Simteract continues to maintain the news feed on the Steam page of Urban Venture, a very promising game under development. Today, the devs tell us about the garage, the nocturnal environment and especially the AI, which will undoubtedly be one of the pillars of this urban simulation.
Before getting to the heart of the matter, be aware that all the information you will read on Urban Venture is subject to change since the development, even if it is well underway, is still in its infancy.
The garage
The garage is going to be one of the central gameplay features of Urban Venture. A short video shows us a system of tabs at the top, allowing you to juggle between the fleet of vehicles, the character, the customizations, and a network tab which we know nothing about at the moment.
For vehicles, this is where you can customize, repair, refuel, and browse your fleet. Car parameters such as range, tire pressure and engine durability will be taken into account in its performance. You will also be able to buy and sell your cars from here, along with other functions the developers are still working on.
Traffic AI
TrafficAI™ is a term already mentioned in the previous Urban Venture blog post. As a reminder, this is a technology that places cars on virtual roads and behaves as they do in the real world. The algorithm is based on the study of real autonomous vehicles. The immersion promises to be crazy. Watch in this timelapse how a simple crossroads can become alive:
And the AI goes far, while the game is far from over. Traffic has real behavior. Drivers are able to start honking when they are "frustrated" (too long waiting in a traffic jam?). Traffic jams will also be less frequent at night than during the day. And that last point is important because Simteract absolutely wants players to experience full day and night cycles on the game's roads, just like a taxi would in real life.
The AI is also able to react to dynamic weather. When it starts to rain, for example, there will be fewer people on the street and the braking distance is increased, cars can drive more slowly and so on.
Nighttime improvement
“The night in Urban Venture is a delicate subject. When we started implementing a day/night cycle, we had the challenge of lighting the roads with streetlights. » raises the developers, who have worked to make the environment as realistic as possible. Here is an image that sums up the work well:
That's all for now, and that's not bad. It's always nice to be able to follow a project in its development with a visibly passionate team. We remind you that Urban Venture is planned for the end of the year, or even the beginning of 2023, in early access, and that at present there is no competing game capable of offering so much realism. And it's not Taxi Simulator, under development at Woodland Games, which will change the game.
Don't forget to put Urban Venture in your wishlist to be informed of the latest news on Steam.