Hi! This weekly report explains the new trading mechanisms of the Merchant and the new unit Space port.



As introduced in last week's Friday Report, the resource system now distinguishes between up to 8 resource types for every of the 3 resource categories energy, food and goods.

In addition to special items like research budget and landing permits (right part of the screenshot) all resource types will be available for trading. For each resource a market price is calculated based on the amount that was bought and sold during the game.



When the merchant arrives at your planet he will have a set of resources available that are in demand. The bar on the left side of the trade ring shows the storage of the merchant which is limited. This means that you can sell only a few resource packages if you don't buy anything from the merchant.

We plan to give the AI trading abilities, too - so the merchant becomes a shared resource. First come, first served!

The space port is a new building that gives you the ability to construct a rocket. With this rocket you can sell up to 5 packages to a distant world (1000 resources each). This will offer a much better price than the merchant, but you will have to build a new rocket or every 5 packages you sell.



Thanks for following us! We wish you and your families the absolute best for the new year ahead.

Jens & Martin

Hi! This weekly report explains the new trading mechanisms of the Merchant and the new unit Space port.



As introduced in last week's Friday Report, the resource system now distinguishes between up to 8 resource types for every of the 3 resource categories energy, food and goods.

In addition to special items like research budget and landing permits (right part of the screenshot) all resource types will be available for trading. For each resource a market price is calculated based on the amount that was bought and sold during the game.



When the merchant arrives at your planet he will have a set of resources available that are in demand. The bar on the left side of the trade ring shows the storage of the merchant which is limited. This means that you can sell only a few resource packages if you don't buy anything from the merchant.

We plan to give the AI trading abilities, too - so the merchant becomes a shared resource. First come, first served!

The space port is a new building that gives you the ability to construct a rocket. With this rocket you can sell up to 5 packages to a distant world (1000 resources each). This will offer a much better price than the merchant, but you will have to build a new rocket or every 5 packages you sell.



Thanks for following us! We wish you and your families the absolute best for the new year ahead.

Jens & Martin

Welcome to our 30th Friday Report!
This week we have been working on:

• a diversified resource system
• population resource demands
• global resource storage

All the things described in this post will be released with alpha 18 in a few weeks.

So far our resource system knew only money and the three resources energy, food and goods. Adding more depth to this aspect of the game is something we have been dicussing for months and now the time has come.

The simulation of Imagine Earth now distinguishes between the following types of food: Grain, vegetables, salad, water, fish and meat. The same goes for energy and goods.



So what does this really change about the way you play Imagine Earth?

The demand for resource variety depends on the level of your city districts. The people living in a level 1 district are satisfied with any type of food and goods. A level 2 district will need at least 2 types of food and 2 types of goods to be really happy. A level 3 district will need 3 types (see screenshot below) and so on.



In detail each type must have at least a 20% share of the districts consumption. So a greenhouse could produce enough salad to meet this criteria for up to 5 level 2 districts.

The storage of resources now differentiates between the different resource types, too. You can buy every type of food - even those you aren't producing - and thisway meet the needs of your people. As the screenshot shows you can also prioritize the storage of a specific resource. This might for example be a resource you want to make sure is available when the demand of your people rises.



Trading resource will become more important and complex with the new resource system. More details on this next week.

Welcome to our 30th Friday Report!
This week we have been working on:

• a diversified resource system
• population resource demands
• global resource storage

All the things described in this post will be released with alpha 18 in a few weeks.

So far our resource system knew only money and the three resources energy, food and goods. Adding more depth to this aspect of the game is something we have been dicussing for months and now the time has come.

The simulation of Imagine Earth now distinguishes between the following types of food: Grain, vegetables, salad, water, fish and meat. The same goes for energy and goods.



So what does this really change about the way you play Imagine Earth?

The demand for resource variety depends on the level of your city districts. The people living in a level 1 district are satisfied with any type of food and goods. A level 2 district will need at least 2 types of food and 2 types of goods to be really happy. A level 3 district will need 3 types (see screenshot below) and so on.



In detail each type must have at least a 20% share of the districts consumption. So a greenhouse could produce enough salad to meet this criteria for up to 5 level 2 districts.

The storage of resources now differentiates between the different resource types, too. You can buy every type of food - even those you aren't producing - and thisway meet the needs of your people. As the screenshot shows you can also prioritize the storage of a specific resource. This might for example be a resource you want to make sure is available when the demand of your people rises.



Trading resource will become more important and complex with the new resource system. More details on this next week.

Behind the scenes we are currently working on a big change for the resource system and the needs of your people. This is still work in progress - so there is nothing to show yet.

Meanwhile Jens redesigned the Research district, Park district and Financial district. They new use the same base element and nicely integrate into your cities, but have received a more recognizable special element. You can see all of them in the picture.

Behind the scenes we are currently working on a big change for the resource system and the needs of your people. This is still work in progress - so there is nothing to show yet.

Meanwhile Jens redesigned the Research district, Park district and Financial district. They new use the same base element and nicely integrate into your cities, but have received a more recognizable special element. You can see all of them in the picture.

It's release time again and this one really brings a lot of changes. For example we have added new city and shadow graphics, it's now possible to sell colony shares and the growth of forests depends on local temperature and fertility. Since most gameplay changes aren't very obvious in the game you can read all the details here.



This one is a very important change to the gameplay. Until now there is nothing you can do when your colony is out of money, except harvesting some forests. The money balancing was kind of bad, because we had to make sure a small colony generates enough taxes to fund it's further expansion. Scaled to a big colony you always had more taxes than you could ever spend.



With the new release you are now able to sell colony shares. This is a great way to make some money whenever you need it. The worth of each share depends on the size of your colony. The disadvantage of this is that you will have to pay more money when you repurchase it at a later point of time. As the screenshot shows your buyers also demand and dividend so you have to distribute a fraction of your profit (when all shares are sold its 25% of your profit on normal difficulty).

Jens did a rework of the city graphics. The new cities match the the futuristic style you would expect from a civilization that colonizes space.



In addition they have been pimped with specular reflections on all the window faces. This gives your colony a complete new look, especially with the night lights that now are colorized in each player’s color.



The shadows really needed a filtering to make them less pixellated. For the technically interested: We are now using percentage closer filtering with 6 or 12 Poisson distributed and randomly rotated samples.

We have added more details to the production statistics.



When you hover a specific building type in the resource stats you can easily find out how much productivity is lost by things like pollution or negative influences by neighboring buildings. The example screenshot shows the stats for all fisheries. The last row is the amount of money the production of 100 fish costs.

Fertility and temperature are two very important values for the local climate of a field.



As the screenshot shows these values can be visualized for the whole planet in the navigation view. Note the two red lines of unfertile area close to the equator. This happens on earth-like planets because most air with high humidity is being pulled towards the equator by the rising of hot air there.

Based on fertility and temperature each type of forest now has areas where it grows best.



In addition all forests will become more dense when surrounded by other forests. The only exception to this are cacti. All other individual differences are explained in FReport #27.



The sandbox editor now comes with add and remove buttons for every ground, deco and building type. As shown in the screenshot below you can select the wanted ground type and use the plus button to assign it to another random field. This makes it very easy to distribute fossils, gold, forests and other stuff.

Last but not lease you can now drag a building from the build ring to attach it to the mouse cursor and place it multiple times. Alternatively you can keep the shift key pressed. Both features also work for tools and allow for mass repair or remediation.



Summed up we are very happy with the new release and now it's time to take a break for some days. We hope you like the new features, too and would really like to hear your feedback. Some of the new features (like multi-build) go back to feedback from other players, so you can be sure we will read what you have to say.

It's release time again and this one really brings a lot of changes. For example we have added new city and shadow graphics, it's now possible to sell colony shares and the growth of forests depends on local temperature and fertility. Since most gameplay changes aren't very obvious in the game you can read all the details here.



This one is a very important change to the gameplay. Until now there is nothing you can do when your colony is out of money, except harvesting some forests. The money balancing was kind of bad, because we had to make sure a small colony generates enough taxes to fund it's further expansion. Scaled to a big colony you always had more taxes than you could ever spend.



With the new release you are now able to sell colony shares. This is a great way to make some money whenever you need it. The worth of each share depends on the size of your colony. The disadvantage of this is that you will have to pay more money when you repurchase it at a later point of time. As the screenshot shows your buyers also demand and dividend so you have to distribute a fraction of your profit (when all shares are sold its 25% of your profit on normal difficulty).

Jens did a rework of the city graphics. The new cities match the the futuristic style you would expect from a civilization that colonizes space.



In addition they have been pimped with specular reflections on all the window faces. This gives your colony a complete new look, especially with the night lights that now are colorized in each player’s color.



The shadows really needed a filtering to make them less pixellated. For the technically interested: We are now using percentage closer filtering with 6 or 12 Poisson distributed and randomly rotated samples.

We have added more details to the production statistics.



When you hover a specific building type in the resource stats you can easily find out how much productivity is lost by things like pollution or negative influences by neighboring buildings. The example screenshot shows the stats for all fisheries. The last row is the amount of money the production of 100 fish costs.

Fertility and temperature are two very important values for the local climate of a field.



As the screenshot shows these values can be visualized for the whole planet in the navigation view. Note the two red lines of unfertile area close to the equator. This happens on earth-like planets because most air with high humidity is being pulled towards the equator by the rising of hot air there.

Based on fertility and temperature each type of forest now has areas where it grows best.



In addition all forests will become more dense when surrounded by other forests. The only exception to this are cacti. All other individual differences are explained in FReport #27.



The sandbox editor now comes with add and remove buttons for every ground, deco and building type. As shown in the screenshot below you can select the wanted ground type and use the plus button to assign it to another random field. This makes it very easy to distribute fossils, gold, forests and other stuff.

Last but not lease you can now drag a building from the build ring to attach it to the mouse cursor and place it multiple times. Alternatively you can keep the shift key pressed. Both features also work for tools and allow for mass repair or remediation.



Summed up we are very happy with the new release and now it's time to take a break for some days. We hope you like the new features, too and would really like to hear your feedback. Some of the new features (like multi-build) go back to feedback from other players, so you can be sure we will read what you have to say.

Good news for those who where questioning the retro 90s look of Imagine Earth. Yes, not all buildings are state of the art and some will get a makeup upgrade already with the next release in a few days. Finally the cities look like futuristic stuff you would definitely build while you are colonizing space.

Good news for those who where questioning the retro 90s look of Imagine Earth. Yes, not all buildings are state of the art and some will get a makeup upgrade already with the next release in a few days. Finally the cities look like futuristic stuff you would definitely build while you are colonizing space.