Making Game accessible to Not-So-Experienced-Players

[DanDan]

Trying to read the rules and analyzing the game a bit. I realized one thing: the game tries to incorporate features so that many players can play it at the same time.

- There are even rules against bullying players, especially new ones, out of the game.
- The demand is ridiculously high in the beginning and not-much-changing through all the game (which actually probably harms competition in the later stages of the game).
- One can even make money flying half-empty planes.
- Etc. etc. etc.

My proposal, if one would want to really make the game attractive to more players: make it more transparent.

- Why is the 3rd/4th fleet penalty not described anywhere? Any new player will just wonder about the costs without understanding the reason. Nothing documented on it in the manual.
- The "too small aircraft" warning: make it transparent. Tell people how big an airplane has to be on a certain route, or how much penalty there is for a certain plane - whats the harm in that? Nothing on that either.
- Why not show actual demand instead of some "estimate"?
- Why not show the ticket prices and seat configurations of other airlines?
- Maybe, when planning a route, there could be a "attractiveness-factor" displayed, so that people know, if their flights are planned well? A route-attractiveness factor for the flights of each airline accumulated: so I see my 3 flights on a certain route have an attractiveness of X, my comeptitors of Y - then i can at least see, that i am doing something wrong.
- Make demand more fluctuating, so that bigger companies have the disadvantage of bigger companies: the lack of flexibility.

All of us pay so much in staff-costs for various experts, that I think that should be available to us. And all this would help people so they can learn from others easily, and the whole thing wouldnt be such a cryptic knowledge. Because currently any new player, especially without the help of an alliance and a lot of dedication, will run into at least 2 or 3 of those problems. I am not saying all those proposals are to be taken literally, and adaptions are needed, but currently, the whole system seems to work perfectly for a clique of know-it-alls who know every undocumented twist in the game.

[gazzz0x2z]

visibility of the "hidden" rules would be indeed a strong point.

knowing that "the TU114 is too small from 1981 for lines beyond .....blablabla....." would be very helpful for newcomers.

[Zobelle]

VL aircraft should never go “too small”, personally.

The only thing to force your hand should be better economics.

[Luperco]

I agree on all dandan proposals.

I would add a way to forecast the expenses of a flight before schedule it (for example showing them on the flight edit page with a dropdown to choose the actual aircraft) and a different way to search for demand that doesn't involve in click and load all those pages (for example send a mission of employers to search for routes).

[Tha_Ape]

I have reservations about certain points (either because I consider them useless or too obvious), but I completely agree on the general idea.
Some things can stay relatively complicated, but not "hidden" or accessible only through teaching.
I'm available as a mentor, and it is sometimes a bit boring to have to repeat very important points about the game just because nothing is said about them in the manual.
Wouldn't solve everything, there will always be a guy jumping in the pool without water wings, but would still avoid some repetitive explanations about aspects that are part of the ABC for the experienced player but for which a newbie can find only allusions, no clear mention.

Example from the manual (https://www.airwaysim.com/game/Manual/General/StartupEasy2)

You will notice that all your aircraft are of the same fleet group. Using aircraft that are similar to each others will bring significant cost savings in fleet commonality costs since your airline does not need many different training systems and such. In our example the aircraft is a Boeing 737-500, and the B737-300 and B737-400 models are fully common with this model. But getting for example the older B737-200 is not common with this fleet group anymore, so in this case using that model for future routes is not recommended.

When you start you should stick to aircraft from the same fleet group as long as practicable. But if you have many different types of routes available, or the used aircraft market does not have good choices, you may need to add another fleet group to your airline's fleet. Be aware that this will generate extra overhead costs - but do not be too afraid of it; since if the operation with the new fleet is profitable it will easily cover these costs.

"using that model for future routes is not recommended". Ok, but to what extent?
"Be aware that this will generate extra overhead costs - but do not be too afraid of it" At what point shouldn't I be afraid anymore?
Etc.
If you don't know you should aim for a certain profit margin in order to be able to grow on the longer run, you might not realize that you made a mistake. And nothing explains it.

[Mort]

Perhaps the manual should be made into a wiki - or add a wiki as a seperate resource that the players can contribute to?

[George Bush]

We could just make a wiki as a community...

[Mort]

We could just make a wiki as a community...

Yes, but in order to make it as accessible as possible for new players, it being baked into the game interface somehow would be best

[DanDan]

oh, and also important in my opinion: make the aircraft data permanently available to players (also for the future aircraft with their "approximate" launch dates). that would help newer players as well.

[Zobelle]

Battles are won and lost on this knowledge.

GW4, Would anyone have even bothered ordering more propliners had they known the best Caravelle, 707 variants weren't far behind?

GW1, Were those of us who doubled down on the A320-100 smarter for having done so over waiting on the A320-200?

[Luperco]

Battles are won and lost on this knowledge.

GW4, Would anyone have even bothered ordering more propliners had they known the best Caravelle, 707 variants weren't far behind?

GW1, Were those of us who doubled down on the A320-100 smarter for having done so over waiting on the A320-200?

Yes at both questions. At least in GW2. Experienced players got a lot of 320-100 and and prop for various reasons even if they know better planes are behind the corner.

The problem here is that even experienced player doesn't know what really happen but can only guess.

This is a financial simulation and, in my opinion, this kind of game should give much more details to the players.