Search - gdp
Starting with v0.75.0, a massive realignment of colonial GDP will be taking place, and some of you with massive GDP figures numbering in the quadrillions or more may not like it (or may not care), but on the whole, it will be a lot better.
Before v0.75.0, GDP has been just a lazy calculation, adding up the market value of all resources in a colony, along with all of the money that colonists had in their wallets. This was an easy way to set it up at the beginning, and it sort of worked, and not too many people cares, so I left it as is.
The problem, is that anybody who knows about economics will know that this calculation has nothing to do with GDP, making the number totally meaningless as a measure of economic output. The result was that a colony could have a massive GDP just by getting gifts, making an epic trade, or simply existing for a long time and building up massive resource stockpiles. Again, all of this is fine, but it really gives no valuable information about the health of your colony's economy.
With this update, I decided to just totally scrap the old GDP figures, and implement a real GDP calculation, in the economic sense. Going forward, GDP is now a rolling calculation of the gross industrial output of your colony over the span of one "year." This makes it a far more accurate and meaningful measure of the industrial strength of your colony.
So, in order to be able to make the calculation, I first had to definitively determine what one "year" is in My Colony. After reviewing some of the existing game mechanics, I came out with one year being 120,000 "tick" cycles in the game, or roughly one hour of play time. So going forward, the GDP of your colony will be the sum of all industrial output over the last hour of play time.
The part that will sting at first, is that since it is a rolling calculation, that means the GDP figure will be incomplete in your colony until you have played for an hour. I could probably just check the current output and extrapolate it out to fill in the gaps, and I might at some point, but since the issue is irrelevant after an hour of play, I haven't bothered to do it yet.
Now the other part that might sting, it that this represent a complete and total realignment of the various GDP's across the galaxy, especially among older more established colonies that are hoarding epic amounts of resources. Just now that the intention is not to punish those colonies in any way, but to create a more accurate measure of the industrial output of the colony. And really the fact that you just have millions and millions of resources stockpiled, doesn't really say much about the health of your colony's economy.
Because of the change, most people (probably everyone) will be seeing a massive reduction in their GDP. I mean massive. On the flip side, it is happening to everybody across the board, and you will now now for sure what the economic strength is of your colony.
Honestly, the old way of computing it was dumb. A brand new colony with 2 people could get an epic gift from their commonwealth and suddenly have a GDP rivaling colonies that have build up millions of population over the years.
And speaking of gifts, they are not computed in the new GDP calculation. It is solely based on the industrial output of the colony. Although taxes you collect from your charter colonies DO factor in.
Anyway, this actually gives way to new game mechanics that will be able to take advantage of a new GDP calculation. The GDP now gives you a real measure of the strength of your economy, and you will be able to monitor and respond to the boom/bust cycles of the colony. It's not in there as of this writing, but I will be soon adding the GDP Growth % statistic so you can monitor if your colony is growing or in a recession. A growing economy will boost your approval, while a recession will harm it. If your colony enters a great depression, you will get protesting.
Finally the GDP growth rate stat will also be added to the online database, so there will be a ranking coming soon of which economies are growing the fastest. Sort of like in real life!
Anyway, that is the change that is coming. I hope not too many people are upset about their massive GDP numbers being cut down to size, but I think in order to move things forward, it had to happen eventually.
Before v0.75.0, GDP has been just a lazy calculation, adding up the market value of all resources in a colony, along with all of the money that colonists had in their wallets. This was an easy way to set it up at the beginning, and it sort of worked, and not too many people cares, so I left it as is.
The problem, is that anybody who knows about economics will know that this calculation has nothing to do with GDP, making the number totally meaningless as a measure of economic output. The result was that a colony could have a massive GDP just by getting gifts, making an epic trade, or simply existing for a long time and building up massive resource stockpiles. Again, all of this is fine, but it really gives no valuable information about the health of your colony's economy.
With this update, I decided to just totally scrap the old GDP figures, and implement a real GDP calculation, in the economic sense. Going forward, GDP is now a rolling calculation of the gross industrial output of your colony over the span of one "year." This makes it a far more accurate and meaningful measure of the industrial strength of your colony.
So, in order to be able to make the calculation, I first had to definitively determine what one "year" is in My Colony. After reviewing some of the existing game mechanics, I came out with one year being 120,000 "tick" cycles in the game, or roughly one hour of play time. So going forward, the GDP of your colony will be the sum of all industrial output over the last hour of play time.
The part that will sting at first, is that since it is a rolling calculation, that means the GDP figure will be incomplete in your colony until you have played for an hour. I could probably just check the current output and extrapolate it out to fill in the gaps, and I might at some point, but since the issue is irrelevant after an hour of play, I haven't bothered to do it yet.
Now the other part that might sting, it that this represent a complete and total realignment of the various GDP's across the galaxy, especially among older more established colonies that are hoarding epic amounts of resources. Just now that the intention is not to punish those colonies in any way, but to create a more accurate measure of the industrial output of the colony. And really the fact that you just have millions and millions of resources stockpiled, doesn't really say much about the health of your colony's economy.
Because of the change, most people (probably everyone) will be seeing a massive reduction in their GDP. I mean massive. On the flip side, it is happening to everybody across the board, and you will now now for sure what the economic strength is of your colony.
Honestly, the old way of computing it was dumb. A brand new colony with 2 people could get an epic gift from their commonwealth and suddenly have a GDP rivaling colonies that have build up millions of population over the years.
And speaking of gifts, they are not computed in the new GDP calculation. It is solely based on the industrial output of the colony. Although taxes you collect from your charter colonies DO factor in.
Anyway, this actually gives way to new game mechanics that will be able to take advantage of a new GDP calculation. The GDP now gives you a real measure of the strength of your economy, and you will be able to monitor and respond to the boom/bust cycles of the colony. It's not in there as of this writing, but I will be soon adding the GDP Growth % statistic so you can monitor if your colony is growing or in a recession. A growing economy will boost your approval, while a recession will harm it. If your colony enters a great depression, you will get protesting.
Finally the GDP growth rate stat will also be added to the online database, so there will be a ranking coming soon of which economies are growing the fastest. Sort of like in real life!
Anyway, that is the change that is coming. I hope not too many people are upset about their massive GDP numbers being cut down to size, but I think in order to move things forward, it had to happen eventually.
Just a bit more info on the new GDP changes.
The game behind the scenes now calculates your quarterly GDP growth, and your "colonial news agency" reports this data to you if you have the GBT price news ticker enabled in-game.
As you can see, your colony now has some economic "analysts" that try to predict what the next quarter GDP print will come in at, based on the trends of the last few quarters.
The game stats (both in-game and the website) will show your current quarterly GDP print, as well as the total annual GDP for the most recent full in-game year.
Something I am about to implement, which I have not finished yet, is inflation adjustments. When working on GDP, I started noticing that the rates fluctuate pretty wildly, since they are based on market prices from the galactic board of trade. To smooth this out a bit, the game is going to start recording a rolling history of the average GBT price for a range of resources, and using the price difference to smooth out the GDP growth stats. This is sort of like they do in real life, when they adjust GDP numbers for inflation.
So for example, if your GDP rose by 10% in the quarter, but the GBT prices its based on rose by 12%, then in reality your GDP actually shrunk by 2%. Opposite is true if GBT prices are falling. Anyway, it's not 100% perfect, but real life GDP calculations aren't either. But I think factoring out the price inflation factor will give the best and most useful number possible, and also prevent people from trying to somehow goose up their growth rates by posting a bunch of GBT trades. Although considering everybody's GDP is based on the same prices, that wouldn't help them much relative to other colonies anyway.
The game behind the scenes now calculates your quarterly GDP growth, and your "colonial news agency" reports this data to you if you have the GBT price news ticker enabled in-game.
The game stats (both in-game and the website) will show your current quarterly GDP print, as well as the total annual GDP for the most recent full in-game year.
Something I am about to implement, which I have not finished yet, is inflation adjustments. When working on GDP, I started noticing that the rates fluctuate pretty wildly, since they are based on market prices from the galactic board of trade. To smooth this out a bit, the game is going to start recording a rolling history of the average GBT price for a range of resources, and using the price difference to smooth out the GDP growth stats. This is sort of like they do in real life, when they adjust GDP numbers for inflation.
So for example, if your GDP rose by 10% in the quarter, but the GBT prices its based on rose by 12%, then in reality your GDP actually shrunk by 2%. Opposite is true if GBT prices are falling. Anyway, it's not 100% perfect, but real life GDP calculations aren't either. But I think factoring out the price inflation factor will give the best and most useful number possible, and also prevent people from trying to somehow goose up their growth rates by posting a bunch of GBT trades. Although considering everybody's GDP is based on the same prices, that wouldn't help them much relative to other colonies anyway.
I have just put the finishing touches on the v0.75.0 update to My Colony, and will begin pushing it out to all platforms tomorrow (Thursday) morning, possibly even tonight if I get time. This is a huge update in terms of "under the hood" changes, and so there is a lot to cover here. It also marks the beginning of a series of "online" focused updates which will be taking place between now and the end of the year.
Now that My Colony has arrived on Steam (which you can find here), I have decided to shift focus a bit more away from the mobile side of things, towards the Desktop and online side of things. My Colony has always played better on the Desktop, but since the majority of users were on mobile, a lot of the design of the game had to be made with that reality in mind. As some of you already know, a few months ago, Google Play blacklisted My Colony from their store search results, cratering the mobile downloads of the game by over 90%. As a result, the My Colony user base has transformed from over 90% mobile users, to now almost 50/50 with Desktop users, spread out between my website, the Ape Apps Launcher, Windows 10, Chrome OS, Facebook Games, and now Steam. And even though the crash ratings on Google Play are back down under 2% and the downloads have picked back up slightly, it is still nowhere near where it once was. On top of that, the experience did open my eyes as to how Google Play operates, and demonstrated the risk involved with being tied so heavily to one platform. On Desktop, things are spread fairly evenly between the distribution networks (too early to tell on Steam yet), so there is a little bit of safety that comes with that situation. Plus, as I said, the game is just 10 times better on Desktop anyway.
So, just to be clear, I am not abandoning Android and iOS, and those platforms will continue to receive all of the latest updates. I am just not going to be focused on mobile first, and some features may not work on mobile platforms, as you will soon see below.
But enough of the intro, you are here to see what is new in this version, and there is quite a bit. So let's take a look!
First I want to go through some of the bugs that were addressed in this release, as one of them has a pretty large impact on later-stage Human colonies. So during this update, I discovered a mistake in the code that was majorly"nerfing" building consumption and production when the building had a very low "tick" phase. The two prime examples where the Ancient Alien Condenser and the Atmosphere Scrubber, but it would also impact buildings with tons of employees, like the Investment Bank.
Essentially, if the production/consumption tick phase was lower than that of the overall simulation's building tick phase, a bunch of update cycles for that building would get skipped, causing it to produce or consume resources at a far slower rate than it was supposed to. As far as I can tell, this issue has been baked into the game for ages, and when adding new content, I have just set the stats in a way to compensate for it, not even realizing it was there. As soon as I fixed the glitch though, the impact on Atmosphere was immediately apparent.
Ancient Alien Condensers and the Atmosphere Scrubber immediately went into "beast mode", chewing through millions of atmosphere in a matter of minutes. This brought my Atmosphere down to zero, causing all of the condensers in the colony to shut down, since they were out of "fuel". This led to an immediate water shortage which was difficult to get on top of, since I could not generate new atmosphere fast enough to keep up with the consumption of the condensers. I eventually just had to import a ton of water from the Star Gate.
Anyway, to address this, I slightly nerfed the stats on the Condenser, and introduced a new upgraded Large Atmosphere Generator to assist in rebuilding Atmosphere. I kept the Scrubbers running in beast mode though, I figured at their new consumption level, one Atmosphere Scrubber can take care of a pretty good sized colony.
So be aware of this new change, and modify your colony accordingly. I already know the bug reports section will be full of "I updated and now all of my Water is gone" reports, so just be aware of what is happening. It is not exactly a bug, but the result of the fix of a bug.
The next fix is related to Creative Mode in Region games. Basically, it didn't work before, and now it should.
Speaking of Regions, there was a glitch where Resource decay would be greatly amplified on Region maps. This has been corrected. I have also implemented several changes which I hope address the issue people have on Regions where tech/resources are lost. I cannot reproduce this issue on my own, so I hope the fix works. I know you will make me aware if it doesn't though!
Next, a lot of changes were made to the server this update. I am getting ready to add in-game moderators to My Colony, which I had hoped to have ready by now, but the server needed so many changes to accommodate for it, that I just didn't get to it. Just know that it is coming soon though.
The first big change comes with authenticated API calls. Aside from the public API's, you basically need to be logged in to your Ape Apps account to do anything on the server now. This requirement seems like a no brainer, but you have to realize that the My Colony server predates the Ape Apps Account server, and there were originally no account requirements at all.
Due to this change, the tie between your Ape Apps Account, your online colony, and the website is now pretty solid. If you happen to get banned from Ape Apps for some unrelated reason, your colony is pretty much inaccessible too, and you will need to send me an email convincing me why you should be able to get back in.
All colony resources are now stored on the server as well. They have actually been stored on the server for some time, but the server would never override the resources saved to your game file. Now it will. The server now keeps a timestamp and checksum synchronized to your online game saves, so that it can detect if you have decided to go back and restore a backup game file. This is to help detect different forms of cheating that are out there, and while restoring a backup does not flag you as a cheater, it is logged and will be available for review by the soon-to-be-announced in-game moderators.
Next up, in-game private messaging has been moved from the my-colony.com servers to the main ape-apps.com servers. As a result, you can now view and reply to your in-game private messages from right here on ape-apps.com. They will also soon be available on my-colony.com. Currently, they don't render very well on the website, but I will be making it all look pretty shortly. In-game it doesn't look much different from before, but in theory the message size limit is gone, although the game still doesn't let you write more characters. The website does though. In the coming updates though, the entire in-game messaging interface will be rewritten to take advantage of the new features available by using ape-apps.com messaging.
The next big change in the game, which I have mentioned already in another thread and some may not be pleased with, is the complete rewrite of how colonial GDP is calculated. In short, it is now an actual GDP calculation, instead of just the sum of all of your resources. So now instead of measuring just how rich you are, which anybody can attain by simply getting a big gift from another colony or from the Galactic Emperor, it is now a measure of the current productive output of all of your buildings, tax collections, and resource collections. In this way, your GDP only grows if your industrial output is growing. If you are maxed out with full storage, then your GDP will be stagnant. I might adjust it next update to have GBT profits figured into the calculation as well, since it is technically a sale of goods. I haven't decided yet.
The game tracks your GDP over time, and will give you both quarterly and annual prints. It takes about two hours of game time to collect enough data to get a full GDP reading, so be aware of that. In your stats, the large GDP number is your current quarterly rate, and the smaller number is the annual rate. One game "year" is roughly equivalent to one real life hour. The quarterly and annual growth percentages also factor GBT price inflation into their calculations, so that large fluctuations in GBT prices do not throw the GDP growth values way off. In addition, the game ai now has "economic analysts" who will try to guess what your GDP growth rate should be every quarter, based on the trends of the last year, and will let you know each quarter if you were on target or below estimates. It's sort of like watching CNBC.
I might start adding other fun little news items to the GBT price ticker on the bottom of the screen too.
Next, there is a new feature that I hope people are able to have some fun with. I have added the ability in-game to stream a live feed of your game play onto your colony website at my-colony.com. On supported platforms, there will now be a "Streaming" button in the bottom right corner of the screen. When you click on it, it will start up your live feed and turn Red, letting you know that it is on.
It also uses your microphone (if available and you give it permission) so that people watching your stream can hear your amazing voice-over commentary. Also when you turn on streaming, the in-game chat channel and the chat channel on your my-colony.com colony site are synchronized, so that you can text-chat directly with those viewing your feed. You will also get a notification in-game when somebody starts watching your live feed.
The in-game streaming works if you are playing on Chrome, Android, Native Client/Steam. It does not currently work on iOS or Windows 10 (Store) edition of the game. I am not sure about Facebook Game Center, as I did not test it.
Moving on, I have decided to merge the in-game popup Commonwealth and Diplomacy windows into the main Statistics window, so that everything is in one place. In-game private messaging will also be moving to this window soon, and eventually, a revamped in-game encyclopedia will be in there as well. I just think it's better to have all of the options in one tidy place.
You may have also noticed a new "Federation" option at the bottom. Federations are headed in-game to My Colony. I have been promising them for a year and a half now, and since I decided to focus on online play for the next couple of months, Federations went ahead and made the cut.
Creating or joining a Federation requires "government level 7", which is game-engine speak for "you need to build the Hall of Congress." This is pretty much the most expensive building in the game, and before now it hasn't really done anything for you. Now it unlocks Federations. Because of this requirement, only United Earth and LIS can make or join Federations, but Reptilians and Zolarg will be getting their own equivalent buildings in 0.76.0.
The only thing you can do with Federations right now is either make one, or join one. Making one is expensive, and joining one is free. However, when you choose to join a Federation, current federation members receive a ballot in their Federation screen and must vote to approve your membership.
Balloting works like this. When a new measure is put up, it will expire in three days. At the end of three days, the yays and nays are counted, and the winner is determined. However, if a measure receives yays (or nays) from over 50% of current Federation members before the three days are up, the vote is also ended.
The balloting system only works for admitting members right now, but it is going to be greatly expanded. Unlike Commonwealths, Federations are an "alliance of equals", with each independent member state getting 1 vote. One colony will be the president, voted on by the other members. The President will be able to put new initiatives up to a vote, and only the president can put a new initiative up, unless that initiative is a vote of no-confidence in the President, which could be needed if the current president goes inactive.
Federations are going to be able to do things that regular colonies cannot do and, for those who wish to enable it, there is going to be an optional PVP element coming for Federations making use of Star Ships. I am not talking about attacking peoples bases or anything, but you might be able to send your fleet to blockade a planet, disrupt communications, etc. I am welcome to ideas on it, but this element will be 100% optional, and you can only do the PVP mode with Federation members who have enabled it. I want people to still be able to play a 100% peaceful mode if they wish.
The Federations are in the early stages, but there will be new Federation stuff with each update, so feel free to start one up and start accepting members, so you are ready for when the fun stuff goes live.
So those are the primary new things in this update, I am sure there are others, but I don't remember off the top of my head. Now I just want to give a quick update on what is coming next.
As I mentioned, Federations are going to be fleshed out over the next few updates. In addition, both Federations and non-federation planets will be able to establish Trade Routes using their Star Ships, and the Colonial Map from the my-colony.com website is going to be accessible in-game soon to aid in this. There are also new interactions coming for Embassies, some of which will only be available to PVP Federations. To support this, both Zolarg and Reptilians are getting new giant 'Hall of Congress' type building soon, as well as Star Ship production.
There are also going to be further changes made to the My Colony website to accommodate all of the new stuff. Federations will each have their own page, and unlike Commonwealths, there will be a few customization options for a Federation page. If you haven't looked at the My Colony website recently, check it out, I've been adding things here and there over the last few weeks: https://www.my-colony.com/
Finally, in-game moderators are on the way. I have several applications, and will be contacting people with offers as soon as the server is ready for them. There is still a bit of server work I need to do to accommodate what I want to do with moderation, but I think when it's all implemented, it will make the online experience a lot better for everybody.
So that is all for this update. This one took me longer than normal to put together, and I have to spend the next few days catching up on other projects, but I should start v0.76.0 mid next-week. Until then, enjoy the update, and it should be hitting all platforms within the coming days!
Now that My Colony has arrived on Steam (which you can find here), I have decided to shift focus a bit more away from the mobile side of things, towards the Desktop and online side of things. My Colony has always played better on the Desktop, but since the majority of users were on mobile, a lot of the design of the game had to be made with that reality in mind. As some of you already know, a few months ago, Google Play blacklisted My Colony from their store search results, cratering the mobile downloads of the game by over 90%. As a result, the My Colony user base has transformed from over 90% mobile users, to now almost 50/50 with Desktop users, spread out between my website, the Ape Apps Launcher, Windows 10, Chrome OS, Facebook Games, and now Steam. And even though the crash ratings on Google Play are back down under 2% and the downloads have picked back up slightly, it is still nowhere near where it once was. On top of that, the experience did open my eyes as to how Google Play operates, and demonstrated the risk involved with being tied so heavily to one platform. On Desktop, things are spread fairly evenly between the distribution networks (too early to tell on Steam yet), so there is a little bit of safety that comes with that situation. Plus, as I said, the game is just 10 times better on Desktop anyway.
So, just to be clear, I am not abandoning Android and iOS, and those platforms will continue to receive all of the latest updates. I am just not going to be focused on mobile first, and some features may not work on mobile platforms, as you will soon see below.
But enough of the intro, you are here to see what is new in this version, and there is quite a bit. So let's take a look!
First I want to go through some of the bugs that were addressed in this release, as one of them has a pretty large impact on later-stage Human colonies. So during this update, I discovered a mistake in the code that was majorly"nerfing" building consumption and production when the building had a very low "tick" phase. The two prime examples where the Ancient Alien Condenser and the Atmosphere Scrubber, but it would also impact buildings with tons of employees, like the Investment Bank.
Essentially, if the production/consumption tick phase was lower than that of the overall simulation's building tick phase, a bunch of update cycles for that building would get skipped, causing it to produce or consume resources at a far slower rate than it was supposed to. As far as I can tell, this issue has been baked into the game for ages, and when adding new content, I have just set the stats in a way to compensate for it, not even realizing it was there. As soon as I fixed the glitch though, the impact on Atmosphere was immediately apparent.
Ancient Alien Condensers and the Atmosphere Scrubber immediately went into "beast mode", chewing through millions of atmosphere in a matter of minutes. This brought my Atmosphere down to zero, causing all of the condensers in the colony to shut down, since they were out of "fuel". This led to an immediate water shortage which was difficult to get on top of, since I could not generate new atmosphere fast enough to keep up with the consumption of the condensers. I eventually just had to import a ton of water from the Star Gate.
Anyway, to address this, I slightly nerfed the stats on the Condenser, and introduced a new upgraded Large Atmosphere Generator to assist in rebuilding Atmosphere. I kept the Scrubbers running in beast mode though, I figured at their new consumption level, one Atmosphere Scrubber can take care of a pretty good sized colony.
So be aware of this new change, and modify your colony accordingly. I already know the bug reports section will be full of "I updated and now all of my Water is gone" reports, so just be aware of what is happening. It is not exactly a bug, but the result of the fix of a bug.
The next fix is related to Creative Mode in Region games. Basically, it didn't work before, and now it should.
Speaking of Regions, there was a glitch where Resource decay would be greatly amplified on Region maps. This has been corrected. I have also implemented several changes which I hope address the issue people have on Regions where tech/resources are lost. I cannot reproduce this issue on my own, so I hope the fix works. I know you will make me aware if it doesn't though!
Next, a lot of changes were made to the server this update. I am getting ready to add in-game moderators to My Colony, which I had hoped to have ready by now, but the server needed so many changes to accommodate for it, that I just didn't get to it. Just know that it is coming soon though.
The first big change comes with authenticated API calls. Aside from the public API's, you basically need to be logged in to your Ape Apps account to do anything on the server now. This requirement seems like a no brainer, but you have to realize that the My Colony server predates the Ape Apps Account server, and there were originally no account requirements at all.
Due to this change, the tie between your Ape Apps Account, your online colony, and the website is now pretty solid. If you happen to get banned from Ape Apps for some unrelated reason, your colony is pretty much inaccessible too, and you will need to send me an email convincing me why you should be able to get back in.
All colony resources are now stored on the server as well. They have actually been stored on the server for some time, but the server would never override the resources saved to your game file. Now it will. The server now keeps a timestamp and checksum synchronized to your online game saves, so that it can detect if you have decided to go back and restore a backup game file. This is to help detect different forms of cheating that are out there, and while restoring a backup does not flag you as a cheater, it is logged and will be available for review by the soon-to-be-announced in-game moderators.
Next up, in-game private messaging has been moved from the my-colony.com servers to the main ape-apps.com servers. As a result, you can now view and reply to your in-game private messages from right here on ape-apps.com. They will also soon be available on my-colony.com. Currently, they don't render very well on the website, but I will be making it all look pretty shortly. In-game it doesn't look much different from before, but in theory the message size limit is gone, although the game still doesn't let you write more characters. The website does though. In the coming updates though, the entire in-game messaging interface will be rewritten to take advantage of the new features available by using ape-apps.com messaging.
The next big change in the game, which I have mentioned already in another thread and some may not be pleased with, is the complete rewrite of how colonial GDP is calculated. In short, it is now an actual GDP calculation, instead of just the sum of all of your resources. So now instead of measuring just how rich you are, which anybody can attain by simply getting a big gift from another colony or from the Galactic Emperor, it is now a measure of the current productive output of all of your buildings, tax collections, and resource collections. In this way, your GDP only grows if your industrial output is growing. If you are maxed out with full storage, then your GDP will be stagnant. I might adjust it next update to have GBT profits figured into the calculation as well, since it is technically a sale of goods. I haven't decided yet.
Next, there is a new feature that I hope people are able to have some fun with. I have added the ability in-game to stream a live feed of your game play onto your colony website at my-colony.com. On supported platforms, there will now be a "Streaming" button in the bottom right corner of the screen. When you click on it, it will start up your live feed and turn Red, letting you know that it is on.
The in-game streaming works if you are playing on Chrome, Android, Native Client/Steam. It does not currently work on iOS or Windows 10 (Store) edition of the game. I am not sure about Facebook Game Center, as I did not test it.
Moving on, I have decided to merge the in-game popup Commonwealth and Diplomacy windows into the main Statistics window, so that everything is in one place. In-game private messaging will also be moving to this window soon, and eventually, a revamped in-game encyclopedia will be in there as well. I just think it's better to have all of the options in one tidy place.
Creating or joining a Federation requires "government level 7", which is game-engine speak for "you need to build the Hall of Congress." This is pretty much the most expensive building in the game, and before now it hasn't really done anything for you. Now it unlocks Federations. Because of this requirement, only United Earth and LIS can make or join Federations, but Reptilians and Zolarg will be getting their own equivalent buildings in 0.76.0.
The only thing you can do with Federations right now is either make one, or join one. Making one is expensive, and joining one is free. However, when you choose to join a Federation, current federation members receive a ballot in their Federation screen and must vote to approve your membership.
The balloting system only works for admitting members right now, but it is going to be greatly expanded. Unlike Commonwealths, Federations are an "alliance of equals", with each independent member state getting 1 vote. One colony will be the president, voted on by the other members. The President will be able to put new initiatives up to a vote, and only the president can put a new initiative up, unless that initiative is a vote of no-confidence in the President, which could be needed if the current president goes inactive.
Federations are going to be able to do things that regular colonies cannot do and, for those who wish to enable it, there is going to be an optional PVP element coming for Federations making use of Star Ships. I am not talking about attacking peoples bases or anything, but you might be able to send your fleet to blockade a planet, disrupt communications, etc. I am welcome to ideas on it, but this element will be 100% optional, and you can only do the PVP mode with Federation members who have enabled it. I want people to still be able to play a 100% peaceful mode if they wish.
The Federations are in the early stages, but there will be new Federation stuff with each update, so feel free to start one up and start accepting members, so you are ready for when the fun stuff goes live.
So those are the primary new things in this update, I am sure there are others, but I don't remember off the top of my head. Now I just want to give a quick update on what is coming next.
As I mentioned, Federations are going to be fleshed out over the next few updates. In addition, both Federations and non-federation planets will be able to establish Trade Routes using their Star Ships, and the Colonial Map from the my-colony.com website is going to be accessible in-game soon to aid in this. There are also new interactions coming for Embassies, some of which will only be available to PVP Federations. To support this, both Zolarg and Reptilians are getting new giant 'Hall of Congress' type building soon, as well as Star Ship production.
There are also going to be further changes made to the My Colony website to accommodate all of the new stuff. Federations will each have their own page, and unlike Commonwealths, there will be a few customization options for a Federation page. If you haven't looked at the My Colony website recently, check it out, I've been adding things here and there over the last few weeks: https://www.my-colony.com/
Finally, in-game moderators are on the way. I have several applications, and will be contacting people with offers as soon as the server is ready for them. There is still a bit of server work I need to do to accommodate what I want to do with moderation, but I think when it's all implemented, it will make the online experience a lot better for everybody.
So that is all for this update. This one took me longer than normal to put together, and I have to spend the next few days catching up on other projects, but I should start v0.76.0 mid next-week. Until then, enjoy the update, and it should be hitting all platforms within the coming days!
So after the last GDP update, I am unable to understand how the GDP is now calculated. ANd as a result, my GDP stimulation is hard as I don't have a specific method. The one I use now just increases in by a few million every second and isn't consistent by any stretch of the imagination. Does anyone have a good way to consistently increase GDP and/or by more than that? Also if you know how it is calculated, do tell.
@Conco2 The GDP is calculated by the total dollar value of goods produced by your buildings during a specific timeframe. So if your GDP is stalling out, all else unchanged, probably your storage is full for your resources and so your factories basically have no output.
There is no GDP benefit whatsoever to hoarding a ton of resources, so if GDP is your only concern, you have to actually either use or sell the resources you are producing. If you think about it, an economy that stocks a ton of resources and then just lets them sit there rotting, really isn't growing. You need to have exports or use them to build new things.
There is no GDP benefit whatsoever to hoarding a ton of resources, so if GDP is your only concern, you have to actually either use or sell the resources you are producing. If you think about it, an economy that stocks a ton of resources and then just lets them sit there rotting, really isn't growing. You need to have exports or use them to build new things.
Gdp depends on the output of your production. The more you produce, the higher the GDP. But if your storage is full and the inflow of resources is higher than the outflow, it will stop the production. Causing the GDP to stagnate or drop. Also it depends on the value of the resources on the market. What often happens is, ppl like messing with it and make the prices drop. Which causes the GDP to drop.
@colbya I indeed dont have the highest population but my GDP is the highest in the game. All of united earth together has about 11 pentillion and Betelgeuse Financial Services Ltd. has 9 Pentillion in the bank. Betelgeuse, my main colony has over 30 Pentillion, but the game doesnt refresh the colony website for amounts over 10 pentillion.
So: 4th largest by population but 1st and 2nd by GDP. (There might be somebody with more whose GDP also doesnt refresh anymore, but I haven't heard of that by now)
But still thanks for the Science fact :) Send me your embassy and lets work together!
So: 4th largest by population but 1st and 2nd by GDP. (There might be somebody with more whose GDP also doesnt refresh anymore, but I haven't heard of that by now)
But still thanks for the Science fact :) Send me your embassy and lets work together!
buildings have (rn, bast will remake the GDP so that production per time makes the GDP, not resources you have) no effect on the GDP. It's only how many resources you on your colony have
Now we have:
City 1: 1B
City 2: 2B
City 3: 1B
Region GDP = sum(City1, City2, City 3) = 4B
But the value need to be valuated for each city independently.
I suggest, only for region map (individual city don't need it) a overall GDP layer based on the total production, the system will only see the production, and ignore the resources consummated.
Instead to record a static gdp value, the system will examine the resources produced, or better, only the total value converted in money.
City 1: 1B
City 2: 2B
City 3: 1B
Region GDP = sum(City1, City2, City 3) = 4B
But the value need to be valuated for each city independently.
I suggest, only for region map (individual city don't need it) a overall GDP layer based on the total production, the system will only see the production, and ignore the resources consummated.
Instead to record a static gdp value, the system will examine the resources produced, or better, only the total value converted in money.
Oh I understand :)
Right now it computes the gdp inside the city, like if you produce 100 nanites per min and the price is 1000 per 100 you will get a gdp of 1000. But if the price of nanite goes up to 2000 per 100 it won't update (if you don't enter the city to refresh the calculation) yet the gdp of the city should be 2000.
Am I correct?
Right now it computes the gdp inside the city, like if you produce 100 nanites per min and the price is 1000 per 100 you will get a gdp of 1000. But if the price of nanite goes up to 2000 per 100 it won't update (if you don't enter the city to refresh the calculation) yet the gdp of the city should be 2000.
Am I correct?
Yes, now we have a static gdp, and i propose a dynamic gdp. Maybe can be the max production in a 30min-1h time windows, not every 60s.
I still don't understood why the base resources value change all the time.. even if i open the online market (lis version, League trade authority), the value change.. for this reason we have a gdb leader-board without any sense, player with 1Q gdp instead 50T max, or 200-300T, instead 60-70T...
I still don't understood why the base resources value change all the time.. even if i open the online market (lis version, League trade authority), the value change.. for this reason we have a gdb leader-board without any sense, player with 1Q gdp instead 50T max, or 200-300T, instead 60-70T...
https://mc1.my-colony.com/api.php?pf=2&g=1&c=0hZgBkjn
(replace 0hZgBkjn with desired charter code)
Returns JSON formatted data on specified colony, as well as mother colony and list of child colonies.
(replace 0hZgBkjn with desired charter code)
Returns JSON formatted data on specified colony, as well as mother colony and list of child colonies.
{
"charter":"EfbgdYs6",
"name":"EMERALD CITY",
"civilization":"United Earth",
"race":"Human",
"maptype":"Red Planet",
"founded":"December 16, 2016",
"independence":"December 18, 2016",
"population":24718,
"gdp":1484542777812088300,
"unemployment":0,
"mapstage":4,
"playson":"web",
"lastactive":"2017-04-28 09:42:03",
"theme":"#2867ed",
"screenshot":"https://www.my-colony.com/screenshots/ss-146399.jpg",
"website":"https://www.my-colony.com/colonies/EfbgdYs6/",
"sector":"0,1",
"location":"-90,-442",
"rrr":72,
"mothercolony": {
"name":"United Earth",
"charter":"earth",
"website":"https://www.my-colony.com/colonies/earth/",
"relations":100,
"sector":"0,0",
"location":"0,0"
},
"childcolonies": [
{
"name":"TouristsDieHere",
"charter":"GE7RmoX0",
"population":76189,
"website":"https://www.my-colony.com/colonies/GE7RmoX0/",
"relations":92,
"sector":"0,0",
"location":"0,0"
}
]
}
- charter: charter code
- name: colony name
- civilization: what civ they are playing as, like United Earth or Zolarg Empire (so far)
- race: what species they are. so far there are human and zolarg. eventually there may be more than one civilization per race
- maptype: what map they are playing, like Red Planet, Lunar, etc
- founded: when the colony was founded
- independence: when they gained independence, or "0" if they are not independent
- population: their population
- gdp: their total gdp
- unemployment: unemployment rate, times 100, ie 5% would be 5 and not .05
- mapstage: what their atmosphere level based stage is
- playson: what platform they last used, like web, android, ios, windows, desktop
- lastactive: timestamp of when they last played
- theme: the theme color they chose in their colony website options
- screenshot: if they uploaded a screenshot, the url will be here
- website: the url to their colony website
- sector: the x,y coordinate of what sector their colony is located in
- location: the x,y coordinate of where they are located within the above sector
- rrr: the RRR index of the colony ( http://forum.ape-apps.com/showthread.php?tid=1994 )
- mothercolony.name: name of their mothercolony
- mothercolony.charter: charter for their mothercolony
- mothercolony.population: the population of their mothercolony
- mothercolony.website: mothercolony website
- mothercolony.relations: the relation percentage the colony has with their motherland, times 100, ie 95% = 95, not .95
- mothercolony.sector: the x,y coordinate of the sector their mother colony is in
- mothercolony.location: the x,y coordinate the mother colony is in within their sector
- mothercolony.rrr: the RRR index of the colony ( http://forum.ape-apps.com/showthread.php?tid=1994 )
- childcolonies (array, from largest to smallest):
- childcolonies[x].name: name of child colony
- childcolonies[x].charter: child colony charter code
- childcolonies[x].population: child colony population
- childcolonies[x].website: website for the child colony
- childcolonies[x].relations: percent relation that the child colony has with parent, times 100, ie 95% = 95, not .95
- childcolonies[x].sector: x,y coordinate of the sector child colony is in
- childcolonies[x].location: x,y coordinate of the child colony location within their sector
The exact GDP of my colony is $363,902,839,860,000,500. There are colonies with higher GDP (I've seen 10 to 100 times my GDP) and their colonial website works just fine.
Betelgeuse Financial Services Ltd. is the commonwealth, that manages the financial assets of the colony of Betelgeuse. With a GDP of over $9,000,000,000,000,000,000 the commonwealth has the highest displayable GDP in the game. Every Colony joining gets a 100 million dollar welcome bonus upon request and any ressources they might need.
Cooperation with any other factions, federations and commonwealthes is always welcome! Just send me your Embassies and I send mine back!
If any colony is in financial trouble or needs emergency assistance, feel free to contact me (It is also planned to found a third commonwealth for quick response aid in case of starvation, riots or drought - but for now just contact this commonwealth).
Colony Website: https://www.my-colony.com/colonies/Ru093inr/
Charter Code: Ru093inr
Cooperation with any other factions, federations and commonwealthes is always welcome! Just send me your Embassies and I send mine back!
If any colony is in financial trouble or needs emergency assistance, feel free to contact me (It is also planned to found a third commonwealth for quick response aid in case of starvation, riots or drought - but for now just contact this commonwealth).
Colony Website: https://www.my-colony.com/colonies/Ru093inr/
Charter Code: Ru093inr
I'd love for someone to explain how to best increase your GDP, or at least how it works. I have a fairly large Commonwealth, but my GDP seems to be stagnant and I can't quite figure out why.
I have that much GDP and was wondering who out there had more so I can try and get to the top. If you do please reply with your charter and how much GDP you have and I will try and top it.
https://www.my-colony.com/colonies/kVxf8w1a/
https://www.my-colony.com/colonies/kVxf8w1a/
So today I am pushing out a new My Colony release, v0.74.0. This is mainly a bug fix and stability release, as I didn't add any new Reptilian buildings this time around. v0.74.0 is also the build that will be going out to Steam at the beginning of November, so those who have been waiting for the Steam release should add it to their wishlist using the following link, to help give the game a good boost out the door:
https://store.steampowered.com/app/964130/My_Colony/
That said, there are some new goodies on board with this update that some of you should appreciate. Let's take a look at what has changed with v0.74.0!
First, I did a bit of tweaking with the IQ/Education stuff. For starters, several of the buildings that required ultra-high IQ's have been slightly dialed back a bit. In addition, there is now a change that jobs will actually hire workers who are not quite smart enough to work there, sort of like in real life. These workers are placed in a new "on the job training" mode, where they still help production, just a bit slightly less than a normal worker. However, their IQ slowly increases while at work, as their company takes on the responsibility of their education. To a lesser extent, all regular employees get a slight IQ boost at work now too, as it is assumed that people pick up a bit of knowledge while they work.
Next up, there is a brand new engine setting that I know a lot of people will appreciate. You can now turn off (or on) the popup notifications that are active during online play (xxx is online, starvation in xxx, etc). I already reduced the occurrence of these in the prior update, but now if you want, you can just turn them off altogether.
Another fix that people will be happy about, is that Region games now properly report GDP and unemployment figures to the My Colony server. The GDP figures are the sum of all GDP's in the region, while the unemployment figure is the average unemployment across all region cities (weighted by the population of each city).
Next up, if you've ever wondered how much money a colonist needs before they retire, now you can find out. In the Economic Statistics screen, there is a new Retirement Savings Cutoff statistic. Any colonist whose savings go above this level will likely enter into retirement and stop working until either a) they die, or b) they fall back under the cutoff.
The savings cutoff changes pretty often based on global market prices. For those wondering how that price is derived, it is essentially the current average GBT price of a set amount of Food, Water, Rum, Cloth, and Toys. Everything a colonist needs to enjoy their golden years.
Also in this update, I have increased the rate at which unhappy colonists will utilize entertainment facilities. Before, it was not uncommon to have entertainment go 90%+ unused, but now if your colonists need it, they will be more likely than before to utilize it.
At last, I have made some changes to the save game code, in hopes to reduce the occurrence of corrupted game files. I don't know why some people experience this a lot more than others, but I added some additional stat logging to try to pin down exactly how and why it is happening, and I have also added some changes that might make it better too, but we will see if they worked over the coming days.
So that is it for today's update. There will be an extended delay between the next update as My Colony works its way through the Steam approval process. After that, things will be back to normal again. Until then, enjoy the update, let me know what issues you find, and thank you for playing My Colony!
https://store.steampowered.com/app/964130/My_Colony/
That said, there are some new goodies on board with this update that some of you should appreciate. Let's take a look at what has changed with v0.74.0!
First, I did a bit of tweaking with the IQ/Education stuff. For starters, several of the buildings that required ultra-high IQ's have been slightly dialed back a bit. In addition, there is now a change that jobs will actually hire workers who are not quite smart enough to work there, sort of like in real life. These workers are placed in a new "on the job training" mode, where they still help production, just a bit slightly less than a normal worker. However, their IQ slowly increases while at work, as their company takes on the responsibility of their education. To a lesser extent, all regular employees get a slight IQ boost at work now too, as it is assumed that people pick up a bit of knowledge while they work.
Next up, there is a brand new engine setting that I know a lot of people will appreciate. You can now turn off (or on) the popup notifications that are active during online play (xxx is online, starvation in xxx, etc). I already reduced the occurrence of these in the prior update, but now if you want, you can just turn them off altogether.
Another fix that people will be happy about, is that Region games now properly report GDP and unemployment figures to the My Colony server. The GDP figures are the sum of all GDP's in the region, while the unemployment figure is the average unemployment across all region cities (weighted by the population of each city).
Next up, if you've ever wondered how much money a colonist needs before they retire, now you can find out. In the Economic Statistics screen, there is a new Retirement Savings Cutoff statistic. Any colonist whose savings go above this level will likely enter into retirement and stop working until either a) they die, or b) they fall back under the cutoff.
Also in this update, I have increased the rate at which unhappy colonists will utilize entertainment facilities. Before, it was not uncommon to have entertainment go 90%+ unused, but now if your colonists need it, they will be more likely than before to utilize it.
At last, I have made some changes to the save game code, in hopes to reduce the occurrence of corrupted game files. I don't know why some people experience this a lot more than others, but I added some additional stat logging to try to pin down exactly how and why it is happening, and I have also added some changes that might make it better too, but we will see if they worked over the coming days.
So that is it for today's update. There will be an extended delay between the next update as My Colony works its way through the Steam approval process. After that, things will be back to normal again. Until then, enjoy the update, let me know what issues you find, and thank you for playing My Colony!
@evansricky please see the release notes and also this thread: https://www.ape-apps.com/viewpage.php?p=26421
In short, the GDP calculation was completely inaccurate before, and has now been fixed. All GDP's are being adjusted accordingly, not just yours. Your old number is not coming back, because it was totally inflated and not a real reflection of GDP.
In short, the GDP calculation was completely inaccurate before, and has now been fixed. All GDP's are being adjusted accordingly, not just yours. Your old number is not coming back, because it was totally inflated and not a real reflection of GDP.
So, I started a LIS base on the abandoned world a couple of days ago. All was going good when I switched it to online so that I could trade. A day later my colony was doing really well, all of my resources were back to pre-switch levels and everyone was happy. A couple of hours later I noticed my GDP tanking. 
Of course you can see it is climbing back up rapidly, but there is no really good reason for this.
Help?
Edit:
aaaaand my colonists are protesting themselves to death now. But hey the GDP is doing great now. This is amazing.
Of course you can see it is climbing back up rapidly, but there is no really good reason for this.
Help?
Edit:
aaaaand my colonists are protesting themselves to death now. But hey the GDP is doing great now. This is amazing.
No, because once the city have build the gdp, if you don't enter again in the city the value won't change.
Don't matter if the value isn't correct, because the resources base value line is x10 the standard ( all my nanite map have different value, don't matter how many nanite i have, the overall value is always around 900'000'000'000'000, from 1B to 5B nanite, always the same total value).. Or because the city don't produce anymore resources.
The region system +- every 60s will check the production, and update the GDP with the correct value.
Don't matter if the value isn't correct, because the resources base value line is x10 the standard ( all my nanite map have different value, don't matter how many nanite i have, the overall value is always around 900'000'000'000'000, from 1B to 5B nanite, always the same total value).. Or because the city don't produce anymore resources.
The region system +- every 60s will check the production, and update the GDP with the correct value.
@bastecklein
To add on I did a test through a regional city. If you go to a map, then exit out and make another map, wait a minute, then it will set the gdp to the first map, but then it will decay over time to where the gdp was. Another game-breaking bug that could cause for maps without production to be declared producing
-testing colonies are the ones that are broken, and I will destroy them soon
https://coloniae.space/adu/10p8kF2n
That is my colony ADU, not sure if it will help.
I can give a duplicate of my colony if needed.
To add on I did a test through a regional city. If you go to a map, then exit out and make another map, wait a minute, then it will set the gdp to the first map, but then it will decay over time to where the gdp was. Another game-breaking bug that could cause for maps without production to be declared producing
-testing colonies are the ones that are broken, and I will destroy them soon
https://coloniae.space/adu/10p8kF2n
That is my colony ADU, not sure if it will help.
I can give a duplicate of my colony if needed.
The upcoming v1.22.0 release of My Colony is going to be introducing a significant change to the economics of My Colony, and some players may need to adjust their strategies in order to compensate.
The lowly workers of the My Colony Universe have decided that enough is enough, and they have been treated poorly by their overlords for far too long. They have been forces to scrape by on poverty wages, while their colonial masters have stashed away trillions and trillions of the generic Money currency, and now they want their piece of the pie.
Before now, colonists did not really care what or how much they were paid, they just dutifully did their jobs without complaint. Soon, failing to pay your colonists what they feel is an appropriate wage will result in a significant hit to your approval rating and a decline in production output. If left unchecked for too long, workers may even go on strike!
Here is how the new system works. Before, the poverty level was calculated, but being in poverty did not actually impact the game in any way. Now, workers in poverty will end up resorting to crime in order to make ends meet. This will lower your production output and land values across the board. So at the very least, you will want to make sure to keep wages above the poverty line, to avoid sending your colony into a criminal death spiral.
After poverty though, colonists will now start to become aware of their station in the social hierarchy. In particular, colonists will compare their annual salaries to the GDP per capita of the overall colony. If your colony is raking in record GDP and profits and your colonists are getting paid scraps, they will become angry, impacting your overall approval. However, if the situation persists and wages are significantly below GDP per capita, there will be a chance for workers to go on strike.
Strikes will happen based on occupation. For instance, the "Scientists Union" may choose to go on strike, effectively shutting down all structures that employ scientists. This can quickly destroy an economy, so you want to try to avoid a strike at all costs.
Anyway, the new wage/approval system is but one of many exciting new features coming to My Colony v1.22.0, so stay tuned for more updates!
The lowly workers of the My Colony Universe have decided that enough is enough, and they have been treated poorly by their overlords for far too long. They have been forces to scrape by on poverty wages, while their colonial masters have stashed away trillions and trillions of the generic Money currency, and now they want their piece of the pie.
Before now, colonists did not really care what or how much they were paid, they just dutifully did their jobs without complaint. Soon, failing to pay your colonists what they feel is an appropriate wage will result in a significant hit to your approval rating and a decline in production output. If left unchecked for too long, workers may even go on strike!
Here is how the new system works. Before, the poverty level was calculated, but being in poverty did not actually impact the game in any way. Now, workers in poverty will end up resorting to crime in order to make ends meet. This will lower your production output and land values across the board. So at the very least, you will want to make sure to keep wages above the poverty line, to avoid sending your colony into a criminal death spiral.
After poverty though, colonists will now start to become aware of their station in the social hierarchy. In particular, colonists will compare their annual salaries to the GDP per capita of the overall colony. If your colony is raking in record GDP and profits and your colonists are getting paid scraps, they will become angry, impacting your overall approval. However, if the situation persists and wages are significantly below GDP per capita, there will be a chance for workers to go on strike.
Strikes will happen based on occupation. For instance, the "Scientists Union" may choose to go on strike, effectively shutting down all structures that employ scientists. This can quickly destroy an economy, so you want to try to avoid a strike at all costs.
Anyway, the new wage/approval system is but one of many exciting new features coming to My Colony v1.22.0, so stay tuned for more updates!
Also, 134M GDP per capita... 560K workers... Man I'm dead...
Edit: My GDP per capita has skyrocketed to 844M and my GDP has skyrocketed to 784 TRILLION. I am pretty much done for, especially since the nanite market crashed. A bit of hope though for me is the skyrocket in Weapons of Mass Destruction prices, which is at levels not even starships have reached before. Cash into the market while you can!
Edit: My GDP per capita has skyrocketed to 844M and my GDP has skyrocketed to 784 TRILLION. I am pretty much done for, especially since the nanite market crashed. A bit of hope though for me is the skyrocket in Weapons of Mass Destruction prices, which is at levels not even starships have reached before. Cash into the market while you can!
Today I am putting the finishing touches on My Colony v1.23.0, the Dark Matter Update (Part 1), and it should be hitting all platforms throughout the weekend. This update also adds a new Challenges mode, so let's take a look at what is new!
This update adds the first components of the new Dark Matter tech tree which was designed by @Electrogamer1943 and introduces the new Dark Matter resource and the Dark Matter Infrastructure technology.
Along with the new tech and resource we have four new structures in this update, the Dark Base Alpha, Dark Base Beta, Dark Dimensional Portal and the Dark Matter Reactor Arc. Please note that Dark Matter is not currently live on the Galactic Board of Trade, for technical reasons that will have to come during the next update.
There are several more structures coming in the Dark Matter line, which I simply did not get to in time for the update, so there will be a Dark Matter Update Part 2 update coming in the not-too-distant future. Please give feedback and comments to @Electrogamer1943 and be sure to thank her for providing all of us with some fresh new content for My Colony 1!
The next big addition in this release is the new Challenges feature, available to Online games, which you can find in the Statistics window.
Challenges are a new late-game way for big colonies and federations to compete against each other for glory (and trophies), and there can (and will) be multiple challenges running simultaneously. Challenges also provide a purpose and a use for the millions and millions in resources that people have just sitting there in storage doing nothing. The idea is to give players something else to do after they have already unlocked everything and reached end-game.
The system is fairly simple. A challenge will be posted which will run for X number of days and be worth X number of trophies as a reward. Players can contribute resources to a challenge on behalf of either their Colony or their Federation (if they are in a Federation). When the time is up, trophies will be awarded to both the Colony and the Federation who contributed the most to the challenge. You will be able to see a listing in-game of both colonies and federations ranked by the number of trophies they have earned.
I will be posting new challenges on a regular basis, and they will range from only a few days to several months, so check the Challenges screen often to make sure you don't miss out. Challenges give a good opportunity to use up some of the mass amounts of resources people have, and should also help people's GDP, as resources sitting in storage do not contribute to GDP, and having full storage shuts down your GDP production. There is one challenge up right now, but I will be adding several more after the update goes live to all platforms, so keep watching the challenges screen, and try to win some trophies!
Now for some changes to gameplay. I have raised the Import and Export (non-GBT) fees to 99.9% each, and in the next update I will probably remove the Import and Export resource features entirely from online games. Importing and Exporting makes it too easy to exploit the Galactic Board of Trade, and so it will be going away. Keep in mind this is for online games only. My inbox will be open for all incoming hate mail related to this change...
Speaking of trade, I have revamped the code for the Auto Trade feature, which was basically disabled up until now. Feel free to test the Auto Trade for different resources and let me know how the changes work and if they need tweaked some more.
Finally, there were a lot of bug fixed in this update, regarding both building rendering and performance while building with a lot of drones. If you are still having issues in those areas, please let me know!
So that is all for this update. The next update will be Dark Matter Part 2 as I mentioned before. In the meantime, I will be adding more Challenges and also more Collectable Structures on a weekly basis, so be sure to check both of those screens in-game so you don't miss anything, and stay tuned for more!
https://www.apewebapps.com/my-colony/
#mycolony
This update adds the first components of the new Dark Matter tech tree which was designed by @Electrogamer1943 and introduces the new Dark Matter resource and the Dark Matter Infrastructure technology.
Along with the new tech and resource we have four new structures in this update, the Dark Base Alpha, Dark Base Beta, Dark Dimensional Portal and the Dark Matter Reactor Arc. Please note that Dark Matter is not currently live on the Galactic Board of Trade, for technical reasons that will have to come during the next update.
There are several more structures coming in the Dark Matter line, which I simply did not get to in time for the update, so there will be a Dark Matter Update Part 2 update coming in the not-too-distant future. Please give feedback and comments to @Electrogamer1943 and be sure to thank her for providing all of us with some fresh new content for My Colony 1!
The next big addition in this release is the new Challenges feature, available to Online games, which you can find in the Statistics window.
Challenges are a new late-game way for big colonies and federations to compete against each other for glory (and trophies), and there can (and will) be multiple challenges running simultaneously. Challenges also provide a purpose and a use for the millions and millions in resources that people have just sitting there in storage doing nothing. The idea is to give players something else to do after they have already unlocked everything and reached end-game.
The system is fairly simple. A challenge will be posted which will run for X number of days and be worth X number of trophies as a reward. Players can contribute resources to a challenge on behalf of either their Colony or their Federation (if they are in a Federation). When the time is up, trophies will be awarded to both the Colony and the Federation who contributed the most to the challenge. You will be able to see a listing in-game of both colonies and federations ranked by the number of trophies they have earned.
I will be posting new challenges on a regular basis, and they will range from only a few days to several months, so check the Challenges screen often to make sure you don't miss out. Challenges give a good opportunity to use up some of the mass amounts of resources people have, and should also help people's GDP, as resources sitting in storage do not contribute to GDP, and having full storage shuts down your GDP production. There is one challenge up right now, but I will be adding several more after the update goes live to all platforms, so keep watching the challenges screen, and try to win some trophies!
Now for some changes to gameplay. I have raised the Import and Export (non-GBT) fees to 99.9% each, and in the next update I will probably remove the Import and Export resource features entirely from online games. Importing and Exporting makes it too easy to exploit the Galactic Board of Trade, and so it will be going away. Keep in mind this is for online games only. My inbox will be open for all incoming hate mail related to this change...
Speaking of trade, I have revamped the code for the Auto Trade feature, which was basically disabled up until now. Feel free to test the Auto Trade for different resources and let me know how the changes work and if they need tweaked some more.
Finally, there were a lot of bug fixed in this update, regarding both building rendering and performance while building with a lot of drones. If you are still having issues in those areas, please let me know!
So that is all for this update. The next update will be Dark Matter Part 2 as I mentioned before. In the meantime, I will be adding more Challenges and also more Collectable Structures on a weekly basis, so be sure to check both of those screens in-game so you don't miss anything, and stay tuned for more!
https://www.apewebapps.com/my-colony/
#mycolony
buying really low from the space elevator and selling insanely high on the galatic market , also giving too much money as wage to the colonists ie :350 000 $ and insane pay for each field of work ie 40 000 $ to 90 000$ giving me a gdp that is too high too :147,585,177,145,837,030,000 (gdp)and i had an average colonist savings of +/- 4 000 000 ( it is my first tie playing the game on my computer and didnt even know about the money glitches until i looked in the forums
thanks for the quick answer ! best regards Félix T .
ps; good luck with the patches and stuff !
thanks for the quick answer ! best regards Félix T .
ps; good luck with the patches and stuff !
I have no idea how to improve GDP, I've been played for a few weeks and my GDP is decreasing. I had almost 15,000M by now I just have 8,000M. What should I do?
Colony 1
Colony 2
Colony 1
Colony 2
GDP is always relative. in the beginning, you use most of the resources you produce to construct new buildings. But you will come to a point when you produce more then you're builder bots can use for construction. Then you are just waiting for your bots to finish the construction. Your GDP begins to rise very fast after that
Yeah, at least you don't have to confirm each building you sell anymore. I remember on mobile mode when I had to do that and it took a long time, especially if you have many buildings that you need to demo. One click per building is definitely good enough because it allows you to destroy many buildings in a short time. If you clicked 6 times a second, have destroyed 6 buildings in one second, and 360 buildings in one minute, so I think it's safe to say that the one click per building is a good balance between having a really fast rate at which you can destroy buildings and having too much risk of destroying the wrong buildings accidentally.
If bast were to add a sell all button to the structure menu, you and I both know that at least a few people will end up accidentally clicking this button on an adv. robot factory and will loose their whole array of adv. robot factories. If that happened to me, I would be pissed, and so would all of you who want the button, and you would be kicking yourselves for wanting the button because now your gdp has been nuked. So it's best to not give us the capacity to accidentally screw ourselves by adding a sell all button to the structure menu that could end half our gdp in one click. Imagine spending hours trying to build an array of aluminum generators only to accidentally press the sell all button and destroy all of the generators you worked for so long to build in just one click.
If bast were to add a sell all button to the structure menu, you and I both know that at least a few people will end up accidentally clicking this button on an adv. robot factory and will loose their whole array of adv. robot factories. If that happened to me, I would be pissed, and so would all of you who want the button, and you would be kicking yourselves for wanting the button because now your gdp has been nuked. So it's best to not give us the capacity to accidentally screw ourselves by adding a sell all button to the structure menu that could end half our gdp in one click. Imagine spending hours trying to build an array of aluminum generators only to accidentally press the sell all button and destroy all of the generators you worked for so long to build in just one click.
I understand it's frustrating to lose money, but it's your own fault for using and relying on the market. You shouldn't care about money and gdp. It doesn't mean anything. You can produce everything on your own and there is no ranking for gdp or how much money you have. Unless you're interested in pissing contests, which guessing on your post here you are.
You should care more about the game development, bugs being fixed etc.
You should care more about the game development, bugs being fixed etc.
Well that failed lol
They bought everything i had up for sale and now i ended up with a colony of a fucktillion dollars : https://www.my-colony.com/colonies/uQSVxqNU/
Least i tried... hopefully the overlord comes back from his trip soon and solves this mess
@Ottoich , i'd be glad to hand over that massive pile of cash to you to help you restart your commonwealth in case you can't get unbanned. Last time i checked your GDP was in that area anyway. (and yes i know GDP is calculated with the resources held as well, but the money can be used to buy back the resources from other players maybe)
They bought everything i had up for sale and now i ended up with a colony of a fucktillion dollars : https://www.my-colony.com/colonies/uQSVxqNU/
Least i tried... hopefully the overlord comes back from his trip soon and solves this mess
@Ottoich , i'd be glad to hand over that massive pile of cash to you to help you restart your commonwealth in case you can't get unbanned. Last time i checked your GDP was in that area anyway. (and yes i know GDP is calculated with the resources held as well, but the money can be used to buy back the resources from other players maybe)
Per capita for me is $6,623,328. My GDP fluctuates a ridiculous amount though so I'm, not really sure. I think the crashes are every time I sell resources (since I don't have the money yet but the resources are gone) but I'm not sure if that's the reason.
per capita depends on your GDP an population... so shouldn't it fluctuate too?
Ottoich said:per capita depends on your GDP an population... so shouldn't it fluctuate too?
I'm sure it does but it's not graphed so I can't see the history.
Here are the current update plans for My Colony.
v0.49.0 has begun on web and will be a bug fix update. So far there are strange rendering issues on MS Edge browser that need worked out, plus other existing bugs. Don't ask me what day it will be done, I don't know yet.
After v0.49.0, most of the remainder of the month will be spent finishing Antiquitas, which I hope to have released before US Thanksgiving holiday (11/23).
Once Antiquitas is done, work will begin on My Colony v0.50.0, and I have significant updates planned while I start getting the engine ready to support my next game, Colony Wars.
First up I will be doing quite a bit of work on the interface. I am thinking of replacing the bottom left corner menu that you get when you click on a building (with the build, sell, cancel, etc buttons) with a small row of icons that appears under the buildings when you click on them. Then there will be a new building stats screen with improved data, such as production per minute and some fun graphs and whatnot. Will also give info related to how many of each type of building you have and so forth.
For vehicles, I will be adding the ability to group them together with keyboard shortcuts, and then calling them up with a keypress. For instance, you will be able to highlight a bunch of vehicles, press ctrl+4 to assign them to group #4, then when you press the '4' key, it will call up all of those units.
I am also going to be totally redoing the way GDP is calculated. Having a horde of cash or resources will no longer boost your GDP. It will instead be based on your production output for a specific time period.
There is also going to be a new map editor coming to the game with different terrain features. You will be able to build your own maps and then start a new colony using custom maps (offline mode only), or export your maps and let other people play them.
The engine will be getting support for flying-type units which can move over buildings, walls, and other obstacles. The current construction drones will be made to fly.
Some buildings will become movable, in that they will be able to "pack up" into a vehicle, drive to a different location, and then "unpack".
On top of these changes, I want to have several big Zolarg content updates before Christmas. Once 2018 starts, I am going to begin implementing the 3rd race in the game, Reptilians. Also in 2018, My Colony premium license will increase from $2.99 to $3.99. I think it's still a good deal, especially given the amount of content now in the game, and will go towards maintaining the server. If you are on the fence about upgrading though, there is your heads up.
Another note, sometime in 2018 (first quarter probably) I will be removing all Facebook integration and switching over to the Ape Apps account system (the login you use for this forum). It's not quite ready to go yet, still needs key features like password reset/recovery. Once I make the switch, playing My Colony online will require an Ape Apps account, and your game saves will be tied to your account. I will probably also remove most of the auto-banning and open up applications for server moderators who will have tools to be able to take a more human approach to anti-cheating. Having moderators and tying online play to an account should help cut down cheating quite a bit.
Anyway, that's all I got for right now. As always, tons more to come! I don't know what % done My Colony is now. 20% maybe?
v0.49.0 has begun on web and will be a bug fix update. So far there are strange rendering issues on MS Edge browser that need worked out, plus other existing bugs. Don't ask me what day it will be done, I don't know yet.
After v0.49.0, most of the remainder of the month will be spent finishing Antiquitas, which I hope to have released before US Thanksgiving holiday (11/23).
Once Antiquitas is done, work will begin on My Colony v0.50.0, and I have significant updates planned while I start getting the engine ready to support my next game, Colony Wars.
First up I will be doing quite a bit of work on the interface. I am thinking of replacing the bottom left corner menu that you get when you click on a building (with the build, sell, cancel, etc buttons) with a small row of icons that appears under the buildings when you click on them. Then there will be a new building stats screen with improved data, such as production per minute and some fun graphs and whatnot. Will also give info related to how many of each type of building you have and so forth.
For vehicles, I will be adding the ability to group them together with keyboard shortcuts, and then calling them up with a keypress. For instance, you will be able to highlight a bunch of vehicles, press ctrl+4 to assign them to group #4, then when you press the '4' key, it will call up all of those units.
I am also going to be totally redoing the way GDP is calculated. Having a horde of cash or resources will no longer boost your GDP. It will instead be based on your production output for a specific time period.
There is also going to be a new map editor coming to the game with different terrain features. You will be able to build your own maps and then start a new colony using custom maps (offline mode only), or export your maps and let other people play them.
The engine will be getting support for flying-type units which can move over buildings, walls, and other obstacles. The current construction drones will be made to fly.
Some buildings will become movable, in that they will be able to "pack up" into a vehicle, drive to a different location, and then "unpack".
On top of these changes, I want to have several big Zolarg content updates before Christmas. Once 2018 starts, I am going to begin implementing the 3rd race in the game, Reptilians. Also in 2018, My Colony premium license will increase from $2.99 to $3.99. I think it's still a good deal, especially given the amount of content now in the game, and will go towards maintaining the server. If you are on the fence about upgrading though, there is your heads up.
Another note, sometime in 2018 (first quarter probably) I will be removing all Facebook integration and switching over to the Ape Apps account system (the login you use for this forum). It's not quite ready to go yet, still needs key features like password reset/recovery. Once I make the switch, playing My Colony online will require an Ape Apps account, and your game saves will be tied to your account. I will probably also remove most of the auto-banning and open up applications for server moderators who will have tools to be able to take a more human approach to anti-cheating. Having moderators and tying online play to an account should help cut down cheating quite a bit.
Anyway, that's all I got for right now. As always, tons more to come! I don't know what % done My Colony is now. 20% maybe?
The GDP (gross domestic product) displays the total value of your economy. Every Resource has its value(what it's worth in money). Money itself is also used.
Money+resource1 x value in money+ resource2 x value in money+...+ resource30 X value in money.
Money+resource1 x value in money+ resource2 x value in money+...+ resource30 X value in money.