informations about this technology.

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I think something like that would breathe more life into research and make it a bit more realistic.

I find myself way too often funding research teams cause i know there will be this 44.0 skill point requiring research in 1933 which i totally need so i should better start investing all the money every 3 months in 1914.

And is this 3 month funding intended? You set the fundings the month before a quarter ends and get full bonus on skill points. Maybe lower funding costs but implement the requirement to fund every month of a quarter to get the full bonus?

Thanks for reading all this (with my bad english and stuff)

[Eric.B]

The problem with this is there a chunk of the user population that ~must~ know everything. They're the ones that caused us to have a tech tree in the first place. In the past you just got two memos, one letting you know when a technology year is met and the other letting you know when you had the skills to use it.

So in all likelihood the current system won't change in that respect.

I find myself way too often funding research teams cause i know there will be this 44.0 skill point requiring research in 1933 which i totally need so i should better start investing all the money every 3 months in 1914.

And is this 3 month funding intended? You set the fundings the month before a quarter ends and get full bonus on skill points. Maybe lower funding costs but implement the requirement to fund every month of a quarter to get the full bonus?

You should only be charged every 3 months, or is it charging you monthly?

[Cerberus23]

The problem with this is there a chunk of the user population that ~must~ know everything. They're the ones that caused us to have a tech tree in the first place. In the past you just got two memos, one letting you know when a technology year is met and the other letting you know when you had the skills to use it.

So in all likelihood the current system won't change in that respect.

Wish i would have been around that time already to strengthen the voice of reason.

I find myself way too often funding research teams cause i know there will be this 44.0 skill point requiring research in 1933 which i totally need so i should better start investing all the money every 3 months in 1914.

And is this 3 month funding intended? You set the fundings the month before a quarter ends and get full bonus on skill points. Maybe lower funding costs but implement the requirement to fund every month of a quarter to get the full bonus?

You should only be charged every 3 months, or is it charging you monthly?

It's charging me monthly (just tested).

[Cerberus23]

And licensing stuff? I mean no one would ever thought of using everything invented for free, right?

Here boss, new engine available... if you pay [amount of cash here] $ for a license we can make use of it.

So you actually have to think about what licenses you're getting from the start to create your first car.

[Eric.B]

Licensed components already count for design skills increase. I view that as your "learning how others do it" rather than just giving you the skill points to make new technology.

As for straight up buying technology. It might be possible, but there isn't really that much tech in the game to do it. In my opinion.

When the second phase of Licensing gets implemented, you'll be buying pre-built engines/chassis/gearboxes more so than a license to build them. I may implement a limitation on licensing due to your design skill when this occurs.

[BlueOrange]

Hey Eric,

one thing that has come to my mind every now and then when i'm about to design a new car and went over to my research guys to ask them:

"Hey guys... is there technology in the future that might be worth waiting for?"

And then i wonder... how could they possibly know?

Quite possibly because it takes several years of work to take a technology from "I've got a great idea" to "I could actually use this technology and not have it explode in my face." And, in most cases, commercial manufacturers aren't doing research (inventing new technologies) so much as development (taking new technology and putting it to work). So, as a person who's made a living inventing things, I find the research screen pretty credible.

What's annoying (but extremely credible) is that the research team seem to assume that I've read their memos. It'd be wonderful if they learned to make the research area a little more welcoming, and to say "Here are some technologies / vehicle designs that we acquired recently, but haven't used yet." Of course, if they did that, then they'd probably be rather annoyingly reminding me about various technologies and layouts that I'm not interested in, but I'm sure I'd eventually work out how to tell them to shut up. And scientists do like to nag.

[Eric.B]

Of course, if they did that, then they'd probably be rather annoyingly reminding me about various technologies and layouts that I'm not interested in, but I'm sure I'd eventually work out how to tell them to shut up. And scientists do like to nag.

I could only imagine the amount of popups for all the vehicle bodies in the game. Yeah, that wouldn't go over too well.