This feature came in to being when I discover the website: http://www.gamediscovery.com/ideas/. For those who haven't been to it, or clicked on the link, it's a website for amateur computer game designers, looking for ideas how they can make their own games. This includes an ideas section where people can submit their own ideas for games. Finding this section got me thinking, could I come up with my own idea. As you'll read early on existing games such as Roller Coaster Tycoon where my starting point, but my objective was to come up with ideas to distinguish it from games like that. This is a result of an extended amount of brainstorming and deciding what ideas I'd use in such a game.
 

The idea I have for a game is a deeper version of the Theme Park Inc or Roller Coaster Tycoon series, with more emphasis on ride selection, and park management, as opposed to the emphasis being mostly on the layout design. The problem was how to avoid it becoming a case of setting up the park, and then having little to do until you’ve made enough money to upgrade. That’s what eventually brought me to the idea of a game where you are the manager of a travelling funfair business.

You start the game with no rides, so the first thing you need to do is acquire them. You would be given a choice of several companies selling rides of various quality, and with various options of the rides coming with upgrades or theming when you purchase them instead of having to pay extra for them later. You could also have a company that rents out a limited number of the basic rides for you to use, for a set period of time, which would mean higher running costs, and you couldn’t customise the ride but you wouldn’t have to pay out front to start with. Another purchasing option that would be good to include would be a second hand adds section, where a random assortment of rides would be for sale, at a cheaper than new price, but would be less reliable, and have more wear and tear than new rides.

As well as the rides there would be other sections to buy items. There would be a food and drink section, where you can purchase items starting at small snack wagons, going up to food tents, and even large food and drink halls. You could also purchase games and amusements to make extra money, starting with small prize booths, going up to arcades, and even bowling alleys or a laser warrior’s attraction. You would also need to purchase fair facilities such as toilets, seating areas, a security centre, or a wristband booth where you could sell adult and kiddie wristbands, and set which rides visitors can ride with them. You could also purchase a perimeter fence here to increase fair security, and you could add an entrance booth to the fence, where you could charge an entrance fee, but this could reduce the amount people would pay to go on rides. Another facility you could buy would be various stages and exhibition halls, which can be upgraded to provide entertainment for the guests and exhibitions such as an animal house, freak show, or a Santa’s Grotto. You could charge to enter exhibitions, and putting on a show on a stage could improve a fairs atmosphere, and raise the amount people will pay for rides, as they’re getting a free show.

Once you’ve got your attractions you can go to your lot and upgrade them. There would be a theming section; you could go to an airbrushing company, who could paint your rides in a choice of classic funfair images, or with images from popular culture. If you had more money you could go to a theming company who would customise your ride with models and decorations with a choice of several themes. Decorating your ride will increase it appeal, and your choice of theme or decoration will have an effect on how the ride appeals to various groups of visitors. You’ll need to choose carefully still as some themes will work with some rides better than others. For instance a futuristic theme won’t work very well with a ghost train, nor will classic funfair airbrushing work on a modern thrill ride.

You will also be able to buy upgrades to use for certain rides, such as shows and exhibitions for stages, disco lights, water sprays and spinning cars. Once purchased you can decide if you will use them at a particular event. These will affect the specs and appeal of a ride, for instance having live actors on a ghost train will increase it’s running costs, and reduce it’s appeal to younger age groups, but will increase it’s appeal and the amount of money older age groups will pay for it.

Once you’ve got a selection of rides you can book a fair. These will be in various locations around the country. Which ones are available to you will be affected by a couple of factors. One will be money, as some places will charge you more to hold a fair than others. Another will be your rides, as you get a better range of rides, and rides of better quality more places will let you hold an event there. Another factor is your fairs reputation, as you hold successful events, which people leave happy, your reputation will increase and more places will hire you.

There are several things to consider when booking a fair. To start with there’s the cost of hiring the land. There’s also the length of the fair, for some you may have  a choice of what dates you want to hire the land for, but some linked to a specific event would have set dates. For every fair you will have to pay the cost of setting up each ride, as well as its running costs, so you will have to make more money quickly on a fair lasting only a short length of time to turn a profit than a longer lasting one. However a longer one will mean your rides will be at it for a longer length of time, during which you won’t be able to use them at another event, even one where it could make more money. You also risk locals loosing interest in the fair after a certain time on a longer lasting fair, so would need to appeal to a more wide spread audience.

Another consideration is the space at the fair. There will be seven or eight basic maps, starting with a small one with only Seven single ride slots, up to large ones with 50 ride slots, including ones next to each other to allow rides like roller coasters and water rides which will take up several consecutive ride slots. There could also be some extra custom maps for specific events.

Another factor would be local wealth, and price tolerance. Fairs in richer areas will have people who could potentially spend more money, and some areas will have people willing to pay more for rides and attractions than others, but these fairs will most likely be harder and more expensive to get than less prosperous ones.

Some events may also have some restrictions. For instance some family locations may disallow rides that are of to high a thrill level, events in a town centre may disallow fences, a fair at a music event may only allow a fair that has a stage as one of it’s attractions. You wouldn’t be allowed to book an event with restrictions you couldn’t meet, and if you do book one, and don’t comply with the restrictions your company’s reputation would be seriously damaged.

Another thing to consider will be the people dynamic of the fair. There are 6 groups to consider, parents with tots, family fun seekers, family thrill seekers, teens, thrill seekers, and undesirables. This will give you an idea of what rides will appeal the most to your visitors, as well as what security measures would be appropriate. This dynamic will change according to what advertising methods you employ, and on a longer lasting fair through word of mouth, if one group has a good time, more people in that group will visit, and if people in a group have a bad time less of them will visit.

Another stat to consider will be the amount of passing trade, and the potential number of visitors. Passing trade refers to the number of people who will be in the area, regardless of your advertising and could potentially visit your fair if there’s something there to appeal to them. The potential visitors refer to the number of people who live close to the fair, and could be attracted as extra visitors to your fair with the right advertising or word of mouth.

Once you’ve booked a fair you’ll need to organise it. To do this there would be an advance time button, that would advance time by a month, or until the start of your next fair, when you’d have to organise it. There are a couple of things you’ll need to do. One is to decide what advertising, if any you’ll set up. You’ll have various forms of advertising ranging from posters and pamphlets, hiring an entertainer or promoter to go to a certain location, going up to advertising on local radio and TV which you can not only pay for, but try to target at a certain visitor group, such as a choice of advertising during children’s TV or during a music show, or sending a promoter to a school, a youth club or a night club.

You’ll also need to decide what staff to hire, you’ll automatically get basic staff to run rides and attractions, with some basic maintenance and cleaning included in your ride running costs, but for longer running, larger and more popular fairs you may well need to hire extra mechanics and cleaning staff to keep the fair running smoothly. Having a fair with rides which breakdown, or too much litter will leave people less happy, meaning they spend less and your reputation will suffer. You may also choose to hire security staff to deal with trouble makers and improve security at the event, or you can hire groups of entertainers to improve the atmosphere, which could help increase what people will pay per ride. You’d have a choice of several groups, such as people dressed as cartoon characters, circus acts, dancers or music acts. Each group will appeal to a different group of visitors.

You would also then need to decide what extras to add, such as a perimeter fence, and entrance booth or a wristband booth. All of these can effect how your fair will be run.

With these factors decided you’ll have to decide which rides and attractions to install. This will have a big effect on how your fair does; you would need to choose rides that will appeal the most to the groups visiting your event. For instance large thrilling rides won’t appeal as much at a family event, so are likely to get fewer riders, and having too many rides like this, and not enough family rides could even have a negative effect on the happiness of visitors.

When placing the rides you will also need to decide which upgrades to use to get the most out of them, and what to charge per ride. What people will pay will depend on the wealth of the area the fairs set in, and the appeal of the ride to particular dynamics of visitors. For instance groups with young children would pay more to ride a carrousel than a group of teenagers. This could also be affected by the time of year. People would pay a lot for a water ride during summer, but would pay a reduced amount in winter. People would pay a much larger amount for a ghost train or house, especially an upgraded one close to Halloween than they would at other times of year. An exhibition hall with a Santa’s Grotto upgrade could make a small fortune in the Christmas season, but have almost no one interested in it at any other time of year.

Most rides and attractions would fit in to one slot on a map, but there would be some exceptions. Larger rides, like a large Stage, water rides or flume rides would need several consecutive slots, like a 2 X 1 footprint, or a 3 X 1, 2 X 2, or 3X 2 space requirements.

You would also need to designate some slots as kiddie ride slots, food courts, and game areas. You could have just one slot, or several slots together to create larger kiddie areas or food courts. Once created this would split the slot in to 4 quarters, in which you could place one attraction in each quarter. In the kiddie ride area you could place kiddie rides, as well as seating areas, and some of the basic food courts. In food courts you can place the smaller food stalls, (larger food restaurants and halls would take up a whole slot on their own) seating and toilets. In the game areas you can place the smaller game and retail stalls (again larger ones will take an entire slot) as well as seating and basic snack stalls. The demand for toilets and food stores will depend on the fairs location. One in a town centre could go without them as the facilities already exist nearby, although not having them could take people away from the fair earlier than they would with them, but this wouldn’t be to big a problem unless it’s a particularly large fair. In a fair in a more rural location not having any facilities would cause people to leave early and unhappy.

On shorter lasting fairs you would have to make all these decisions at the start of the event. For longer events you could set the option to review it every so often, say once a week. At an event review you couldn’t make major changes such as changing rides or event facilities, but could make some minor changes, like hiring extra cleaning staff if litter has become a problem, doing more advertising, and changing the price of rides, and changing what upgrades are in use. If it’s a particularly long event, say over 2 months you would be able to do a major review once a month where you could change rides and facilities, but you would have to pay extra set up, and dismantling costs to do this.

As the game continues there will be extra factors to consider. One on going cost will be that if a ride is not being used at a fair you will have to pay the cost of keeping it in storage. This won’t be a large amount per ride, but as your fair increases and you get more rides this will go up, and you may decide you want to sell some of your less popular rides, or you’ll need to book larger or more events to ensure all of your rides are used as much as possible.

As rides get older there will be effects on them. As they are used it will have an effect on the rides reliability, meaning it could break down more, meaning you need more mechanics, and if you have too many rides breaking down it will effect the rides reputation. When a ride is in use at a fair the wear and tear on them will increase, this will affect the theming, and make them less appealing. The reliability will continuously drop at a slow rate and at a faster rate as the ride is used, and the wear and tear on a ride will increase as it’s used at a fair.

You will have the option to send a ride away for maintenance to increase its reliability, or to a theming company to reduce the wear and tear on it. Doing this will cost money and will mean the ride will be unavailable for a period of time. The less reliable the ride, or the more wear and tear the more it will cost to repair, the time it will be out of commission will stay at roughly the same, unless the reliability or wear and tear is allowed to get badly out of hand in which case it will be down for a longer length of time for major repairs.

There would be several modes of play. There would be a free mode, where you decide how much money you start with, what month of the year you start on, and make your fair from their.

There could also be campaigns you could play against computer opponents. You’d have challenges like who puts on the best or most profitable event on a pre determined date, who can make the most money from a fair at a pre decided location over a number of months. You will need to have enough money, and a good enough ride selection and reputation to book one of the events for the date. Another goal could be the first who can get enough money and fair reputation to hold an event at a piece of land, and hold a successful event their.

You could potentially have a multiplayer turn based game this way. You could have the option to play over the internet where each player would have to control their company for one month every day of the game. To make sure this would be possible you’d need to have a basic computer controller for people who don’t update their company each day, where the computer would assign rides to any fairs that come up, but wouldn’t do anything major like book a fair, buy, sell or alter a ride, or send a ride away for repairs.

A slight problem with this is how to make sure whoever goes first doesn’t have an advantage with the best pick of the second hand rides, and the first pick of events to book. To avoid this I think the best method is to only make purchased rides and booked events unavailable to other players at the end of the month their purchased. This could cause a slight problem where two people could buy the same ride from a second hand dealer or book the same event, and both benefit from that ride or event. This would be unrealistic, but it would prevent the first person to go having an unfair advantage.

One extra idea here is that some events could reduce their price if they remain unbooked as they get closer to the event. This gives an element of strategy, do you pay more to secure an event earlier, or try to get it cheaper.