1. Removed expensive burger 🍔 feedback from Missed Sales figures. 2. Mission 3 now fails when any of the three failing parameters are triggered. 3. Fixed bug that stopped day one tip 💡from triggering in Mission 4 when fast forward ⏩ is clicked. 4. Stopped income coins 🪙 from appearing in City, Dashboard and Bank views 5. Fixed bug that stopped Scotch 🐶 from disappearing on click. 6. Stopped business tips 💡 in Mission 02 from publishing on the wrong day📆. 7. Stopped the player progress meter from overlapping with the perfect recipe vfx 8. Removed multiplayer autosaves 💾 from the saved games screen. 9. Prevented Mission 04 from starting with a graph 📊 visible. 10. Sound effect fixes:
Changed sound effect for mission success ✅
Removed sound effect for mission fail ❌ screen
Reduced unhappy customer 😖 SFX by 1dB Mission progress will show 75% completed.
Removed coin pouring SFX from new/load game sequence.
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Weekly Short Update #32 📰
Hello heroes, 🤗
General fixes and modifications 🛠️
1. Added a fix to prevent events 📰 from being duplicated after becoming invalid in a Mission 📖. 2. Mission tips 💡 are now always reset when players reload 🔁 that mission. 3. Fixed all weather icons ⛈️ to ensure they match actual weather in the locality 🏙️ 4. Implemented a fix to ensure stand shortcut buttons are displayed when a game is reloaded 🔁 5. Fixed bug 🪲 that enables players to purchase a third food truck 🚚 in Mission 2. 6. Stopped several visual effects from disappearing prematurely. 7. Dimmed the highlight for Mission tips 💡 to eliminate all photosensitive effects 🔆 8. Fixed bug 🪲 preventing some sound effects 🔊 from working when reloading sequence is initiated. 9. Players can now purchase food trucks 🚚 from the Stand Comparison screen. 10. The mission progress bar now updates by mission progress rate instead of individual goals 🎯:
Progress is distributed evenly by number of goals to 100%
Mission progress is then updated by an aggregate of its goal completion rate
For example, if a mission has 2 Goals, Goal 1 is 100% completed and Goal 2 is 50% completed; Mission progress will show 75% completed.
Events: Expect the Unexpected
Hello heroes! 👋
This episode about the game’s Events system brings to mind the words of Dale Carnegie:
"People rarely succeed unless they have fun in what they are doing."
From the beginning, we knew that because of the nature of Business Heroes, the game ran the risk of being an overly serious management game.
And we certainly didn’t want that. 😒
So, we introduced the Events system to enhance the player's excitement and entertainment while growing their food truck business.
You can think of the Events system like the news media in real life. Except that the news it delivers is improbable to happen in real life.
As players grow their food truck businesses, they will have to adapt and make quick decisions in response to these very unrealistic events. 😆
Design & Implementation
We divided the events into two categories, Good and Bad. Each day, the system generates a random number 🔢 that determines the chances of an event occurring the following day. 🌄
Depending on the number, the outcome can be a good event, no event, or a bad event.
In general, the system leans towards good events. We did that because the goal of the system is enjoyment, not frustration.
The news section pops up whenever there's a new event, and players can select their preferred news channel from three choices.
Their selection determines the category of event they get.
Each event spans from a minimum of 1 day to a maximum of 10 days. For example, the event below is a 50% sale on all Upgrades that will last for 1 day.
Both event categories have 5 levels each. These levels determine the effect and frequency of the event. A level 2 good event has less positive effects on a business compared to a level 5 event, and is likely to happen more frequently than a level 5 event.
The same is true for bad events.
We also designed the system in such a way that the probability of getting a Level 1 or 2 event is higher than that of levels 3, 4, and 5.
The image below shows that the probability of occurrence of a Level 1 good event is 26/40 as against 2/40 for a Level 4 good event.
The events cause a percentage increase or decrease in a wide range of statistics, all of which are listed below:
For displayed stats, you can always see the event effect and duration in their tooltips.
Events can range from a massive discount on upgrades to the Nation discovering a cure for cancer.
Here are a few examples:
The events system is an exaggerated, gamified version of business reality designed to boost fun and enjoyment. We hope players find that it adds to their overall experience of the game.
That's it for this episode!
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Live Long and Prosper 👋, Team Visionaries
Weekly Short Update #31 📰
Hello heroes, 🤗
New Implementations 🎁
User Interface
1. Implemented a new save/load 💾 system for missions:
Saved games now load based on the player's mission completion level instead of current progression level️.
Environment
1. Implemented tracker and visual components for ranking company 🏢 valuation in multiplayer.
General fixes and modifications 🛠️
1. Fixed bug 🪲 causing game to crash when player attempts to retry Mission 01 under certain conditions. 2. Removed splash image when retrying missions to reduce player waiting time ⏱️. 3. Unlinked mission effects from a player’s progression level and tied it to their mission level.
Weekly Short Update #30 📰
Hello heroes, 🤗
New Implementations 🎁
User Interface
1. Added animation configuration for multiplayer timer ⏲️ in Game Settings 🎛️ 2. Each food stand 🚚 now has its own current customer segment instead of universally targeting the same customers. 3. Implemented gameplay tips 💡 in Mission 04. 4. Updated perfect recipe buttons for 3 states:
Locked 🔒
Unlocked 🔓
Used ✅
Environment
1. Implemented a voting 🔢 system for game play ▶️, pause ⏸️, and speed ⏩ options in multiplayer:
Players can vote for their preferred option (Pause, Play, Fast, Skip)
The option with the highest vote is chosen.
All players can see current votes 🔢 for each option.
General fixes and modifications 🛠️
1. Timer ⏲️ countdown in multiplayer now starts only after checking for events 📰 2. Added colour 🟡 and image 🖼️ transition customizations for timer to match game colour mode 3. Players can now play from Mission 1 when they start a new Career game.
Weekly Short Update #29 📰
Hello heroes, 🤗
New Implementations 🎁
User Interface
1. Implemented timed mode 🕰️ for night-time setup in multiplayer:
Timer ⏲️ starts countdown when night-time starts 🌃
When the countdown is completed, the day starts automatically. 🌞
Implemented functionality to add more time for players with more stands
Environment
1. Implemented automated 🤖 successful run for Mission 4. 2. Implemented 3 failure ❌ options in Mission 04:
Not profitable
Out-of-stock
Bankrupt
General fixes and modifications 🛠️
1. Fixed error in inventory count when moving from Mission 3 to Mission 4. 2. Added manual reconnection 🔁 request when auto reconnection exceeds default tries.
Weekly Short Update #28 📰
Hello heroes, 🤗
New Implementations 🎁
User Interface
1. Player progression now shows reward points when player reaches each reward threshold.
Environment
1. Added perfect recipe lock 🔒 buttons for each customer segment 👨👩👧👦 2. Implemented automated 🤖 successful run for Mission 3.
General fixes and modifications 🛠️
1. Fixed error in Mission 3’s accounting when cash 💰 reward is received. 2. Player progression level-up ⬆️ information now shows on the Menu Screen. 3. Fixed the bug 🪲 disrupting the bankruptcy logic in Mission 4. 4. City matrix highlight and profitable coin 🪙 VFX is visible again in city view 🌆 5. Fixed bug preventing players from modifying their burger 🍔 recipe in Mission 03
How Price-Sensitivity Affects Sales
Hello heroes! 👋
One of the key factors that affect how customers interact with food stands is pricing. It's a crucial aspect of the business model and has a huge impact on purchase decisions.
Decision Design
Some customers are more sensitive to the price of burgers than others. Students, Parents, and Staffs, for instance, have lower disposable incomes compared to the other segments. For them, affordability/price is a big part of the buying decision.
Other factors that influence buying decisions in the game are:
- Time of day - How appealing the Stand looks - The food and service quality of the Stand - Brand popularity of the business
These customers will shy away from your stand if they consider your burger to be too expensive. How do they decide what's expensive and what's not?
Utility Value
This is where utility value kicks in. They compare the cost of your burger to the cost of alternatives, such as a homemade burger, and decide based on which option offers the best value for their money.
If the cost of buying all the ingredients plus the time and effort to make the burger themselves is significantly less than the burger price, they will likely consider it expensive.
But as the difference between the burger's price and the cost of the homemade option reduces, it will seem more affordable to them, and their likelihood of buying the burger will be higher.
Determining Price Sensitivity
To show you how it works, let's take a closer look at how pricing affects the buying behaviour of the Students segment.
The formula we used:
This results in a graph that shows how the probability of Students buying a burger drops as the percentage difference between the burger price and homemade cost increases:
You can see that Students are very price sensitive as their purchase probability begins to drop at a very low percentage price difference between buying the burger or making it at home.
The graph is different for each customer segment. Some customers like Fit-ones and Managers have a high purchase probability even at a price difference above 200%!
This is because their buying decision is based more on stand appeal, food/service quality, brand name recognition, etc., than on price.
The key to maximizing sales is to consider the target market's price sensitivity when setting menu prices.
That's it for this episode!
Don't forget to join our community to get these behind-the-scenes specials delivered directly to your inbox. Plus, we've got other exclusive perks waiting for you.
Live Long and Prosper 👋, Team Visionaries
Weekly Short Update #27 📰
Hello heroes, 🤗
New Implementations 🎁
Environment
1. Implemented visual ‘closed’ 🔒 state for food stands. 2. Added highlight VFX for mission tips 💡 in Mission 3.
General fixes and modifications 🛠️
1. Implemented autosave 💾 points when retrying Mission 2. 2. Fixed visual animator for food truck not animating to open 🔓 state. 3. Corrected errors in the tooltip 💬 texts. 4. Fixed accounting 🧮 bug affecting the first run in Mission 2. 5. Stopped tips 💡 VFX from stacking with alert alarm ⏰ VFX.
Weekly Short Update #26 📰
Hello heroes, 🤗
General fixes and modifications 🛠️
1. Population footsteps 👣 now syncs properly on Client in Multiplayer in Multiplayer. 2. Fixed the bug 🪲 that stopped the music player 🎛️ from going back to shuffle or loop after playing event-triggered tracks. 🎶 3. Improved VFX behaviour for events roller to make it disappear with one click. 🖱️ 4. Fixed bankruptcy logic for Mission 2 to allow player bankruptcy with ownership of two food stands. 5. Events are now managed correctly when the client reconnects 🔁 with the host upon day’s end in multiplayer. 6. Fixed colour coding (red 🟥 for negative, green 🟩 for positive) for marketing points as appropriate.
