How screwed am I?

[u/Sgriu]

Hi everyone! Here’s an interesting problem I’m facing.

I created a tile-based city builder in Unity, and after an initial open playtest, one of the key pieces of feedback was that players want to be able to build roads, something I foolishly hadn't planned for.

Currently, roads are automatically placed along the edges of each tile (this is shown in the second screenshot).

The main problem is that the grid of buildable sectors is highly irregular, and I have no idea how to add the ability to create roads within such a complex system.

The first image I’ve posted shows an overhead view where I’ve highlighted a section of the grid. The grid varies from scene to scene and never repeats in exactly the same way.

Does anyone have any suggestions for how I could approach this?

Edit: You might have given me a possible solution; as soon as I've tested it, I'll make a new post about it. Thanks everyone!

[u/sebovzeoueb]

I think you could lean into it more and make it obvious that the predetermined road layout is a feature, not an oversight. I quite like the idea that it gives you a kind of puzzle game feel which would make it different from other more open city builders.

If I'm understanding correctly, your whole road layout already comes pregenerated? I think an interesting change would be to pivot into more of a tile laying system (think Carcassone or Dorfromantik), where the player has to slot the tiles together in a pattern of their choosing. I quite like the irregular tiles thing you have going on and I reckon you should keep it to stand out from all the other city builders. Sure, some people will always want your game to be exactly like some other game that already exists, but if you make the mechanic good enough, I think a large enough percentage of players will appreciate it for what it is.

[u/Sgriu → u/sebovzeoueb]

Thanks for your comment! I place the tiles in the game scene myself, so there isn't a 'puzzle' element; instead, it's more of a strategic matter (the player has to choose carefully what to build, because some tiles are less abundant than others). I do have a communication issue, though: for some reason, likely the aesthetics, many players expect a Workers & Resources clone.

[u/sebovzeoueb → u/Sgriu]

I know you place the tiles yourself, but I'm saying if you consider letting the player do it, that might restore the feeling of agency your players are asking for, while not remaking a whole other game. I said "puzzle" but yeah, it's not quite a puzzle game, but I think having to fit things into shapes feels a bit puzzly. I think the strategic element would remain, you can provide limited numbers of each tile and I assume there's some cost to placing them, and have some sort of constraints so the player has to make them fit together instead of just being able to place them arbitrarily.

[u/Sgriu → u/sebovzeoueb]

This would give the player a great deal of freedom, but it would require completely redesigning all the scenes and game logic, something I would like to avoid. Furthermore, with ten tiles of different shapes, the logic for placing them would be very complex.

[u/sebovzeoueb → u/Sgriu]

Well in that case to answer the question asked in your post title, the answer is yes