Texas Discussion Thread

[Marcello Julio]

Like I said in the Montana thread yesterday, where this subject was briefly said, I hope this Wallbert problem will be resolved in some future update. We need some new company to compete with Wallbert, an Target for exemple. Texas NEEDS to bring this in and get it applied in all states, like happened with NAMIQ near Colorado release, Where they replaced Coastline Mining for the NAMIQ.

[flight50]

@flight50 MAN I hope your right about that. I haven't see the whole stream. Just small bits. But I hope thats true. Would be nice to see more competition like Target (Can be called bullseye) or lows (can be called highs). etc

I wanna try to stay as positive as long as I can but I'm starting to lose it. Helena really upsets me. Its like the devs don't care. 2 Walmarts....I'm use to but 3 is a slap to ATS fans. One could have easily been USBB or Kolico at least. I'd rather Kolico so that it could have made its debut as another new company.

I'll give SCS to the end of 2023 before I have to turn it up a notch. That should be plenty of time to see continous growth for new companies. New industries is hit or miss but even with what's coming with Texas, new industries can open up new doors. Example: Cotton Gin. We know Texas is coming with cotton. Can you all think of cargo related to cotton. I can. From things we wear, things we use to things we eat. There's a lot that can be done with cotton. Here's some examples for cargo.:

[ external image ]

Of those six categories, only Plastic is not really in the game yet. But Texas could even do this.....chemical plants/refineries on the Gulf coast has resin companies. We could get plastics going to many industries. Lots can be done with plastic including recycling in which we just got. But back to Cotton. Clothing manufactures, clothing stores, retail stores that feature cotton products. Kohls, Walmart, Target, Costco, Sam's.

Diapers - Proctor Gamble and Kimberly Clark are 2 huge personal product and hygiene manufacturers and guess what.......There is a Kimberly Clark in Paris, Texas along with a few other worthy companies that could come to Paris. Proctor Gamble and Kimberly Clark feeds - Walmart, Target, Costco, Sam's with cargo.

Bath Products - Bedding, personal use products. Same companies again....Walmart, Target, Costco, Sam's. Kohl's, Bath and Beyond

Livestock - provided food and byproduct in fertilizer

Paper and cardboard. We have this industry but we could use another competitor for sure. There are several paper products out there available from retailers.



We just got Annie full time in ATS and she got help with Petr getting hired. She can't do it all by herself. Its just too much to handle all of ATS when thinking of new dlc's and previous developed areas. I think they both can bring a huge splash to ATS. Much need diversity. It can't happen overnight though so that's why I'm giving it time. Texas is a beast and is a handful so after it, we'll see what Annie and Petr can do. ATS needs to start its new chapter in life and I think our two skilled concept artist can do it. But they need time. We've seen the amount of concept art Annie does and how she goes about doing it. Its not an easy job. I really like her. She's so animated and her personality bring energy itself. I hope Pavel turns her and Petr loose and bring ATS to life with lots of diversity. The staff is now there to make some changes for the better. More will come I'm sure but we can see improvements now with what's in place if Pavel lets them shine.


@Marcello Julio Oh you know I'm not fighting ya on that. Texas can do a lot more than just Target though. Ideally, I'd be looking at bringing a solid 5-6 retailers alone. The biggest ones that could make the most impact and be populated all over the US though is Target, Sam's, Costco, Lowe's, Kohls, Ikea, Kroger and Albertsons. There are many more but start with these, get these implemented and replace some overused depots..make space by removing some of those non functioning prefabs with functioning ones. Just those mentioned alone would vastly reduce the repetitiveness in the retail sector of ATS. Not all those need to go in every city but there are many Wallberts than can get replaced. Homestore could probably be reduce by 50% with Lowes. Costco and Sam's can split the load and debut in ATS as wholesale bulk loads. Ikea competes with Heartwood Furniture. Ikea also competes with Charged, Homestore and Lowes for appliances. Kroger and Albertsons are dedicated grocery stores. They could complete with Walmart and Target which are both supercenters. Supercenters can complete with Kohl's for non grocery products.

There's tons of cargo that can get shared with everything I just mentioned with a lot of crossing over into other stores along with importing and exporting. Between all those stores I just mentioned, you are looking at an easy 50-100 cargoes. Grocery stores alone can account for 50 cargoes if you look at the agriculture thread in my signature. So 50-100 is really feasible. The flatbed thread alone can get you 100+ cargoes. So I really don't think 100 between those 2 thread is impossible.

[SouthernMan]

Imo, with what little I know of how it works to add a new company and do more beyond that, I no longer see any point in why SCS doesn't add more companies more often. If we consider that SCS has specific teams for this kind of thing (making prefabs), they can do a lot more than what they give us.

What is so difficult for them to add more new companies? Yes, I know new companies came, but why not more than 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 new companies? Do people really think this is too much and enough?

For many people, every new update and new dlc is a bigger disaster than the next. The scenery is well done, everything is very beautiful, but... And the industry?

[Optional Features]

Industry and interactivity are the two things missing from the game.

The map with Montana is complete for now. But I want to do more. I want to make a yard in Montana for my trucks. I want to physically store trailers. I want to have a sign on my company with my logo. I want to be able to build and separate trailer sets. I'd like to be able to do multi drop or take long term contracts.

Features hopefully will be coming soon, and way more focus (retroactive in places) on industry. There's so much space, but so little is deliverable.

[oldmanclippy]

It's not that hard to make new companies, they add 20-30 new companies with every ETS2 DLC for only 50% more asking price. ATS:

New Mexico: 2
Oregon: 9
Washington: 6
Utah: 2
Idaho: 0
Colorado: 5
Wyoming: 3
Montana: 6

8 ATS DLCs: 33 new companies
Cost: $95.92

Beyond the Baltic Sea: 33 new companies
Cost: $17.99

[flight50]

There's a lot of fill in prefabs all over the map. It's a given, it's understood. But these fillers should be considered as replacementable in the future. Not all industries are in the game yet. More to come. But when they do come, it's a lot of work to add them.......properly. But its necessary work. Hard or not, if they want happy customers, it's a must to consider tge economy as a whole but that whole must include diversity.

Properly means going back to older states sometimes. But this is part of the US economy. In the past, perhaps SCS didn't have the staff to implement in older maps. That or they avoided going backwards because of the effort it involved. You can't take one slice of pizza and expect the rest to not get taken by others. Others in this case are states feeding off that same pizza. Everyone taking a slice is from a different background, different way of life. More than likely different birth places. Same thing with map dlc's, they add variety.

Introducing new pieces to the puzzle have to fit somehow under the same roof. Sometimes they all fit under the roof. Sometimes the puzzle pieces only works in a certain area. The same roof is the US. The puzzle pieces are the states. The same area are the regions. Linked regions creates the economy. Each region contains portions of the economy. If SCS starts treating ATS like regions, things will work. That is the major. The minor is treating ATS nationally. Nationally, ATS could have roughly 1.5 to 2 dozen companies but regionally should double that or more. There should also be a few state specific companies. Lots more to consider in ATS but they can't be ignored any longer. The map is getting to big to keep holding ATS hostage. Break the chains Pavel, lol.

So if any of this comes to fruition, Texas should start it. What they do with Texas specifically can setup the entire South region. What they do with Kansas can setup the Midwest. So a mini flood of new companies can jump start new regions imho. Wait til later and it's tougher implementing it all going backwards. Thats thevdeck of cards now. ICC's were neglected for long now its harder ti get things back on tract.

At the same time, they still have to address the US as a whole too. Just part of dealing with the unity of the US. The economy of the US is perhaps more difficult than for Europe but this is where SCS needed to do research a lonnnnng time ago to know what they are dealing with. They didn't have the proper research team back then. Now they do. Soooooo make the proper changes now while the map is smaller. A count for new and old states. Only researching for new states does not address the entire US.

[flight50]

It's not that hard to make new companies, they add 20-30 new companies with every ETS2 DLC for only 50% more asking price. ATS:

New Mexico: 2
Oregon: 9
Washington: 6
Utah: 2
Idaho: 0
Colorado: 5
Wyoming: 3
Montana: 6

8 ATS DLCs: 33 new companies
Cost: $95.92

Beyond the Baltic Sea: 33 new companies
Cost: $17.99

Lol and this is why I fussed about new companies for years now. I point it out every year. Texas sounds like the largest and most content packed dlc in all of SCS's history....to date. Not sure what HoR would have been yet. But I'm sure Texas will have less new companies than the lowest company output dlc ETS2 has come out with since France. Take all the ETS2 dlc's since France and count how many new companies got added. So no, it's fairly easy to make new companies. The hard part is implementing it. For ETS2 it's perhaps easy to do with regions and customs in mind. 50 countries....50 different ways.

In ATS 50 states and 50 different ways as well buttttt those 50 are also United. Sooo now you have to think both regionally and nationally. What is SCS going to do starting with Texas. Deepgrove in Texas was a very bad sign. Is nationally only going to define ATS? Or will ATS be about regions and national? All eyes are on Texas. If SCS gets this wrong, it's gonna effect the future for ATS.

[oldmanclippy]

Lol and this is why I fussed about new companies for years now. I point it out every year. Texas sounds like the largest and most content packed dlc in all of SCS's history....to date. Not sure what HoR would have been yet. But I'm sure Texas will have less new companies than the lowest company output dlc ETS2 has come out with since France. Take all the ETS2 dlc's since France and count how many new companies got added. So no, it's fairly easy to make new companies. The hard part is implementing it. For ETS2 it's perhaps easy to do with regions and customs in mind. 50 countries....50 different ways.

In ATS 50 states and 50 different ways as well buttttt those 50 are also United. Sooo now you have to think both regionally and nationally. What is SCS going to do starting with Texas. Deepgrove in Texas was a very bad sign. Is nationally only going to define ATS? Or will ATS be about regions and national?

HoR would have been absolutely nuts I imagine. Tons of roads and tons of new companies. Just look at the blog screenshot map that had been assembled by other members: https://www.google.com/maps/d/viewer?mi ... 999965&z=6 Massive in area too. I get why we didn't get it, but it's still a shame.

Texas won't compete with Iberia that's for sure. Iberia was reverse highway robbery, even with the rural and Pyrenees misses. I see it being more similar in content quantity to Beyond the Baltic Sea. Which would be good, especially if it matched it on the ICC side.

[Izmaragon]

I'm with you on the amount of "placeholder" depots Flight...

There are OTHER companies that could be used.....

MuriCorp.... some name I came yup with in a fit of fantastic imagination overuse when I was in Middle school...

Or MuriMart, MontiMart, TexaShop, TexaMart, IdaSpud or Spudaho perhaps...

ShopCart maybe...

Flaming Fuels... Or Flamingo Fuel

EquiCon for Equipment Construction

TexagriCo or MonAgriCo

State name+agriculture+Co.

Yeah, just possible company/depot name suggestions for MORE companies.

[flight50]

If it comes down to it, I'd be okay with Texas going to Q1 of 2023 to address ICC's. It won't be the end of the world. The map is boxed right now. A lackluster ICC's effort in Texas that doesn't equal what a $17.99 ETS2 map does would be bad news for Texas. Reducing the price of Texas less than $17.99 makes zero sense to me. That is a belittling yourselves as a dev. 4 years worth of work and charge $11.99..........nahhhh I wouldn't go that route if I was Pavel. I don't see why SCS would let that happen. Too many years...to many resources to take the risk for a lackluster Texas.

The vast majority of resources are now all on Texas. We see what ETS2 maps produce. We see what the map team, the asset team and programmers do for it. Time to think the same for Texas. I'd be throwing the kitchen sink in for Texas. For an ATS map dlc, its the most wanted dlc according to Steam's wishlist rankings. Perhaps that number should tell Pavel that people are really looking forward to the dlc. Word of mouth can hurt big time if Texas doesn't meet expectations. The ETS2 crowd has no problem stating issues with lackluster dlc's so imagine what's going to happen with Texas if its going to be lackluster.

To many unknowns for Texas still. I kinda don't really trust that microsite too much but the new industries that are actually on that list, is not a huge number. So if that's the case, that is when you go all out on making current industries much much deeper by adding a lot more companies to create diversity.

It's day one release Texas I'm concerned about. First impressions will go a lonnnnng ways. In due time Texas can be improved but what will day one bring?