That may edge into real world politics a bit (since RFKramer has established that there’s no really big geopolitical divergences aside from fictional people getting the positions, it gets into real world politics a lot).
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Hmm, do you think democratization of these countries is impossible? Or do you think it is possible, albeit extremely difficult?
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Me myself? I don’t know enough about the situation and history to say. And that’s all I’ll say about that.
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OK, I think it’s possible, but I’d like to see more community broader opinions on this point.
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If you’re talking about the real world, I don’t think the game thread is the right one for it. If you’re talking about in-game, my answer stands, until I see more of the foreign relations B plots.
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Hmmm, so do you think this decision is appropriate for game design?
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I don’t know how the foreign relations B plot will unfold, and I don’t know if there are any paths planned where “failure is the only option”. So when we see more of the foreign relations plot (post in game midterms, probably after some more domestic stuff), I’ll be able to make a better judgment on whether it’s a good idea in this game.
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I was convinced. It may be too early to judge. By the way, what do you mean by “failure is the only option”? I’d like to hear it for reference.
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I wanted to quickly write about this for some clarity. This person happens to be one of my incredible Patrons and they suggested the possibility to be able to democratize more nations throughout the course of the game, namely Saudi Arabia and Egypt as they’re brought up during the Middle East trip.
In my current outline, this is not a possibility for two main reasons: firstly, there just isn’t any proven means for the United States to essentially force a democratic regime change without using military force. Economic sanctions or incentives may be able to improve human rights conditions over time, but no autocrat is going to give up control over a purely economic threat. As we’ve seen especially in the case of Russia and Egypt to a lesser extent, dictators live in luxury regardless of the economic conditions of their population.
Secondly, Egypt and Saudi Arabia in this instance are extremely close, long-standing allies of the United States. If the U.S. were to rashly invoke economic sanctions, cut off arms deals, and end mutual trade agreements, not only would it completely destabilize the Middle East, but many of America’s adversaries such as Iran, China, and Russia would almost certainly attempt to sway the KSA and Egypt to their sphere of influence. Even if they did not sway them, their drop in influence and power without American aid would still stand to benefit them massively.
In sum – I really just did not see a realistic way to write this into the story. I really wanted to create a more realistic (though with some exceptions for storytelling purposes) story, and I was just unable of seeing a way to keep with that goal while writing this in. Additionally, there is already a planned instance during the specified war chapter where, in a victorious post-war scenario, the United States will be able to work to transition an autocracy into a democracy. Given the story’s focus on domestic policy, the already-existing democratization storyline, and the unrealistic nature of a U.S.-driven transition to democracy in a foreign power, I just didn’t see this as a feasible addition to the People’s House.
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Pretty much anything you can think of is possible I’d imagine. Various outcomes exist on a sliding scale of likelihood and difficulty in being able to be carried out.
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Wow that’s exactly what I expected and that is very positive… You actually have to do politics
And you have to manage your live
I don’t want to be corrupt or anything that’s why I have to ask why do you start with 15%corruption? I accepted no bribe or anything so I expected to have 0%
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As a preface: this might be considered a spoiler depending on your play style and how much you want to know going into a game, so I’ll use that feature below just in case. This is definitely not a major spoiler, but I know some people don’t like to know anything before their first playthrough so I’ll do it just as a precaution!
This isn’t something that’s directly mentioned in the story yet, but there’s two ways of figuring out why you start at 15%. (I should also add that these may not be available in the public version of the demo, as the Patreon-only version is the only up-to-date one). The first way is by talking to Bill Cassidy during the inaugural ball, who will ask if you “enjoyed his help” during the election.
There’s also a feature in the private demo which is a sort of wiki for all the characters. If you go to Bill Cassidy’s page, it’ll mention that he was a top donor of your campaign. So, while it’s a bit hidden, the MC accepted quite a bit of money from him during the campaign in exchange for some promises that will come up later in the story.
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Will the player’s party always lose control of congress after midterms? Or will they be able to keep a majority if having high popularity?
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As of right now, you will lose control of the House of Representatives, though the number of seats the opposition party has is changeable.
For example, if you invest money in boosting candidates and are popular, the opposition party may only have a few seat majority in the House, as opposed to a landslide if you’re very unpopular. Haven’t decided if the Senate will be possible to keep in your control, but the House will go in the opposite direction regardless.
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IMO, the Senate should be possible to control or even expand and here’s why:
Precedent: 3 of the last 4 presidents have expanded their control over the Senate
Cycles: and part of the reason for why is that depending on the last senate cycle, the path to keeping the Senate can be relatively easy. In this game’s case, the president who came before us seems like he won a decently sized victory in his first go, meaning that if he had coattails, it’s going to be a harder map for the opposition
Gameplay: we already know we’ll lose the House. Giving us something to play for in the Senate is a good incentive to care about the game.
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Also as a general note: I apologize for not putting out my regular Writer’s Diary – between upcoming Thanksgiving plans and the immense of work that I’ve been putting into final exams, papers, and presentations, I have just not had the time to write one.
If I have the time, I’ll get it out sometime this week, but I don’t expect that it’ll be published until this weekend.
Thanks for your understanding,
R.F.
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Writer’s Diary #20
November 23rd, 2022
Hey all, and happy Thanksgiving Eve to my American friends. I hope all of you are spending time with family or friends, and like me are looking forward to an excellent meal tomorrow. I apologize for the delay in getting this update out, though I promise I’ve been hard at work.
The Updates
- In exceeding even my own goals, I’ve completely written the leg of the trip set in Japan and South Korea, as well as started to write the much-anticipated meeting with President Li of China.
- I have also decided to push the creation of SATO (see last update for more), to a later point in the story. As such, the main point of the trip will be more centered around signaling a heightened interest in the region, and boosting relations with traditional allies.
- In all, I’ve been writing quite a bit into this, and should be completely done with the trip to Asia by the end of November, with the entirety of Chapter III done by the end of December (hopefully). The Patreon demo will also be updated to include the Asia trip as soon as I finish writing it and my bug testers ensure it’s playable
- I’m also hoping to, in line with one of my earlier posts, publish an updated public demo including the entirety of the new prologue and Chapters I and II. The Patreon demo will still have more chapters, but I think a public update is long overdue.
- It’s still my hope that I’ll be able to spruce up the prologue a bit more before doing this, but it is my promise that there will be a public update as my Christmas gift to you all.
Because of all the final exams and papers due, I have unfortunately not had the chance to really begin working on my short story featuring Jackson Smalls, the MCs Chief of Staff. This is still something I’d love to write in the future, but I wanted to prioritize working on Chapter III rather than doing this side-project.
In all, Happy Thanksgiving, and I hope to be able to announce a demo update for my Patrons by the end of the month!
Updated Word Count: 167,000 words
Patreon Link: RFKramer is creating The People's House | Patreon
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Got some House of cards vibes here
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Loving the progress.
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Any reasoning behind having a Marine Corps background available? All of our modern presidents (Kennedy-present) with military experience were Navy veterans.
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Will there be appearance customization options in the final product?
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Will there be more options for Cabinet picks?
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