Workers & Resources: Soviet Republic - planned economy city builder

[Alienman]

Been reading a bit about the game here and on Steam, and I just want to confirm before buying... is the economic part of the game truly hard to manage? Because it feels like all current management games are on the easy side on this, and it kinda defeat the whole purpose of playing.

 

[Space Satan]

It is too hard to manage it seems for most.
You have a reserve for start to quickbuild. But to build with materials you have to make coal, make bricks, make prefabs, make cement, make concrete, make boards, make steel, make asphalt, make grave and maybe something more. For nearlly EVERY building. And to make steel you must mine coal ore, refine coal, mine iron ore, refine iron ore, transport it to steel mill. and each refining buildings is HUGE, and steel mill is even bigger. You must make public transport and for that you have to reserve space, and almost everycity you have to plan ahead, youcan't build like in tropico, where youplace shit and it connects and fits, there are ranges where people can reach by foot and then you have plan for electric substation because power lines can ess with your roads...and converyors etc. etc. etc.
I restarted shitload oftimes because at some point I realised "fuck, my city design is messed up because of this ouse placement and wrong road elevation" and, well, that's pretty close to what today architects and city designers face - shitload of buildings you can't touch because billion reasons or historical significance and you still have a job to fit some trade center in the area. Can't wait till it will reach 1.0. So far it is okay, buggy and simplistic in some areas but okay.
For example for asphalt road you will need: truck for gravel, asphalt paver, asphalt rollers, buses to deliver workers. And several stages of construction

 

[Jenkem]

>Communism simulator
>unmanageable

sounds about right

 

[Space Satan]

It is quite manageable, but not for those who got used for easy-mode like Tropico.

 

[Space Satan]

Also I like this:

 

[thesheeep]

It is quite manageable, but not for those who got used for easy-mode like Tropico.

Part of the difficulty comes from a very unclear UI, though.
Partly not displaying what you need to know at all, partly hiding it in tool-tips within sub-menus within sub-menus...

Difficulty coming from "I don't even know what is missing" isn't exactly the best kind of difficulty.

And the road-building is terrible.

 

[Mortmal]

One thing i took long to learn, one stupid thing, is you have to build roads for pedestrians to connect buildings to each others not just motorways. Its more complexe than simcity and hell lot more complex than tropico but completely manageable.

 

[Space Satan]

Part of the difficulty comes from a very unclear UI, though.
Partly not displaying what you need to know at all, partly hiding in in tool-tips within sub-menus within sub-menus...

Difficulty coming from "I don't even know what is missing" isn't exactly the best kind of difficulty.

And the road-building is terrible.

It took me 10 mins to understand the UI. So far the biggest problem for me is that asphalt and concrete cannot be stored but prepared on the factory. You have clear indication what is missing and why construction stopped.

One thing i took long to learn, one stupid thing, is you have to build roads for pedestrians to connect buildings to each others not just motorways. Its more complexe than simcity and hell lot more complex than tropico but completely manageable.

Not quite, people will move on their own but with pedestrian roads they will move FASTER and thus calculated range is reduced, so they can reash a lot further than without roads

 

[Hellraiser]

Jiggy Boobles nuclear power stations were just added apparently. Soviet rule is peace and nuclearization!

https://www.pcgamer.com/take-your-commies-nuclear-in-the-new-workers-and-resources-update/

 

[a cut of domestic sheep prime]

Also I like this:

Multiple generations in a single one-room flat, just like comrade Lenin intended.

 

[Burning Bridges]

It took me 10 mins to understand the UI. So far the biggest problem for me is that asphalt and concrete cannot be stored but prepared on the factory. You have clear indication what is missing and why construction stopped.

It took people over 70 years to understand the Soviet Union.

 

[Infinitron]

This update of Workers & Resources: Soviet Republic is focused in Nuclear Industry. Now you’ve got the opportunity to manage the full chain of production, from uranium ore to nuclear fuel, and you can command nuclear plants to provide energy to the whole country.

 

[Infinitron]

This update of Workers & Resources: Soviet Republic introduces airplanes, including the airport design and implementation. Moreover, this upgrade also contains the introduction of tourism as a new profitable business. Bring foreign tourists to your country, build amusement parks or other attractions and create new ways of earning additional income.

 

[dehimos]

With soldiers and revolutionary militias it would be a hardcore Tropico.

 

[Nutria]

I hope this isn't turning into Tropico sequel where it becomes just a generic city builder that doesn't really have anything to do with the setting it's supposed to be in. Like I'm pretty sure that Intourist wasn't a huge money-maker for the USSR. Everything I've heard about it is that it was the most extreme situation where the communist idea that the customer is always wrong made it a horrible experience.

 

[Jenkem]

I doubt it since this game is much more focused on centralized economy and central planning, like you have to establish trade for resources you don't have access to, can sell your goods to other countries for cash to either buy what you need or build new stuff... the economy changes throughout the game and market prices fluctuate

 

[Straight elf]

I hope this isn't turning into Tropico sequel where it becomes just a generic city builder that doesn't really have anything to do with the setting it's supposed to be in. Like I'm pretty sure that Intourist wasn't a huge money-maker for the USSR. Everything I've heard about it is that it was the most extreme situation where the communist idea that the customer is always wrong made it a horrible experience.

Tourists don't need to come from the Capitalist world. There was tourism between the Communist countries, although of course traveling was not as free and simple as now. All major cities in the post-communist world boast several ugly brutalist hotels from the communist era.

Besides, there was a variety of communisms. Most notably Yugoslavia, due to internal struggles with USSR, maintained not just trade in the West, but Western tourists were relatively common in the country. Also the Balaton lake in Hungary had a reputation as a meeting spot for East and West Germans, complete with whores and Western style clubs.

 

[Nutria]

Yeah, Croatia seems like it would have been a nice place to visit, but that's quite a bit different from the USSR.

I guess I've just heard too many stories of people going to Russia around the 1990s and they have a simple complaint like "there's no hot water" and the response is something like "fuck you, it's not my problem".

 

[Burning Bridges]

Vladimir Kaminer told a story how Westerners always communicate wrong in Russia

For example when they are looking for a place to sleep they will ask "excuse me honorable lady, do you happen to know someone who has a free room?"
whereas the correct way was: "get over here old hag, do you want to earn 10 dollar?!"

 

[Joggerino]

This may be the best modern city builder i played. Love the factory planning, logistics, population mechanics, economy, basically everything. Build a child care so more of your people can work, build a gas station and supply it with fuel so that your "citizen" can use his brand new car to go shopping instead of using your public transport system. Of all the dogshit early access city builders this one is a really positive surprise. Though i really wish there was a way to synchronize public transport with work hours like it was done in cities in motion 2. It's kind of a mess right now.

 

[Ol' Willy]

Giving credit where it's due, Commies (after filthy Georgian, at least) actually did some planning when building housing districts. Infrastructure was always first - roads, subway where possible, railroad, schools, hospitals and such. Only then the actual houses were built and people moved in. Internal migration was limited as well which helped.

Now? Housing companies just buy land and build huge 20 and more floors high buildings and start selling apartments. Roads? Rail? Subway? Hospitals and schools? Hell, even parking lots? Nope. Who needs this shit now? There's a district in my city: it was empty fields twenty years ago, now it's completely filled with 20 floors high apartment buildings. Parking space is enough for maybe 10-20% of the cars and you definitely need the car there because communication is crap. I shit you not, they actually staged fake subway site to lure people in: fenced an area and filled it with vehicles to say to people that there's gonna be a subway station soon. Lol, not gonna happen. But there's a shopping mail nearby!

 

[Ol' Willy]

whereas the correct way was: "get over here old hag, do you want to earn 10 dollar?!"

If you want her son or grandson to punch you in the teeth, yeah, that is the correct way.

 

[Jenkem]

any idea when this will be out of early access?

 

[Alienman]

This game would have been so fugging good if it wasn't commie based. What I mean is, the aesthetics and such is really nice, the whole commie flavor, but you being a dictator with a deciding factor in everything kind of kills the gameplay for me. There is no real dynamics in the game, there is no taxes for you to collect, the only incentive to actually improve stuff is if you feel nice enough. Seems like such a waste in an otherwise wonderful builder where you can do so much.

 

[Thorgeim]

i think thats why im easily bored by this. its well done and complex which i love but then i lose motivation to continue or look after my worker town. Also while i dont like forced grids, id love to be able to make things straight/parallel but maybe there is a trick for that.