I hope in the final version, we will have some kind of Achievements page that tells us which endings we've gotten/need to get still, and give us a completion percent for other things like conversations between idols (assuming those are random every game.) Even better might be some kind of plot branch flowchart that shows which choices we haven't made at each chapter?
Anyways, the game and writing is great so far! Very excited to get more endings!
1. I'm not sure if this is a bug or on purpose, but it seems like I can't complete objectives for leveling up Promotions, before unlocking that tier. For example, I launched a radio show before I was on the "Launch a Radio Show" tier, and once I was on that tier, it wasn't counted as being completed, so I had to launch a radio show again. (Hope that made sense.) In my opinion, my actions should count, even if I do them before unlocking that tier?
2. I had max influence with an idol, and found out she was bullying another idol. I tried to influence her to stop bullying, but it told me I didn't have enough influence, despite having max influence with her.
3. I tried moving the bullied idol into a new subgroup, but that didn't fix the bullying problem. I thought that moving idols into a different subgroup than their bully was supposed to end the bullying problem.
4. I was trying to launch a show to fulfill an idol's wish (something like Have Music TV Show with Host) but she went on hiatus, and it replaced her with another idol before I launched it. Once the idol was back from hiatus, I launched the show, but saw the new idol was hosting it. I re-launched the show with the original girl with the wish, but it didn't count as fulfilling her wish. I feel like it should count.
5. One of my idols went on hiatus due to depression from bullying. At one point, there was two minus signs by her name - does this mean she's being bullied by two people, or is it a glitch? Also, she continued being bullied while on hiatus, so her mental stamina never recovered. I could have sworn the bullying used to stop when idols went on hiatus, but I could be wrong? Maybe they are just cyberbullying her remotely... oof.
Personally I think a slight element of randomness would be nice when it comes to singles, rather than everything being very formulaic all the time. It feels like there's some kind of strict numerical formula determining how many singles we sell, aside from the "trending" genres/lyrics. Maybe there's a 1/100 chance your debut single will go viral and rocket your group to fame, or maybe a single will "flop" once in a while and actually make fans leave the group - it certainly happens with real groups.
Tbh, I don't see the point of hiring idols as staffers. By the time I have idols start graduating, a couple years into the game, there's no point for me to hire my idol to become a low-level staffer when I already have 100 million yen and all of my staffers are 10-stars. Is there something I'm missing, or something new that's been added recently? (Sorry for my ignorance if so!)
Maybe this is just me but I think it might be nice to have a few random happy events amongst all the chaotic cults, sweaty handshakes, misprinted CD's and everything else that goes down lol.
Like "An elementary schooler recognized (idol) in the street and gave her her favorite teddy bear, (idol's) training is multiplied by 1.5 for 1 week" or something. I love the drama but a little wholesomeness might be nice too ;)
Oh yeah another side note... I don't understand the buzz system, and I'm not sure if you've done away with it since it doesn't appear on the screen anymore?
But it seems to me that the media is strangely inconsequential now. I had a TV show for several weeks and only got 53 new fans from it. I see no point in having media except to advance my promotions levels. I don't want to spend millions of yen to get 53 new fans when I already have 100,000+...
Unless it is adding buzz and buzz brings in a ton of new fans? I'm not really sure haha. But personally I'd either make it so you get a larger amount of new fans from media or make it clear how many fans buzz is adding.
I also don't understand the new cafe system well, if you hover over the cafe it says something like "1,000 new fans per idol per shift" but I didn't notice my fan count going up any more than ~20 per day. I'm not sure if this is a glitch, or if my current fans are moving to "biasing" that idol (I don't know the J-pop word for bias sorry!)
I played through the new update for a few hours and this is my idea about the random events.
I'd love to see longer story events that extend over a few weeks, and maybe have several options which branch off to other options that will appear later on. For example, the cult story was really unique lmao. But it ends so quickly... I chose "cease and desist" and everything stopped there. Why not choose "cease and desist," but the cult doesn't listen, then a few weeks later a related choice pops up, such as "The cult didn't listen to you and in fact has started sending one of your idols creepy letters. What will you do now? A. Monitor the idol's mail or B. get the police involved" Like... all the stories now just feel very low-stakes and repetitive. Worst case scenario, you maybe lose some influence with an idol and a few million dollars (which is nothing in later gameplay.) It just feels like rolling a dice, rather than actually being immersed in a story about idols.
I'm just a little worried about the finished gameplay being repetitive. This being given 1 choice for 1 event seems like it'll get somewhat old unless there's like 100+ random events with higher stakes. Although this gets me wondering whether Idol Manager is supposed to be more of a board game with cards and dice, a visual novel with emotions and real stakes involved, or a mix of both... hm. I'm very excited to see where this game ends up, and hope you have lots more content planned. The game gets richer with each update and I think most of us wouldn't mind waiting longer for a better game.
While there's nothing wrong with the current graduation system, I'm kind of curious: I assume idols in real life sign some kind of contract about how long they have to stay? I know K-pop idols sign a 7 year contract but I don't know about Japanese idol groups. I don't imagine an idol can stick around for only 6 months then be like "I'm outta here y'all bye!" and suffer no consequences for it. After all, a lot of money is invested into training a new idol. Any company would want that idol to return them a profit or pay a fee if they leave before their contract is up.
For the final game, I think it'd be interesting to have a little more gameplay surrounding graduation. For example, being able to haggle with idols over their graduation, or know exactly why they are wanting to graduate. Kind of going off of 8thPrince's ideas above. Such as, "I feel my mental health isn't being taken care of in this group" or "I feel I never get center position," maybe you can fulfill her wish to keep her from leaving. Or maybe an idol says, "I'm too old, I think it's time for me to go," you could offer her her own TV show to get her to stay longer, or maybe have her work at a very slow rate so she can have more of an outside life in her late 20's.
It seems to me right now that idols leave after some unspecified period of time and I don't know why or get any input in it. Seems as if it'd be more complex in real life.
Also I'd love to see more consequences and drama surrounding the election. For real idols, it'd suck to go down several spots, or to not even be in the top 10. It might make them rethink staying in the group. Maybe other idols who place in the top 3 will expect more money or opportunities. In the game right now, after the election everyone goes on with life as usual, except some idols have a few stars of fame added.
Anyways I'm super excited to see how fleshed out the game will be with new writing added! The core gameplay is really fun now but it just lacks that replayability without the drama, struggles, and pretty much humanity of the idols and their fans. Not sure if this is an unpopular opinion but I do hope a little bit of darkness is added. I know many real idols go through terrible things behind the screen of cute costumes, pop-y music, and smiles. I'd love to see some light shined onto that.
Also I'd love to have some faster way to tell idol's relationships to you. Maybe a "Sort by influence" button or something? It's hard for me to use the socializing aspect because I don't feel like individually clicking through everyone's profile to see who I have high influence with, even though I KNOW I have high influence with some of them.
This is what I've been doing! Pretty much creating a modeling agency first and foremost and a music group second LOL.
However, I believe the idols acting unhappy and leaving the group is a new addition to this update (?) I've never seen idols act unhappy about not having music and concerts. Very interesting! When I did this in past updates the idols were happy to sit there and work as models more or less. I am kind of excited to see them start acting like actual people rather than money-making robots in upcoming updates haha.
I also feel the newer update has made things like releasing singles and concerts more expensive. In the past, I'd be sitting on piles of cash once I started having monthly concerts. Now, it can be really hard to upgrade to the next concert venue size even when I have some cash sitting around. Releasing physical single + concert + election is really expensive too!
Ah sorry, I didn't notice the ability to hover over the past singles in the new update. Even so, I think it'd be nice to display a little logo of the face of whoever was the center. I don't really have my idols names memorized but I know their face and hairstyle haha. I can then keep in my head "blondie and bob cut were the last 2 centers so I won't put them this time."
As far as contracts, I mean when the contract window pops up with the 3 idols to choose from. It'd be nice if alongside the new stamina logos, there was perhaps a minus sign, showing minus how much stamina they are losing to contracts per week or something like that. I usually have 15 idols once I have enough money and that's too many contracts for me to keep track of without it being displayed. So it sucks when I accidentally give an idol 4 contracts because she has high stats but then I have to cancel 1 or 2 so she's not losing like 60 stamina a week.
When we click on the page with previously released singles, I would like a little button displaying who the center of that single was. I like to try to have a different center every single so that everyone will have lots of stamina during concerts. As far as I know there is no way to tell this right now.
And I know this has been mentioned before but I'll bring it back up again. When getting girls into contracts (TV shows/advertisements) it'd be super useful to display how many contracts they're already in and how much stamina they're losing per week. If a girl is already losing 50 stamina per week I don't want to get her into any more contracts.
Also I'm not sure if anyone knows - what is the point of idol salaries? Will idols leave the group quickly if they are underpaid? I have never noticed a difference in paying idols to 50% satisfaction versus 200% satisfaction.
Anyways thank you for working hard on this game, every month I look forward to the next update!
I agree about auto save having gotten worse. Before, auto save would bring me right to the moment before the game crashed. Now I'm losing entire concert performances, upgrading song genres, song releases, etc. I was fine with the game crashing before because auto save was so good but now I lose so much!
I'm not 100% sure what you guys have in mind for the final release, so my bad if some of these are what you're already working on! Super fun game btw, I can't wait to play the released version :)
I know you guys are working on more relationship stuff between the idols and player, but I love drama and think it will really flesh out the game so here's some ideas:
-Idols gossipping about the group to the press or releasing secrets, either while in the group or after graduating. For example, if they're overworked and underpaid in the group, or if one certain member is known to be a bully, they might go gossip about it to the press after leaving. I feel that this is something that happens with idol groups in real life and will make the way you treat your idols extra important. Also it seems to me like the girls are basically irrelevant after they graduate, so it'd be cool if they still matter somewhat.
-More of a minor nitpick but they all seem to go onto pretty average things after graduating, like becoming an office worker or teacher. I think it'd add realism if their fame level impacts what they do after graduating. If an idol graduated with 10 star fame I'd imagine her to go on to become an actress, author, solo artist, etc. rather than have an office job or working at a hostess club. (My bad if this is already a thing, maybe I haven't graduated enough high-star idols to notice.)
-Events relating to the fame and safety of idols. For example, idols having stalkers, or being attacked by a fan at a fan meet. While it's sad, this is also something that has certainly happened in real life. It might cause an idol to have depression, or take a hiatus.
-I know a lot of people have mentioned this but having subgroups would be cool, or even solos.
-Maybe more tangible repercussions for idols being bad singers or dancers. An idol can have a singing and dancing level of 1 and she can reach 10 star fame and no one will say a thing about it. I think in real life, an idol would get made fun of if they were unskilled. Might be even worse if the entire group has poor singing and dancing skills.
-Idols leaving the group on bad terms. Certainly not everyone has a happy and peaceful graduation in real idol groups!
-I think it'd be nice to have more rewards in the late game. Maybe sending idols on a really nice vacation, buying them really nice houses, etc. I know this is just the beta so I'm sure I'm missing out on a lot but as of now once I have 1,000,000+ fans and a bunch of money in the bank, it's like, "Now what?"
Anyways I love this game and the beta is already addictive! Thank you guys for working hard on this game, I'm always looking forward to the next update.
