Welcome to EA 0.3
Welcome to the Blueprint update! Thank you for your patience - we know this update was delayed a bit as the team expanded, but we didn't want to rush it before it was ready.
But now it's ready! EA 0.3 is huge and full of updates, so let's get right into it!
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Blueprints & Interior Installation Firms
Have you ever made a store and thought, "Wow, this layout is perfect. I wish I could save it and share it with the community!"
Well, you're in luck - now you can with Blueprints!! You can easily save your business layout and share your designs with the community - all without leaving the game, thanks to the newly integrated Steam Workshop page! From there you can also download layouts from other community members so you can use them in your world!
Now that you've become a millionaire, you might not want to keep racing to the store before it closes and grabbing 4 boxes at a time to fill up your van! It's time to hire someone else to do that for you. Visit one of the new Interior Installation Firms to get one of those blueprints installed into your store. Or you can use the default layouts provided by the Installation Firms. You're a big CEO now - you can afford it!
There are three new Installation Firms around the city that specialize in different types of buildings (retail, office, residential), so be sure to check them all out. And don't worry - no player buildings were lost to make room for these new buildings - you may notice that Mr. Scott's Office Supply and City Workforce have relocated, though!
Nightclubs
Do you hear that? I hear some dance music playing at that new Nightclub…it sounds profitable! Let's check it out!
Nightclub Income:
- Entrance Fees
- Coat Check Fees
- Beer
- Margaritas
- Martinis
- Whisky
We have a bunch of new decorations in case you want to show off your new Nightclub to the community!
Nightclub Furniture:
- Dance floors
- Disco Ball
- Neon Lights
- Modular cocktail bar
- Barstools
- DJ Booth
New Employee: The DJ
And of course, you can't leave that DJ booth empty! You can also hire a brand-new employee, the DJ, to keep the customers in the club for hours!And who says the customers get to have all the fun? Head out to the dance floor and try out the new player dances as well! Just don't try to take over the DJ booth - there's a reason we hired a DJ!
But no one is stopping you from putting a DJ booth in your apartment and playing some tunes for a happiness boost!
Hairdresser
Obviously, if your customers are going to be dancing under the spotlight, we'd better give them the chance to get all pretty with a fresh look from the new Hairdresser business.
First up, you need the proper equipment:
Hairdresser Furniture:
- Hairdresser Chair
- Hairdresser Chair Modern
- Hairdresser Head Wash
- Hairdresser Mirror
- Hairdresser Shelf
Let's put that equipment to use and offer your customers several services:
Hairdresser Income:
- Hair Shampooing & Blowout
- Hair Cutting
- Hair Styling
- Hair Chemical / Color
- Hair Care Products
Don't forget to keep the store stocked up with Hair Care Products - the Stylists need them to do their job, plus with any luck, you can sell some more to your customers on their way out!
New Employee: The Hair Stylist
This kind of hair wizardry needs the specialized talents of the Hair Stylist.
And while you might not have the skills to cut customer's hair yourself, you can certainly hop in the line and update your hairstyle whenever you'd like!
Security / Theft
All this profit you're earning is getting everyone's attention including some people's attention you might not have wanted - the criminals. Unfortunately, that means if you don't add some security features, you'll start seeing daily losses to inventory.
Protect your inventory - you don't become a billionaire by letting people steal your stuff!
The amount of security you need is based on your store size, and type of goods you're selling. A small fast-food restaurant can get away with just buying a couple security door panels, but a large jewelry store will need a lot more!
Security Furniture:
- Security Panel
- Security Camera
- Dome Security Camera
- Security Guard Locker
New Employee: The Security Guard
For most valuable stores, you'd better get a little of everything and hire a couple security guards to keep an eye on things.The Security Guard locker is an employee station, similar to the Cleaning Station - to assign a security guard, you'll first need to have a Security Guard Locker placed!
Market Revamp
Okay, so those two new businesses will be fun and add a lot of new elements to the game, but what about the rest of the store's economies? I'm glad you asked - there are a few changes!
Ice Cream
First up, you can now sell frozen happiness with a new product: Ice Cream! Ice Cream does well in Fast Food Restaurants, Supermarkets and Coffee Shops!
Primary and Secondary Items
Speaking of adding more items to a store, technically you can still put basically anything in any store, but it might not be as profitable anymore.The primary and secondary items will sell nicely, but anything else will sell much worse than before! Be sure to check out the F1 help guide for a list of which items are sold at each store type!
Products Shortages & Backorders
Next, we've got potential supply chain disruption! Inventory Shortages and Backorders now happen from time to time. If a product is going through a shortage, you'll have to pay even more for your normal supply, and if the item goes into backorder, you just won't be able to get any more for a while. Of course, you can try to offset this by keeping a little extra inventory on hand for emergencies!
Clothing Store Nerf
You may have noticed that the clothing market still brings in the most money by far, and could use a little balancing. Here is a little balancing.Food Inventory Box Quantity Balancing
With the previous update, we balanced Fast Food and Coffee Shops to be more profitable. The problem is now the stores are going through boxes of inventory too quickly! So we have adjusted a few box quantities to help balance this!
| Item | Old # | New # | [/tr]
|---|---|---|
| Burgers | 100 | 300 | [/tr]
| Cupcake | 100 | 300 | [/tr]
| Croissant | 100 | 300 | [/tr]
| Donuts | 100 | 300 | [/tr]
| French Fries | 200 | 400 | [/tr]
| Hotdog | 100 | 300 | [/tr]
| Pizza | 60 | 120 | [/tr]
| Soda | 60 | 120 | [/tr]
Recruitment / Headhunter
Next up, we've also got some changes to recruitment to address player feedback!
Full Time & Part Time
For the two current recruiters (Andersons Recruitment & City Workforce), we got rid of the recruitment by age and replaced that with the option for full-time or part-time!
New Candidates Tab
And instead of the candidates all being crammed into a phone text and sometimes lost, the candidates appear in a new tab in the MyEmployees app instead.This allows much better sorting and searching for the correct candidate. But keep in mind, these candidates now only last 7 days before they expire, so don't take too long to make your decision!
New Employee: The Headhunter
Then we figured we should add another new employee, the Headhunter who allows you to do advanced recruitment for even more control over who you hire!
Automatic Employee Replacement:
Additionally, this employee can keep an eye on a couple of HR Managers and automatically replace their employees that retire or resign, leaving you free to continue to expand your empire!
Headhunter Furniture:
- Phone
- Office Phone
Save Game Compatibility
We understand that you want to play how you want to play, and some people would rather stay in the current version. Because of this, we are leaving up the latest stable version prior to the update. This means, you can choose to stay on the latest version of EA 0.2 instead of the current EA 0.3 release.
In order to access this previous version, find Big Ambitions on your Steam Library, and go to Properties > Betas. From the drop down menu, you should be able to select the previous version that you wish to play.
But, in order to ensure your previous version's saved games don't get overwritten, the first time you launch EA 0.3, it will prompt you to let the game convert your saves to EA 0.3. This makes a copy of the saved game in a EA 0.3 folder, which allows you to revert to the original saved game, if you decide to revert back from EA 0.3 to EA 0.2!
Additional Updates and Fixes!
Graphic Updates
- Character hair has been redone.
- Picture frames have pictures in them!
- More custom coloring of items
- New Clothes
- New Furniture
- New Delivery Truck (AI Only)
- Show lights in windows at night if the business is open
- Many new and updated animations
- Fixed hand-placement animations to line up better
AI
- AI randomly hangs out around the city
- AI gathered at the nightclub
- Customers leave if you temporarily close the business
- New Layouts for all AI businesses in all building sizes[list]
- Added new Secondary Items
- Added Security
- Added Cleaning Station
- Added Storage Shelves
UI Updates
- Shift + Click to multi-select in MyEmployees
- Employee Training time remaining
- "Next Business" dropdown section for BizMan/Econoview
- Warehouse driver UI clarification
- Updated Uncle Fred objectives / tutorial finger pointing for clarity
- Much better auto-fill scheduling and distribution through the week,
- Interior Design Undo/Redo
Traffic and Electric Scooters
- Vehicle handling has been completely redone
- Traffic should actually let you park now
- Traffic shouldn't crash into each other as much
- Autopark should work a lot better for street parking now
- You can rent an electric scooter to get around town faster
Employee Demands QoL Updates
- If an employee is being trained by HR and gets a new demand that is already being fulfilled, you won't get a text about it
- If you are in story mode and haven't unlocked HR yet, employees won't demand Health Insurance
AJ Pederson & Son Expansion
- Building interior has expanded to fit a bunch of new items
- Nightclub furniture / DJ Booth
- Hairdresser chairs and other furniture
- All Security devices
Misc
- New Wall-Grid placement system
- New snapping system for thin objects like the bookshelf, so they can be against the wall
- New Radio Stations including one for your own MP3s
- New hospital floor lines to help you find the exit!
- New dynamic signs
- Self-Serve at order-based business even if there are no employees working
- Game pauses while you place an order at the register, so you don't lose your place in line
- Taxi travel time, adjusted based on game speed settings
- Gambling winnings are now taxed
- Added floor markers in Hospital to guide players to the exit.
- Greatly expanded "F1 Help" Guide
Fixed Bugs!
- Fixed - Employees were invisible in Sommerhus Chair
- Fixed - Couldn't store donuts in fridge
- Fixed - Building preview shows placement grid
- Fixed - Items were sitting sideways on Counter with Glass
- Fixed - Mesh missing 52 5th Ave
- Fixed - Desktop Computer couldn't be placed on Standard Desk
- Fixed - Various Issues when buying an AI store
- Fixed - "Seven" 7th St Map Text UI issue
- Fixed - Couldn't change business name if only change was capitization
- Fixed - You could click "sleep" or "work" while in VoogleMaps
- Fixed - HQ could get stuck in "temporarily closed"
- Fixed - Employee was happy with some night hours while demanding "no night shifts"
- Fixed - so you can scroll in the Employee Scheduler
- Fixed - the Logistics UI that was scrolling backward
- Fixed - finishing some warehouse achievement would give apartments achievements
- Fixed - issue where If you gamble in the last couple seconds of the night, it would keep your money
- Fixed - a bug where you could order items at your own store even if they were sold out
- Fixed - a bug that would supposed freeze while you get health insurance
- Fixed - a bug where you could sometimes access the subway transport from anywhere on the map
- Fixed - a bug where the truck garage would play the opening SFX while staying closed
- Fixed - issue where cleaners hours were counting on their day off.
- Fixed - "Keep Calm and Squat On" GPS map icon
- Fixed - UI for Importers to properly show how long until opening hours when closed.
- Fixed - UI on registers to properly show the percentage of the shift completed
- Fixed - navigation on a couple items at Ika Bohag
- Fixed - repeating delivery text UI so all languages could read it
- Fixed - some texture issues around the city
- Repairing your Car costs have been cut by half.
- Fixed - Employee Demand OLs match the formatting from the MyEmployees page
- Fixed - missing graphic elements
- Fixed - exhausted animation not playing after driving
- Fixed - a glitch that would allow you to drive two vehicles at once
- Fixed - a glitch that allowed you to drive into an apartment
- Fixed - an issue that allowed Freight Trucks to back over the border boundariesa
- Fixed - an issue where trucks quickly leave a warehouse and smash things across the street.
- Fixed - an issue that causes Freight Trucks to turn white after a white
- Fixed - an issue where the player couldn't run down the Parking Garage at 10 Broadway
- Fixed - an issue where the NY Distro forklift would lose purchase products.
- Fixed - the bridge in Hell's Kitchen so you can't drive through to
- Fixed - a bug where game with glitch if you work past your shift
- Fixed - a bug where it you double tapped "F", it would fire frzeeze you in place
- Fixed - a bug where you would get stuck in the queue if the shift ended while you stood there
Now get out there and enjoy the update- we're excited to see your first blueprints!
And keep your eye out for updates and teases as EA 0.4 gets underway!
~ Hovgaard Games
