TramJam

The final version of the Light Rail Game: TramJam.

LRG test p2

This version contains fixes and speed tuning

• Jumping camera position solved
• Game speed tuned up
• Tram collisions altered to make it less frequent.

Known issues:

• switching between maps goes with initiation problems
• The game is best played in 4:3 ratio. Otherwise not the whole screen might be visible

Recommandation:
Before playing an other map quit the game and start it up again.

Map 2 only

A map 2 only release

Test-p1

This version contains some fixes and one feedback-improvement:

• Traffic lights better initiated at start of the game.
• Improved re-routing (a lot faster computation)
• Audio feedback
• Feedback on the problem type in the menu
• City background added in Map 2

Recommendation for the play:
Solve problems at crossings first.
This prevents Trams colliding with another Tram which is not solvable.
Even better is to stop trams manually that might cause problems at crossings.

Beta

Outstanding bugs:

• Map 2 contains a bug and does not spawn Trams due to this
• Re-routing is slow: it does not work for larger maps
• The WayPoints for re-routing can not be dragged
• Re-routing sometimes produces bad results (it should work exactly like changing a route in Google Maps)
• The UI elements attached to Scene elements overlap the menu's
• Reverting to the original route is broken

This short overview presents the second (beta) version of the Lightrail game. It shortly explains the rules and lists possible occurrences and player actions.

Initialising

When entering the game a start screen appears. There you can press the “Start” button and then choose a map and difficulty. For the first map the difficulty is set as it is a tutorial level. The other two maps vary in size and possible connections.
Then, a game is loaded and the player is presented with an initial situation of several trams moving along their designated routes. Mind, that all tracks are unidirectional and that the trams will stop at stations (initially green squares) and traffic lights, according to regular colours. If that state persists there is little to do but every now and then, depending on the set difficulty a disturbance occurs, which might affect the tracks (blockage) or a single tram (tramcar incident). Tram will stop automatically if it hits the blockage (represented by a pill on tracks) and will restart when the blockage is removed.

Player Actions

In the game the player is presented with two sets of actions: Tram actions and solving disturbances.

Tram actions

At any given point in time, the player can choose the tram by clicking it. Then, its speed and route can be altered. When the tram is selected its current route is stressed. The player can drag its current route to a different location and thus change it. It can be done for any tram, at any given moment, one at a time. But in needs to be pointed out, that the trams are not stopped while rerouting and if one does not hurry, they might lose the opportunity to reroute!

Disturbances

As mentioned before, there are two types of disturbances: blockages that appear on track and prevent any tram from passing and tramcar incidents that disrupt the operations of a single tram. Both of them should be solved as quickly as possible in order not to lose too many points. But they should also be solved right so be sure to choose an appropriate action. If so, it has a chance of success, depending on the action itself. Should it fail, the player needs to repeat this action until successful or choose another. It will be known once a timer counts down

Power-ups

Power-ups are special features to increase playability. These are mostly actions, which player can choose and have 100% success rate in a short time. However, they are limited as there can be only one available at a time and once used it can only be regained through regular ‘solving’ of disturbances. However, the chance is small so the player might need to work on that quite a bit.

Scoring

On top of the screen are four fields that indicate current player results in various domains:
PT: Problem timer - refers to the fact that there is a disturbance
DT: Delay timer - refers to schedules not met
IC: Impact counter - refers to the scale of the issues
Score: Points are granted or subtracted when the player takes actions
PT/DT Timer balance: The timers do not show real wall clock time. The delay timer is running twice as slow.

It is strongly suggested to try the tutorial level first. It contains some explanation and visualisation on how the game works.

First Playable

This short overview presents options that have been implemented for the first version of the game and depicts how can the player perform actions.

Upon entering the game, the player should press start button and then is presented with a tram track network map, on which a single tram is moving along a pre-defined route. All the tracks are unidirectional and some of them are on top of one another. Randomly every 5 seconds a blockage on tracks appears, through which the tram cannot pass. Tram will stop automatically if it hits the blockage (represented by a pill on tracks) or grey action button and will restart when the blockage is removed.

Player Actions

In this version of the game the player is presented with two sets of actions: Tram actions and removing blockages

Tram actions

At any given point in time, the player can choose the tram by clicking it. The movement of the tram is suspended and a choice menu appears. The player can choose to alter the tram's speed, stop it entirely or to reroute.
When the tram is selected, its current route is stressed. Rerouteing is possible only in the case of creating a full circle, in which the last node is the node, that the tram visited previously. To make the selection easier, the player can choose any node of interest and the algorithm will create a closest route there. Once a full circle is made, the route is changed and the player is redirected to the menu. When the menu is closed the tram will continue on the new route.

Blockages

Once a blockage appears the player can click on a grey button next to it and choose an action from a menu. For now, there are three unique actions, for which the resolving time differs. Once an action is chosen a timer appears counting down from that time. Although the chance of success differs for all actions, for now all of them are executed with certainty, so the blockage will disappear after the timer has reached zero.