Town Autonomy & Other Cool Improvements + Rewatch Paramaker Stream
A great Friday to you! Jérémie here! I hope everyone had a good holiday! Like the rest of the team, I’m ever so busy polishing the game to make this year’s early access the best we can!
This week, I’m going to talk about a system fundamental to making the town alive with interesting characters, alongside some other very cool improvements that are in the game that I didn’t have time to talk about yet. This is all for Patrons only, so please keep all of that here, thank you 🙂
📺Watch: Paramaker Challenge Discord Stream!
Rina popping in for a sec! On Tuesday, I was joined by Sonia for a very fun Paramaker style challenge stream for Patrons only! We were able to make some pretty cool looks with input from our community Pinterest board, so thank you so much for participating 🤩
⬆️ Watch the video at the top of this post to see what we came up with!
🚶Town Autonomy
With the amazing town that our artists made comes a responsibility: we don’t want the whole place to feel empty, and we want the player to be able to meet characters as they go along their day. We needed a specific system in order to have Townies take walks, visit shops, relax at the park, or even go to work and visit the player!
A townie walking around by themselves. Where are they going? Who can say! Actually, I can, they’re going to work : )
The basics are these: when Townies have nothing to do, they’ll check each lot in town and then check a bunch of “town autonomy” rules. It might be going to a store, going to the museum, going to a park, visiting the player, etc. It might also just be taking a walk around town!
For example, two rules in the above image are “characters that have a high Friend label level with you might want to visit you more” or “characters with the Fitness trait will go to the gym more often”.
This, of course, is entirely moddable, and I can’t wait to see what people will do! There are already more than 30 different town autonomy rules that will have Townies moving around, so I hope you’ll encounter them while visiting a store or when you are relaxing at the park! There are also other things we’ve been able to do with this system (pizza delivery, anyone?), and I bet there’s a lot more potential here.
Furthermore, we’re making sure that lots you visit won’t feel empty and always have Townies working and visiting.
Like I’ve talked about above, this is what the ‘Visit Museum’ town autonomy rule looks like: a Townie will have a higher chance to want to go to the museum if their Mind stat is high.
Other Cool Thing Number 1: Lot Impostors
While the town was growing, and since ALL the lots are real and done in Build Mode, we quickly noticed that all these walls and furniture items were starting to weigh down a bit on the game performance-wise. Indeed, the more stuff there is in the town, the more resources are taken by everything going on on the screen. With only one single loading screen to load the whole save file and then the world being open, this needed a solution.
It’s also not necessary to have all houses fully loaded at all times; if a house or a store has no player-controlled characters in it, loading the interior is not required. I have therefore made a system of “lot impostors”, where a building will be replaced by a single fake object whenever it’s not in use. When your character visits a building (or buys it), it’ll load the real one, with everything inside. All that without a loading screen (the lot loads progressively over a few seconds, but doesn’t block gameplay).
Can you spot the differences between the impostor (top) and the real building (bottom)? Sound off in the comments below! I can see four myself!
This system is not perfect and will always be in a state of improvement, but it’s a really neat technical achievement to combine a complex building into just one object while keeping the colors and textures. It won’t affect your own buildings while you are owning them, but if you make a house, then sell it, or switch to a different household, an impostor will be generated and used instead. This whole system has given a great boost to performance and load times, and I can’t wait to keep improving it!
Another Cool Thing Number 2: Auto-Save
I’ve recently tweaked the way the game saves. Before, it was done in one big chunk, and the game froze for a few seconds while it was saving the whole town, the characters, etc. This meant that auto-save was a difficult task (I think we’ve said that many times already in the past), because having the game just fully freeze for a few seconds every 10 minutes while playing wouldn’t be a fun experience.
I’ve made it so that saving is done in small chunks, so it doesn’t freeze the game. This means that a first version of auto-saving was implemented. It’s not on by default, and it saves every 10 real-life minutes, so if you forget to manually save and then just leave the game by mistake, you won’t lose all your progress. There’s still a bit more work I’d want to do on this feature, but it’s a good start!
That’s all for me this week! Hope you’ve found something you enjoyed in this post of cool improvements (and town autonomy, too!). See you next time!
Jérémie
Comments (71)
i just thought how it'd be cool if paralives.com had a paramaker random personality generator similar to James Turner's random trait generator for TS4. I end up playing basically the same personalities over and over again before I even realize it so tools like this are fun cuz they can help keep my characters personalities interesting and different. I'm sure someone else has mentioned something like this on here before but in case not, wanted to share.
While the body options are very inclusive! and cover a wide range of people, (great job btw) we seem to have lost some of the more "traditionally" feminine and masculine body qualities. Not all women, of course, but many! have softer builds and not all men either, but many tend to have sharper, more angular forms. What’s missing is a way to represent softness or sharpness independently of body mass.! please!!!! :_:
What makes it better is that the bodies are unisex so you really can make your para however you please. I think that’s really sweet if you want to make a para that looks like you and you might be built a different way than others
That is really weird that the saving would cause such a stutter. I would think that saving should be possible if the game is properly multi-threaded. Also the lot impostors is a very good idea for performance. One thing that obviously gives it away is that the windows become opaque and therefore you no longer see into the lot that is being replaced. You could solve this by allowing only items that are view of an opening in the house to be viewable but likely it is not needed because you would only see them if you are looking closely at these unloaded buildings. I wonder if there could be a setting for loading more lots at once for higher tier systems.
i really hope that we get to see more of what the other age groups look like in paralives. Specifically infants and toddlers
I really like the idea of lot impostors. The results seem really neat!!
The Paras look like a bunch of Maggie's or at least like they are related to her, I thought for a moment it was her even, but realized there are differences, but they are cute like her though. It was funny when they put the clown nose on the Para with the old Hollywood look, that would be funny, to be all dressed up like that, and then put on a clown nose, lol!
Glad to see Jeremie back writing some posts for us! The imposter lots is super cool to read about. I can't wait to play the game!
@paralives how to email the team to be added to the talent pool. Thank you ☺️
I realize this may not be the right place to post this, but I have a request: The next time you guys do a stream where you have live play--not build mode or paramaker mode--could you get in closer to the para so we can see how they interact with other paras or the environment? Rina tends to play from above rather than close.
Some additional 50's hairstyles and clothing options would be amazing :) That's my jam in RL.
It's awesome that you guys have so many customization options.
Town autonomy is one of those things I'm SUPER interested in. I love the idea of visiting the gym and actually meeting paras there who feel like they belong in a gym rather than a random grab-bag of paras! Like, if you want to meet a specific type of para to make friends with, it makes sense to visit a place where you may find such a person. I'm really into art, for example, and making like-minded friends has been a matter of seeking out the sort of places where I might meet them.
Random idea. We've heard that at night the town will be more quiet and there will be fewer people on the streets walking around (good). I thought it would be funny if every once in a while you see during the night hours one NPC sleepwalking. This would be rare, *not* every night, some kind of "Easter egg". This could be a fun little animation, maybe they sleepwalk a bit "cartoonishly" or with a "ZZZZ" caption above their head. When you click on them instead of "Talk to X" you get "Wake X up". Random idea: I generally prefer realism and playing straight, so I wouldn't want the game to be this goofy all the time, that's why I said I would make this a rare occasion, but every once in a while this could be fun.
Thanks for uploading this for those of us who missed it live. Rina is always such a lovely host!
I don't remember if we've already seen this in some of the streams, but I think it would add more realism if the NPCs didn't all march on with purpose to their destinations, but maybe you can make them stop to check their phones every once in a while, or stop to look at the windows of shops, I would love if when two NPCs cross paths they wave to each other. I read a reply that for now they will walk alone and not together, I understand, I hope that someday we'll see them in pairs or in little groups Can we have also scenes with NPCs that don't move but are static (like they sit on benches and talk to each other)? Or you prefer not because they are "stealing" the spot to the playable character? It would also be cool to see walking around NPCs with "special functions" like mailman, delivery, policemen, construction workers (they wouldn't visit shops but go around doing their jobs)
Inzoi has something similar, zois sometimes fix their shoe or look around, etc. Its a very cool idea and much more realistic
Side note (not really related to this particular stream), what are gonna be be the computer requirements for this? I am getting ready to build a computer and I want my computer to be built basically for paralives. I know develop is still a ways away but computers are expensive and I need time to get the parts
the system requirements were released a little while ago, i think you can see them on steam, you can also ask about them on discord
Is there going to be a scarfs in the game? I would like to see one or two as "necklaces" so I would be able to add it to different outfits. Probably something to worry about when seasons are fully developed. Just an idea, I'm sure it's been mentioned before and is probably in the works already.
Nice, I like the ghost building solve.
I love how many suggestions from the original streams we’ve seen have been taken into account since postponing early access in order to improve the game. I’m super excited for this to come out
Thank you so much for the auto-save feature. I think a few of us can relate to the horror of a sudden crash and not remembering when you last saved the friggin game!! 😭 Also love the different paras in the vid, so many different styles 😍 And I can't wait to see what all the NPCs are up to 💕🌇
Silly question, but I like to test the limits/possibilities of this mod system: if for whatever reason I want my Para to live in a "ghost town", is it possible to make that NO ONE is out on the streets? :-D
I assume it would be, I hadn't even considered that! That's very exciting if possible, imagine the different 'world flavors' you could build with that.
So amazing! I start to miss jeremías posts, do excited for may 25
I like the townie autonomy system and the autosaving! Can you go back and choose a different autosave file if a para dies or something similar, or does the new autosave replace the previous saves?
There's only one save slot per game, so autosave will replace the previous ones. Having multiple slots is totally something I'd like to add!
Hello, I've been thinking about a system for default NPCs created in Paramaker. It would be useful to be able to save facial and body morphology; for example, I could take default eyes, modify their shape, and have an option to save them as usable eyes for the NPC creation system in live mode. I know nothing about video game development; my idea might slow the game down. A while ago, I played The Sims, and the NPCs were really poorly designed. Even when I modified them, the game only spawned new NPCs, not the ones I had changed.
That's a neat idea! Right now NPCs are premade characters (either fictional or based on Patreon rewards), so they are not randomly generated. If you modify a premade character and overwrite it, it should spawn like you edited them. Thank you!
this was a really fun stream and article! NPC behaviors r so cool!
Woohoo! So glad you enjoyed c:
As a person with cheek piercings, it's SO COOL that they are in the game right away!
Really unfortunate to hear about the only one mole thing i thought you could place multiple :/ it'd be great if that was added at some point! The no socks with sandals is very funny lol, is that a bug? or somesort of a technical thing? I don't think i saw alot of high waisted bottom options? maybe i'm wrong but if not it would be nice to see some of those :) Also i would've thought Miki's hair was the longest! that's interesting that it isn't 🤔 It would be cool to see this stream again but with a masculine Para instead! And i saw in the control panel "Required Calendar Event" for the lot requirements does that mean you can set it so Paras can only visit on weekends or at a certain time of day? Can you set lot requirements for the players household lot aswell? This whole system's very exciting! it'll be lots of fun to get in there and mess with it :) Finally (lol) I was wondering this at the last livemode livestream but I'm not sure if i commented: How do you un-visit a lot? in the livestream when Rina loaded in a lot and then left we could still see inside it and lower/raise the walls and i thought that could be pretty hard on performance if lots only unload once you close the game?
Calendar events are not something I can elaborate much right now, they might be used in the future when players are able to schedule events (parties, etc.) and things of that nature You can 'visit' one lot at a time, so if you visit another one, the first one will get unloaded. There can be a few fully loaded lots at once without impacting performance, so that's not too big of an issue
The stream is so fun to watch. The Townie autonomy seems great and has lots of potential. The clown nose being in the piercing section doesn't bother me, but I am a Sims 2 player, so I am used to modded satchels being in the eyeshadow section for example. So excited to get my hands on this game in a few months!
Glad you enjoyed it!! We can't wait for you to play c:
Thank you so much for all your effort and the logic behind everything. I think your solutions are great! I do have one question, though: When an NPC goes into their house, they simply disappear in front of their door, which I think is fine. But is it the same if it's the house or a shop right next to my loaded property? I think it would be better if at least one building on each side of a loaded property had basic animations. To explain: My character is in their house and lives on a street with several houses/shops on each side. It would be good if the doors of at least one house on each side would open when an NPC wants to "go in," or if the exterior lights on these properties would be on, without necessarily having to load those properties. As a player, you see these properties next to your own most often and pay more attention to details there. Three houses down, you don't really notice whether the doors open when an NPC goes inside. I hope what I'm trying to say here makes sense.
I get what you mean, but I don't think we'll be able to make a change like that for multiple technical reasons. I hope it's not too jarring for you when you try the game out! Thank you for the comment!
having impostor lots is such a smart solution! i had been wondering how the game performance would be impacted by an open world and i'm really impressed by everything i've heard so far! and the auto save feature sounds promising too, nothing more annoying than losing an hour of progress because i forgot to save haha thank you for the post <3
This looks super promising, I love that there will be deep logic that goes into deciding which paras will be likely to visit which lots...and that we'll be able to mod it so easily. One thing I'm wondering, can you add a -1 instead of a +1? (so for example a para who hates books would get a -1 to visiting a library)
Yes, absolutely!
Random idea, do townies ever, or can they choose to go on a walk together? Like if they have a close relationship and are both free, it would be cute if you saw two friends or a couple or a parent and their child walking together.
That could be cute, but town autonomy is right now pretty much an individual character system. Thank you for the question!
Will Paras always be out an about to fill the town (apart from night), or will some Paras stay home depending on their personality (if they're not very social for example)?
Good question! I don't think we have rules for characters to just stay home, but that could be a nice addition! I think the reasoning is that townies going about their days and filling up the town is more interesting than having them stay home, invisible to the rest of the world!
It's great that townies will go places autonomously but have you also set it up so they do it at times that make sense? I assume they will go tp work according to their schedule but for example I would find it more realistic if at night time most townies were at home and not randomly walking around or visiting shops. Was this considered?
Yes, time of day is taken into account, most lots are not "open" at night and townies will greatly prefer staying home!
Is it just me or is that Sebastian (or another para) hiding in the right corner of the house on that screen? 😂 Some questions please 😊 1- Will all townies in early access already have predefined autonomies based on their jobs, skills, etc (will they come with these advanced accordingly to their story arc?) 2- Do these movements change through the week? For example, during the week they go to the gym 3 days, and the other 2 to the park to do yoga instead. Or are they always having the same movements on a daily basis? 3- Other then casually on the streets or places we visit, how else could we find a specific para on the town? Thank you for the post and for the stream this week! Was great to see how versatile the paramaker is. Only request would be more long hairstyles with nice volume 😊
longer hairstyle may be a problem for animation, when they sit for example ! so I don't think we'll have any VERY long hairstyles.
Hi Jérémie, thanks for this post ! Wow. WOW. The insanity that is Paralives' customization continues to astonish me. We'll be able to mod town autonomy ?! That's unprecedented. Genuinely this makes me very excited (although the UI right now reminds me a lot of Project Zomboid's XD ) because there are so many things that seem doable with this. I'm just "worried" about how many categories the Steam Workshop will have XD I hope Steam doesn't have a limitation for tags, especially once game versions come into play, hahaha !!! "if you make a house, then sell it, or switch to a different household, an impostor will be generated and used instead" Just to make sure I understand correctly : impostor lots are created based on how the lot looks, right ? So if we change a building's outside appearance, then sell it, the impostor lot will look like the changed building ; or is it more like a database of buildings and one is assigned at random if the basegame building is changed ? Also it reminds me of an adjacent question I've been having : what are the rules for changing public lots like Bloom or the Edwards & Co. Factory ? We can't live on these lots if we want them to remain functional, but let's say I want to turn the factory into a trendy restaurant, how would that work ? And if I modify the factory to be a restaurant, will it still look abandoned with the impostor lot ?
Howdy! Thank you for the kind words. The impostor is generated using the actual lot, so if you change a building then sell it, the impostor will change to match what you did. Without cheats or devtools, it wont be possible to buy "Public" lots like stores or parks, however, with devtools you'd be able to change their type to whatever you want (eveven residential), if you buy Edwards & Co and turn it into a spiffy restaurant, when the lot is not loaded, the impostor will look like what you changed it to! Thank you again for the questions!
The loading in lots in “chunks” reminds me of Minecraft render distances- such a great idea to use with an open world!! So excited :)
I like the idea of imposter lots to save on resources. It looks like the imposter lot has a lower level of detail compared to the loaded lot, which is great. How do NPCs interact with the imposter lots? Say if an NPC is going home and their lot is not loaded, will the front door function to “let them in”?
They will walk up to the front door, then disappear! It's all one big static 3D model, so the doors can't really "work"; having the door open would also mean you could see inside the empty (no walls, items or floors) shell, and that could be quite jarring. Thank you!
Sounds like you're working very hard to make this game work nicely. Thanks for taking the time. These additions and improvements sound good!
The game is looking amazing, I can’t wait to get my hands on it, well done Paralives team!
Will the lots load in and replace the "imposter lots" if you are visiting an NPC at their "imposter lot" home?
Yep! Lots visited by the player will always be loaded.
Does the imposter house have greener, non see through windows compared to the real one? It's all these small features that make a game feel fully fleshed, loved the update! ❤️
Yep! They're not see-through because the inside of the house is empty (no floor, no walls, no items), so having them be transparent could get quite jarring!
I love the idea of keeping the world alive - especially given that it's moddable, too! Just the ability to see life going on beyond our townies will be great. Have the team taken a look at historical playthroughs like Alice and Kev for additional and unique playstyles, too?
We're currently focusing more on "traditional" gameplay styles, but we're very interested in all the other playstyles as well! Will be a fun thing to tinker with in the future!
All of these sound really exciting! Can't wait to see the next live mode stream.
Wow, you did amazing job! I really love and appreciate what you did for npc autonomy! It makes in-game world feel more real, super real I would say!💛💛💛
I love the auto-save! I lost my progress more often than I'd like to admit. Thx for everything ❤️
The imposter lot looks like a great solution, thanks for working hard guys :)
This all sounds very impressive and you guys did a very good job on this! The only question I have: do fake objects have door mechanics? Would the NPCs still walk through the walls into buildings or walk through the doors into the fake object? Thanks in advance!
Impostor lot doors have no functionality, NPCs will walk up to the front door and then disappear "inside" the impostor
You guys make me so excited for this game!!! Yay
Omg I love the progression of the towns autonomy!! Very well Implemented guys I love it 😍🤗