Above the Fold 
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Above the Fold v 1.0 is HERE!May 29, 2022 - Community AnnouncementsAfter 4 years in development and almost as long in Early Access, the full release of Above the Fold is finally here, in the form of its biggest update yet! This update covers everything, from some much needed stability and bug fixes to loads of new content to unlock and play through in the game, including a long, chained series of events that has multiple possible endings that can give you very different experiences playing through the game. There are 10 new achievements too, of the more exotic variety. In an homage to the game being set in the 90s, you can now unlock achieves that are special nods to the popular culture of its time, whether its Seinfeld, Friends, or Spice Girls. Note that the new achievements and some other features, are not backwards compatible. You will need to start a new game to get these, and to post your game score on the brand new Full Release Leaderboard! There are several graphical updates as well, like the new Challenges screen shown below. As always, you can find a (more or less) complete list of changes and updates below - this time split into 3 sections, because there is so much to cover. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33965572/961dcb8264e4218ffa4503ba9804cd883a1bd972.gif Changelist NEW CONTENT New: 45 chained events, as a main storyline for the game. It breaks down into 6 storylines, leading to one of 3 possible ending-storylines. Each contains 5 events. New: 39 in-game celebrities added, making it a nice round 100 characters, nicely tying in with celeb politics (more details below). New: 10 new Steam Achievements to unlock, paying homage to some of the most popular TV shows of the 1990s. Note, these are not obtainable via older save games. New: Added tutorial tip about dismissing stories, and why you should love it. New: Full Release Leaderboard added on Steam. Note that only games created in this version or later, will count towards this leaderboard! New: Happiness goes up more for the top-billed reporter (diminishing return as more top stories are published). {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33965572/ad30f8baa507dbe32e134e5425d47e5b85069b36.jpg CHANGES Changed: Initial office-expenses raised to $10,000/month, and scale up to $16k, $23.5k, $34.5k and $58k at subsequent levels. Changed: In-game celebrities now have political bias, and their reactions to your coverage of them is stronger, if their opinions are close to the newspaper political spread. There is also a lower chance that they will react to being written about one way or another. Changed: The Owner interaction screen got an update with all new graphics, closer matching what you see in the rest of the game. Changed: Slightly increased the line spacing on the strategic goal cards, to make them easier to read, and removed the previously visible "reward group" (it was just a letter in brackets, anyway). Changed: The Challenges screen got a visual overhaul and isn't just blocks of text and buttons any longer. Changed: Made slight changes to the default political bias of different sto...Fixes and TweaksNov 30, 2021 - Community AnnouncementsWriting continues on the next major updates, but in the meantime here is a minor update with a few balance changes and bug fixes. Changed: Increased the overall chances that personality traits trigger a new event Changed: Reporter personality traits have much greater influence on the score of an issue than previously Changed: Greater chance that Kellum Ded will murder a celebrity in chapter 5 of the game, after you feature that celeb Changed: Unlocked desk element data is no longer part of the save file. Available desks are calculated based on progress. Fixed: Stories taking more than a day to write, were not registering properly. Fixed: Keyboard shortcuts for changing the map scroll speed were not updating the meter on-screen. Fixed: New desk surfaces now unlock properly when you level up, and can be used to customize your Editor's Desk. Fixed: Backwards compatibility issue with older save games, from before the last update to Challenges. Fixed: The filler content no longer refreshes every time you reload the office screen but remain consistent for each issue. Beta 10.0.2 : Celebrity Hot Fix UpdateSep 3, 2021 - Community AnnouncementsThis minor update fixes a crash, which happened in certain instances, where an in-game celebrity was associated with a random event. Once again, thank you to everyone who takes time to report bugs. You are helping to make the game better for everyone! ːfh4crownːBeta 10 : The Strategy UpdateAug 20, 2021 - Community AnnouncementsThe features added in this update are the last major additions to the game play before Above the Fold's full release. Zooming The number one requested feature for a long time was being able to zoom in and out on the city map. That’s in the game now, and it adds a whole new layer to your strategy: spend less time looking for matching stories, and more time finding better ones. Tip: Some players prefer to assign any story of a preferred type early on, and look for higher value replacements once every reporter has an assignment. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33965572/7b5d46107471dfcbe691e4fc81b83bb07f9942ad.gif Auto-Sorting The second huge feature is the addition of auto-sorting your stories when building the front page. Previously, stories were always sorted by straight point value. Often that may not be your top priority however, so now you can sort by politics and age groups as well. Auto-sorting gives you better insight into how each story affects your overall issue, and more time to fine tune the front page. Tip: Different story types appeal more to specific age groups than others. By assigning stories that match, you will attract more readers of that age group. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33965572/3df89fe5efb0041ad404bdd5a6fbb3eabdb6f75a.gif Upgrade to Upgrades The in-game upgrades screen for your office has gotten a visual redesign, honoring the mighty White Board. Alongside the visual boost is another 5-event storyline, that plays out after your research “Web 2.0”. Will your newspaper publish a special edition with a Goodbury Online CD-Rom? Tip: Storylines can unlock Awards, cash, or allow more Angry Letters. They trigger through upgrades, themed issues, and reputation, each playing out only once per game. Every storyline has 3 possible outcomes - the exact effect depending on your newspaper’s direction and your choices, so consider each one carefully. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33965572/460f3c513c99c7933d5b586eb7de720d012301a2.gif The Final Beta With the next update, Above the Fold will be leaving Early Access. There is still more in-game content, polish and balance tweaks to come, but the basic gameplay loop is now done. Thank you to everyone who supported the game getting to this point! There are several other changes and additions in this update. As always, there’s a detailed list below. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33965572/664a5971fdb76f3f9858050bc8907b1e195f74de.jpg All the changes in Beta 10 Added: 101 new headline elements for more variation Added: Zoom in and out on the City Map using the scroll-wheel on a mouse, or comma (zoom out) and period (zoom in). Hit the equals-key to reset the zoom level. Added: Sort buttons on the Editor's Desk, that let you automatically sort your stories by score, political lean or age group appeal. Added: "Going Online" a 5-event storyline that may trigger after you research the "Web 2.0" upgrade. Added: Buttons for switching and picking elements on the Desk Customization screen, making it easier to design your desk. The old shortcuts have...Beta 9 : The Flavor UpdateJul 7, 2021 - Community AnnouncementsThis is a major update to Above the Fold. It comes with 5 new storylines to unlock, more than 3 dozen new events and visual updates from improved buttons and notifications to complete redesigns of several menus and screens. There are quality of life improvements, balance adjustments and lots of bug fixes. Check the highlights below, read on for a detailed breakdown of the main changes, or check the full, itemized list at the end. TL;DR Bullet Points You now win the game, if you last all 4 years 37 new in-game events (5 storylines) 126 new elements for random headline silliness Improved graphics, buttons and notifications A dash of 90s flavor! Because this update adds more meat and richness to the game, we're calling it The Flavor Update. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33965572/664a5971fdb76f3f9858050bc8907b1e195f74de.jpg Events and Storylines Reputation Based Events Your newspaper's reputation in the Commercial Bias category, may now trigger new storylines. With each day your score is either very high or very low, one of these might trigger. As always, they play out over 5 events, and depending on your decisions, will end 1 of 3 ways. A similar 5-event storyline was added for reaching a high reputation in the Fairness category. With these 3 new storylines, each reputation category now has both high and low score storylines associated with it. Making a Profit Every day your newspaper is profitable (not including advertisements) is a chance to unlock the new storyline associated with profitability - be prepared to negotiate with unions and more! Climate Theme with Global Science The 5th storyline in this update unlocks under different circumstances than the others. You must first research the Global Science upgrade, then you have a chance to trigger these 5 events by publishing a "Climate"-themed issue. Note, you may have to try more than once! Recurring Events Each month has 1 new event, recurring on a specific date - as long as your newspaper is in operation that day. Since you start the game without any weekend editions, it means that any event falling on a Saturday or Sunday, won't appear for you until those upgrades are unlocked. Each recurring event gives you two ways to respond. But the results are not set in stone - what you get out of your choices depend on the newspaper you are running. For example, if you're running a business oriented, current events style newspaper, your audience will react differently to wholesome Christmas coverage, than if you're running a lifestyle or local news focused publication. So pick wisely! A Little More 90s, Please There were already several retro elements in the game, but none of them are as cool as the new dot matrix-style info panels. Even though many had moved on to laser printers by the late 90s, there were still plenty of working dot matrix machines in the back rooms of businesses everywhere. More nods include the new buttons, featuring the beveled look inspired by the early Internet days, the new Win-screen use...Above the Fold - Player Survey!Jun 18, 2021 - Community Announcements{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33965572/61530fbaa0df6219df710fe7c1d58edbd183505f.png As Above the Fold gets ever closer to leaving Early Access, the last couple of beta releases is where your feedback will be key to deciding what to prioritize and expand on. It also gives a good indication of what parts of the game needs improvement - but it all comes down to getting that feedback in the first place. If you would like to have your opinion heard, please take a moment to fill out the Player Survey. Thank you in advance - and thanks again to everyone who has taken time to send feedback and suggestions along the way. As a solo dev, my ideas aren't always the best ones, and I appreciate those who take time to share their thoughts. You rock! 🤘Beta 8.2.2 : Win Condition Change + Bug FixesJun 7, 2021 - Community AnnouncementsThis is a relatively small update, but nevertheless features an important change to the game. Specifically, the strategic goals victory condition has been cut in half. If you complete 25 strategic goals, you win the game - where before you had to complete 50 goals. Strategic goals are given to you periodically throughout the game, by the mysterious Owner. On the backend, this patch also marks an update in the game engine. Several bugs popped up after the update, and were promptly eliminated before the update. However, if you find one I missed, please do not hesitate to report it. With the win condition change, you are that much closer to unlocking the achievement. Good luck! Changes in 8.2.2 Changed: You now need to complete 25 strategic goals to win the game (down from 50) Changed: Upgraded the game engine, which led to several new bugs, all of which were hopefully caught Fixed: Crash caused by trying to load a non-existing sprite on the Editor's Desk screen at the end of day Beta 8.2 : A Little Story, A Lot of ActionMay 24, 2021 - Community AnnouncementsThere is some new content in this update, but first, this patch continues where the last one left off, with more stability and bug fixes. Thanks to the added debug tools and a few dedicated fans of the game, some tricky bugs were finally tracked down and eradicated. Breaking News Storylines More exciting than bug fixes is new content! This update comes with 2 new storylines (10 events total) that may trigger based on your reputation in the "Breaking News" category, depending on whether you're scoring high or low. As always, each story line has 3 possible endings and outcomes depending on your choices and the type of paper you're running. Fixes and Tweaks An area that needed a little love was surges. Any topic can surge in interest among Goodburians, and when that happens these type of stories will score higher and attract more subscribers. Previously, only specific events in the game would trigger a new surge. Those triggers are all still there, with the addition of a new, monthly surge of a random topic. A few other parameters around surges were tweaked for better balance, as well. It would seem that the introduction of friends/rivals left a string of rather nasty bugs in its wake, specifically tied to not properly removing all references to said friends and rivals, should one of them leave your newspaper. I want to give a special shout out to two players of the game, who went above and beyond in their help tracking down bugs for this update. Richie Whiteman and Stephanie "Gohst Prncss" Krueger - Thank you both for your patience and for helping to make the game better for everyone! Changes, bullet point style Added: 2 new 5-event plot lines that may trigger if your credibility gets either high or low enough in "Breaking News" (10 events) Added: A random topic will surge in interest every month Fixed: Certain desk customization options could cause the game to crash when loading the editor screen Fixed: When starting a new game, you could get negative subscribers and have a very short game Fixed: Sometimes reporters would have multiple quotes instead of just one Fixed: Two new occurrances of a previously discovered crash, where the game tries to trigger an event involving a reporter that no longer works at the newspaper Fixed: When one reporter is away, the AFK icon would sometimes not despawn when cycling through other reporters Fixed: Surging topics would reset themselves after 0-1 days, which is a tad short Changed: After fixing the above, Surges would last way too long, so that got nerfed Changed: Too many stories of the surging type would spawn during a surge, so that's been reduced Beta 8.1 : Stability PatchMay 15, 2021 - Community AnnouncementsThis mini update includes some important bug fixes, including causes for some reported crashes, and some new ones discovered while fixing the aforementioned ones. In other words, your game will be more stable after this patch. Huge thanks goes out to those who have submitted log files, save games and helped hunt down some of these issues. Here are all the changes in 8.1.2 Added: Logging of in-game events for debug and curious people. In the Office screen, use F3 to toggle on/off Added: A few safety measures were implemented to catch minor save game corruption and prevent crashes Fixed: Bug preventing new strategic goals from appearing if you had tutorials turned off Fixed: Crash caused by events that included reporters that no longer work at the newspaper Fixed: Bug preventing positive effects AND achievement triggering from Morale Events Fixed: Prevent crash, caused by minor corruption in save data, during creation of new monthly award challenge Fixed: Bug causing crashes at the start of a new day/save load, and preventing certain events from queueing, due to previous issues being counted wrong Beta 8 : The Achievement UpdateApr 28, 2021 - Community AnnouncementsThe 21 new achievements added in this update range from the very easy to very challenging. Alongside these, we have another 6 new story lines to trigger, and a nice, new office background. In other words, Beta 8 adds more content and fleshes out the game. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33965572/da5d1c683e266e581df4df481351912162cc684d.jpg Story lines There are hundreds of events in the game. Some are completely random, some are based on Reporter personality traits, some historical with set dates - and then there are story lines. These are chains of typically 5 linked events with 3 different conclusions and rewards, depending on your choices. Story lines always trigger under specific circumstances, and in this update we are adding a bunch of new ones. For the first time, we have story lines that trigger based on your Credibility scores. If your Sensationalism or Sources score high, they may trigger story lines. Likewise scoring low in these same categories, as well as Fairness, triggers different story lines. More of these are planned - eventually all Credibility categories will have two unique series of events associated with them, depending on whether your paper is scoring high or low in that category. Finally, Beta 8 comes with a story line that may trigger any time you publish a Fashion-themed issue. Themed issues and completed upgrades are two other ways to trigger story lines throughout the game. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33965572/bd089559b874b93625ffdb5ee2db665e07036a6e.jpg Achievements Who doesn't love unlocking achieves?! Most of the basics are covered in this round, but more achievements are planned. These initial 21 include rewards for exploring the basic features of the game, such as firing a reporter or buying an upgrade, but also a number of achievements that are harder to get. The hardest one is winning the game, or publishing an issue scoring over 5000 points. But if these still seem too easy, don't worry, there are several tough achievements underway, including a few hidden ones. To the Completionists out there, I am sorry. New Menu Backgrounds This update also features new original 3D art by Jay Sanchez, namely an editor's office as background for the office menus. You can find representations of every aspect of the game, scattered around this office. It's also a taste of things to come. As we get closer to final release, more UI updates will add more polish and niceness to the game. This is beta 8 of 10 planned, after which the game will have its final release. I hope you like the new direction and additions to Above the Fold. All Changes in Beta 8 Added: 21 achievements! Go forth, and achieve! Added: 2 new story lines that may trigger if you have good Credibility scores in Sensationalism or Sources (10 events) Added: 3 new story lines that may trigger if you have low Credibility scores in Sensationalism, Sources or Fairness (16 events) Added: New story line that may trigger if you publish a Fashion-themed issue (5 events). Added: Credits-button o...Beta 7: Friends, Reputation and ConsequenceFeb 22, 2021 - Community AnnouncementsThere is a lot of new content and other changes to cover in this update, so let us start with a TL;DR: Beta 7 introduces the concept of friends and rivals among your reporter staff, along with a number of new in-game events, both repeatable events, and 2 new 5-event storylines. It is strongly recommended that you start a new game, if your save is from before Beta 6.1. Rather than simply deleting older games, load it one last time and "finish" by retiring (from the Office Management screen). Doing so will calculate a final score and save it to your high score list. Friend and Rivals Returning to the friends and rivals concept, here is how it works. If two of your reporters share interest in the same topic and aren't political opposites (as in, one is Very Liberal and the other is Very Conservative), they might become friends. On the other hand, if they share an interest but ARE political opposites, they may become rivals. In theory, other events might cause relationships to form, but this is the standard way. Once two reporters have established a relationship, their respective front pages and raises given, will affect their counterpart. In the case of a friend, there is happiness to gain. In the case of a rival, the opposite is the case. But if you end up firing one of these bonded reporters, a friend will surely suffer while the rival will feel relieved. Word count counts Besides the ongoing effects mentioned above, friends/rivals may also be affected by specific events, and they may trigger events of their own. Friends will sometimes do stuff together after work, whereas rivals might get into loud arguments at the office. With all of this, there are several new quotes for your reporters to say, as they are affected by these relationships. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33965572/2e9c34f2ae698252c67453395a2ac6fcce51187e.jpg Credibility Events There are other new events in Beta 7, tied to specific stories that affect the credibility of your newspaper. These stories are already marked with a green or red flag in the game, and affect your reputation depending on the stories you publish. What is new is, that is any specific story has a very high influence may trigger new in-game events, depending on which way your credibility went. In terms of game balance, you may now see a warning icon appear on screen if you exceed your maximum wordcount before going to the editor's desk. What happens if the articles are too long, is that they are edited down to fit before printing. This kind of editing can sometimes upset the writers who put all that effort into writing them in the first place. The more you go over the maximum allowed, the unhappier your reporters will be. A little bit over might be fine, but do try to watch out for the warning. Awards Award winning became slightly easier in Beta 7. Previously, every themed issue would add 0.1% chance that your next themed issue would trigger an Award. Now, the chance of winning the award is increased by up to 1% per themed i...Beta 6.1 - Tool Tips and TogglesJan 27, 2021 - Community AnnouncementsSmall(ish) update, longish post. Scroll to the bottom of you want the TL;DR version. The last couple of updates were focused on making the game more stable, easier to learn and user friendly. Huge improvements were made but there were more, little things that didn’t make it into the last update but probably should have. Things like tool tips and toggles for features, you otherwise only knew about, if you knew the keyboard shortcut. Besides the things mentioned, this update fixes a few more bugs, but doesn’t offer any new in-game events or storylines. However, it would be a shame for these improvements to sit and wait for the next major content patch to be done, when everyone who enjoys the game, could use this right away. So here we are. One major bug fixed in this update, had storylines repeating themselves under certain circumstances, when they weren't supposed to. If you're continuing a saved game, you may still see this behavior a few times after the fix (those events were already queued in your game data), but new games are no longer affected. Big shout out to James Henderson, whose twitch stream of the game was a big inspiration for this particular update. Give his channel a follow! If you’re a streamer, content creator or reporter, and want to feature Above the Fold, please see the press kit page for more detail. Streamers who let me know ahead of time, might see me show up to answer questions live in chat (just ask James). With Beta 6.1, the in-game help and teaching systems are done. New tips may still get added, others will definitely be rewritten, and so forth - if any parts of the game are a mystery to you, let me know! All changes in Beta 6.1 Added: Toggle to switch game speed on the map Added: Toggle to control map scroll speed, also on the map Added: Toggle to turn the map key and guide bar on and off Added: Button to open the settings window on the map and the office screen Added: Tool tips, when hovering over various icons and buttons in the game Added: Option to turn tool tips on/off via in-game settings Added: Total cash value of advertisements now displayed when you pick them up Changed: Each day of the week has its own color hue on the main office screen Changed: When you schedule a Morale event, it now triggers the following day instead of a few days later Changed: Gamespeed is no longer indicated by pluses (see new toggle instead) Changed: Scroll speed is not longer written out in the upper right corner (see other new toggle) Fixed: Clouds behaving badly when both mouse and keyboard are used together Fixed: Plotline progress would reset and could be repeated, when they were not supposed to Beta 6 adds Stability, Bug Fixes and ContentJan 19, 2021 - Community AnnouncementsBeta 6 of Above the Fold focuses on quality of life, starting with squashing a several bugs reported by all those amazing people, who took the time to let me know. I apologize for the fact that this release took longer than expected - some of those bugs proved quite tricky to solve, and I also wanted to include some fresh content. But first, a big change in the importance of politics. The biggest balance adjustment in Beta 6 is that advertisements you display in the paper, now also affect the political lean of each issue. Ad-cards display the political association of the advertiser when you pick them up, and if you have a lot of ads from one side of the political isle, it will slightly tip the appeal of the issue in the same direction. Personality traits have been part of the game for a while. Each comes with its own bonuses, penalties and associated events in the game, but now your reporters can gain additional traits. Any reporter who has less than 3 personality traits, may gain a new one if they experience a large, sudden shift in happiness (either direction). There are a few new user experience features in this update as well, small things to improve the game overall, like simplifying a bunch of the text shown on screen for faster reading, new icons to quickly indicate the political lean of a story before you pick it up, and in other icon-related news, the guide at the top of the map now displays a flashing chevron next to any story type that is currently surging in popularity. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33965572/0927ce4ecaf92fa37857ee3fad10266d18f9aa8e.jpg We also have 2 new controls! Use the Page Up and Page Down keys to control the music volume, and use the number-keys 1, 2 or 3 to set the scrolling speed of the city map. The current speed is displayed on the right, near the top. A surprising number of people had requested "better cloud movement", so that was added too. Where the clouds would always continue in the same direction before, they now take map scrolling into account and move in a more natural way. Another player request was the addition of borders when playing in windowed mode, making it easier to move the game around. Done, and again, thank you for these suggestions and requests. Finally, there are several new in-game events in this update. Two new 5-event storylines, each tying in with a specific upgrade and a themed story, and a few new procedural events that may repeat several times during the game. List of Changes in Beta 6 Added: Reporters with less than 3 personality traits, may develop a new trait if gaining or losing 5% happiness all at once Added: "The Art Elite", a 5-event storyline that may trigger with an Art-themed issue, after researching "Arts" Added: "Silver Mist Massage", a 5-event storyline that may trigger with a Crime-themed issue, after researching "Organized Crime". Added: Reporters may compliment you or complain, if you publish a politically biased issue that is either perfectly aligned with or far from their ow...Out Now: Beginner Tips and More Content in Beta 5!Oct 29, 2020 - Community AnnouncementsWelcome, Editors, to the 5th Beta update of Above the Fold! This update has a huge improvement for new players - we have Beginner Tips! It's not a traditional tutorial that holds your hand, but 18 contextual tips to point and guide you - every decision is still yours to make, though. Even if you have been playing for a while, these tips may answer some of your lingering questions. You can toggle the Beginner Tips on/off when starting a new game, or at any time via the options menu (Esc key), or using the F2 shortcut. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33965572/3ed26a8a5e16d6c3a623f7738b5bbabd60b1dfd7.jpg Speaking of decisions, this update also comes with 4 new story lines (20 new in-game events). Story lines are linked events, where your decisions carry over and result in 1 of 3 possible endings. This brings us to 20 story lines, and 100 story events added so far, with more coming in every update. Besides these additions, we have some quality of life improvements. A new green/red flag icon now appears next to the active reporter. Previously, these were shown only on the story info-cards. The flags indicate whether a given story may affect the reputation and credibility of your newspaper. Green (pointing right) is positive, red (pointing left) is negative. 125 new headline elements, and 7 in-game celebs have also been added, for greater variation in the generated stories. All of this, various bug fixes, and more, await you in Beta 5 of Above the Fold. As always, there is a chance older save games will be incompatible with the new update. This is especially true for saved games that go back several patches. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33965572/48a112b05178bd93e22640b795c7c0c54814adb5.jpg All Things New in Beta 5 Added: Beginner tips - 18 contextual tutorial pop-ups that explain core concepts of the game Added: Turn Beginner Tips on/off via the options menu (Esc) or use the shortcut, F2 Added: New story line that may trigger after publishing a Science-themed issue Added: New story line that may trigger after publishing a Economy-themed issue Added: New story line that may trigger after publishing a Global Conflict-themed issue Added: New story line that may trigger when publishing a Politics-themed issue after researching Political Cartoonist Added: 125 new headline elements, for greater variation Added: The active reporter now displays a green/red flag, if assigned a story that may affect your newspaper credibility or reputation Added: 7 new celebrity characters, boosting underserved story types (all celebs are associated with a particular type of story). Changed: When an event window opens that only has 1 button, you can now use instead of clicking on it Changed: The red flag now points the other direction than the green flag (for colorblind players) Changed: Added comma separators to numbers in a few places for better readability Changed: Chances of a strategic goal request from the Owner are slightly increased Fixed: Crash when an event tries to change values of a celeb...Beta 4 : Autumn Content UpdateSep 23, 2020 - Community AnnouncementsA total of 20 new in-game events, spread over 4 new story lines, make up the bulk of this content update. It also contains a few balance adjustments and quality of life fixes. Chief among the quality fixes is the addition of a "Saving" icon, to indicate when the game is auto-saving. I added this after learning that some people's save games had corrupt data after leaving the game mid-save. Hopefully this simple addition should fix this problem. Of the 4 new story lines added, 3 of them may trigger after publishing a Climate, Business or Art & Culture themed issue. The events are not guaranteed to trigger on the first try, but the chance increases with every themed issue. The 4th story line may be triggered by publishing a Sports-themed issue, but only after purchasing the "Professional Sports" upgrade. As usual, each story line has 3 endings. Each ending has its own consequences and rewards, as do the choices that lead you to them. You decisions are weighed against the kind of newspaper you are running, and the "right" choice depends on your newspaper's demographic. Balance-wise, the most notable change comes with celebrities. You may already have noticed that publishing stories with celebrity names attached gives them a boost in importance, and your stories can affect what those celebrities think of you. It may even come to them endorsing or condemning your newspaper. None of this is new, but what is, is taking each celebrity's Fame score into account. Now, the effect of an endorsement/condemnation will scale with the Fame, for better and for worse. Change list in Beta 4 Added: Sports-themed issues + Professional Sports upgrade may trigger new story (5 events) Added: Business-themed issues may now trigger a new story line (5 events) Added: Art-themed issues may now trigger a new story line (5 events) Added: Climate-themed issues may now trigger a new story line (5 events) Added: Saving icon, to avoid accidental data corruption by quitting while saving Changed: The effect of making celebrities happy/mad now scales with the fame score of that celeb Fixed: memory leak on the map screen would cause a crash after prolonged playing Fixed: crash when loading a game, saved while having in-game music turned off Fixed bug that would not properly reset your upgrade tree in a new game, after a game over Fixed a bug where a different newspaper name could appear in the ticker when first starting a game Fixed a bug that could prevent 3 story lines from triggering as expected Beta 3 : Celebrity Power and Easier WinningJun 9, 2020 - Community AnnouncementsMore meat on the bones! That is the shortest way to describe this update to Above the Fold. Continuing the trend from the previous two betas, there are 4 brand new story lines - more than 20 new events total - each with 3 different endings and consequences for your newspaper. Celebrities have gotten a boost. Some in-game stories are tied to specific celebs, each with their own opinion of the paper. Based on your actions, their opinions may (d)evolve until the celeb mobilizes their fans, either to support your newspaper or to combat it. Easier to Win One very important change, is that victory conditions have been modified, so that you now need to meet either of the conditions listed below. 25 Awards (was 50) 50 Completed goals (was 100) 1,000,000 subscribers (unchanged) Also worth mentioning, the new Theme-indicator on the city map is a Quality-of-Life feature that several have been asking for. Now you can see right away, when you have assigned enough stories of any given type, for the issue to become themed accordingly. Here are all the new things in Beta 3 New 5-event story line that may be triggered with an Entertainment-themed issue New 5-event story line that may be triggered with a Health-themed issue New 5-event story line that may be triggered with a Politics-themed issue New 5-event story line that may trigger after Photographers have been researched New Theme-indicator in the Map sidebar shows when your issue-in-progress has a theme 30 new Reporter names (10 male, 10 female, 10 last names) 10 new things your reporters might say, depending on their mood 15 new story headline elements for more variation New rare event: Celebrities who really (dis)like you, can now mobilize their fans for/against you. New music on the main menu screen, and on the 'new game' and 'game over' screens 2 new notebooks to choose from when customizing the Editor's Desk: a top-spiral, and red lined note pad Balance: bigger potential impact on celebrity opinions Balance: lowered the number of required awards to win the game from 50 to 25 Balance: lowered the number of required goals to win the game from 100 to 50 Balance: Reporters less likely to change their daily quote by having a story replaced Fixed a crash that could trigger in the "New Game" story line Fixed a bug that would cause a soft lock, when you "Retire" a game Fixed a bug where the event DONG!-sound would play when there was no event Fixed a bug that would cheat players out of the Theme of the Month Award Fixed bug that would cause new strategic goals to not trigger Fixed a bug that in some cases would submit your score to the Alpha leaderboards instead of Beta Fixed a bug that would call the save-script where it shouldn't, with a small chance of data corruption Various minor tweaks and bug fixes Beta 2: Is That a Pager on Your Desk?May 26, 2020 - Community AnnouncementsIn this second Beta update, more content is added across several parts of the game. 5 new story lines, each with 3 different endings, make up the bulk of the content, but wait - there's more! The Editor's Desk screen is still a work-in-progress, but in this update it has gotten some bug fixes and 2 new items. In true 90s style, you can now choose to display a couple of floppy disks, or a neat pager! If there are any other items, you'd like to see in the game - let's hear it! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33965572/b4c16ab5cdb16ca761ac16febfec170714f5f086.gif A new music track was added to the Strategic Goal screen, to emphasize that something different is happening in the game. There are more musical tweaks like this to come in future updates as well. Full Changelist Added: 5-event story line triggered some time after researching Interns Added: 5-event story line that may be triggered with a Sports-themed issue Added: 5-event story line that may be triggered with a Off-Beat-themed issue Added: 5-event story line that may be triggered with a History-themed issue Added: 5-event story line that may be triggered with a Crime-themed issue Added: Floppy Disks and a Pager are now items you can customize your editor's desk with Added: New music for picking strategic goals with the Owner Changed: Morale events can now be scheduled every 7 days (was just 1 at a time) Fixed: Morale Event button would sometimes incorrectly spawn Fixed: Crash related to customizing your Editor's Desk Multiple minor bug fixes Constructive feedback is always welcome. If you have wishes and requests for future updates, put them in a comment. If your idea fits with the overall plan for the game, it will be included.First Beta Update: It's Story Time!Apr 19, 2020 - Community AnnouncementsImportant: Beta 1 is not fully compatible with Alpha save games. It is highly recommended that you Retire any existing games and start fresh with this update. The first beta took much longer to put together than I wanted, and for that I apologize, but here it finally is! Many of the additions and changes are content related, but you may notice a couple of visual changes as well, such as the brand new icons for different story types and available advertisements. These were done by Dutch artist Kay Lousberg, who also designed the city map of Goodbury. You may also notice, that the background color within the game has changed to a cooler tone. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33965572/7bb47109dd801e15bd2e95a0dd7127921933e3d1.jpg TIP: Hit G when on the map to toggle the map key on/off. Because this is the first Beta, the leaderboards have also gotten a wipe! This means that you have a brand new opportunity to put your newspaper at the top of the list, and earn worldwide bragging rights. Finally, there are a number of smaller tweaks and changes. The way you improve morale for your reporters has changed a little, quest goals were rebalanced (again), and you can now right-click on unwanted stories on the map to dismiss them - this not only increases the odds of a new story spawning, it also earns you a few points for that leaderboard. I really hope you enjoy the first beta. The Story Lines are really the major new feature, and the next update will primarily build on that with more of these types of events. Now that the framework for the stories is in, adding more content will be the priority. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33965572/27fed4c7705a2ff8ecf1e12be1626517f3f3600f.jpg All Beta 1 Changes New: Storylines - linked series of events with 3 different outcomes based on choices made. Stories may trigger once per game New: "New Game" story added, may trigger after newspaper is fully staffed New: The "Coffee Plot" story, chance of triggering increases every issue with more than 65% wordcount. New: "City in Need" story, chance of triggering every time you publish a "Local News"-themed issue. New: Story markers and map guide have been updated with new, original graphics New: Advertisement markers have been updated with new, original graphics New: "Buy Lunch" has been replaced with "Morale" and now queues up a morale event, which may increase happiness. Only one morale event may be queued at a time, but the rewards have been increased up to 400% compared to the "Buy Lunch" button from previously. Cost remains unchanged. New: Beta Leaderboard is now live on Steam. Turned off score submission to the Alpha Leaderboard Changed: Leaderboard button removed from the menu, replaced with website button Changed: Office background graphic changed to a "stormy" color tone Changed: Right-click on unwanted stories on the Map to dismiss them, earn a small amount of points for doing so. This also increases the chances of new stories spawning. Changed: Font scales down in event windows with longer de...Plan Your Retirement (from Alpha)Jan 28, 2020 - Community Announcements{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33965572/ede0c67955d3e4c22f7f130aef53bb792b5f3687.jpg The first beta is a few days away at this point (provided no new game breaking bugs appear!) so I thought, I would share some details about what is to come, and why your save game won't be compatible after the new patch. Storylines In its simplest form, a story is a series of linked events that each present you with a decision to make. Each choice has an immediate effect, like with the random or procedural events already in the game, but what makes stories unique is that they each have 3 different endings. The ending you get, depends on the choices you made. The exact effect on your newspaper depends on the story, and the kind of newspaper you're running. To get this feature to work requires some additions to the save game data, that simple is not there in old save games. Adding backwards compatibility in this case, is not a feasible task and so, a strategic decision was made ... But wait, all is not (completely) lost. Time to Retire If you want to END your game properly, I suggest you use the Retire feature (find it under Office Management). When you retire a game, the final score will be calculated and saved to both your local high score list and the leaderboards, if enabled. The screenshot included, is from one of my own retired games. I know, that screen needs a make over. It's on the list. But you can see how the final score is calculated. Speaking of Leaderboards With the move from Alpha to Beta, the leaderboards will be renewed as well. The Alpha boards will not be deleted, but you will no longer be able to submit scores to it. This is your last chance, if you want to be at the top FOREVER! And then, when Beta 1 launches, there will be brand new boards to dominate. I hope you're as excited for Beta 1, as I am. There are more changes, including new story markers on the map, but I will save the full list for the release notes.Feature Deep Dive : ReportersOct 28, 2019 - Community Announcements{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33965572/8f171c6c9363a502cd519001460fbeadb1e5c690.png Reporters are crucial to the direction and specialization of your newspaper. Each reporter has a number of attributes that can influence your paper, from the obvious numeric Skill and Level, to personality traits of all sorts. Some have kids, some don’t. Some are very political, others not so much. But how does all of this come together in the game? That’s what we will cover in this post. Let’s start with the numbers. While Skill represents a Reporter’s basic talent, it doesn’t change much during the course of a game. Level, however, represents a year of experience and will go up by 1 point on that Reporter’s anniversary. Skill and Level contribute to the score of every story written. All of this won’t matter much, however, if your Reporter is in a foul mood. The mood score is a percentage. If it drops too low, the Reporter May quit. But it also affects every story they write. When a story score is calculated, it is adjusted by the mood of its writer. In other words, if a story is worth 1000 points, but your Reporter’s mood score is 35%, the value of the story is reduced to 350 points. This is why, keeping your Reporters happy is so important. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33965572/fac19806bdeea0672214be5d92be3486ca70543e.gif The fastest way to increase someone’s mood is by giving them a Raise. However that is also very expensive, and you don’t want to price yourself out of a star Reporter. You can also “Buy Lunch” for the whole staff. This has only a small chance of improving the mood, although it does have a chance to affect all Reporters, not just one. However, the best way to keep them happy, is by assigning stories to them, that they enjoy writing. Keep an eye on their interests and assign them stories that match. For this reason, Reporter interests are super important for your newspaper. There is no single best approach, as long as you are mindful of your strategy. Do you aim for broad coverage, or specialize in a few topics? You might hire a reporter who fits perfectly into your early game, but who will get replaced as more topics unlock. Experiment to find a combo that works for you, just remember that every time you fire one Reporter, there’s a chance the remaining ones will suffer a mood penalty. Political opinion will also factor into the work Reporters deliver. If you aim to point your newspaper in a particular political direction, structuring the content accordingly is crucial. But if your Reporters aren't on the same wavelength, it will be an uphill battle. Reporters range from Liberal over Independent to Conservative, and though these labels aren't accompanied by a score, if you see the keyword "Very" in front of either of these, their opinion will have greater influence on the stories they produce. You may also care if your Reporter has children. Parents are less likely to quit, even if miserable, simply because they are more responsible. More kids means less likely to ...
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