Prison Architect

I played this for 7 hours today.

I've seen all that the alpha has to currently show. It's a broken game, but it's also obviously early in development... and most importantly it's still fun! It took me forever to find out how to get my prisoners to both stay entertained AND be employees, though. All I had to offer them was the Yard, which wasn't giving them nearly enough entertainment.

Note to everyone: Make sure you have tons and tons of food ready to be cooked. If a prisoner doesn't get their meal then they will start a riot in the cafeteria almost guaranteed. I lost many good guards during the beatings of fat naked men with batons because they were angry they didn't get their bacon.

Vrikk wrote:

I played this for 7 hours today.

Note to everyone: Make sure you have tons and tons of food ready to be cooked. If a prisoner doesn't get their meal then they will start a riot in the cafeteria almost guaranteed. I lost many good guards during the beatings of fat naked men with batons because they were angry they didn't get their bacon.

You don't want to know what happens when I don't get my bacon...

Robear wrote:

I'm a little intimidated with how to put my first prison together. I built what could be an intake area, but next I guess I need a food hall? At least the jail has a set of toilets now...

Do we have to provide restrooms for the staff? A commissary for them?

My best tip: Just learn by trial and error.

Story Time: It was my first time playing the game. The hints told you that you needed a holding cell and a cafeteria at the bare minimum. So I went to work creating these rooms and everything else I thought my prison could use. I hired some guards and then waited for the inmates to arrive. Sure enough, early in the morning the inmates arrive and the guards escort them all to the holding cells. Time passes, everything is going well. Noon arrives and it's time for lunch. The prisoners start to exit the holding cell when one of them turns to the other and whispers, "Where are the fences?" A couple seconds later all the inmates scatter and run for the hills.

That's right, I forgot to fence in my inmates! Live and learn.

Well, bought it today.

Tkyl: don't worry, I made that mistake too. I thought my prisoners would stay inside my carefully built shower/cells/canteen compound. I didn't realize that they could just walk out the door when a staff member came in and book straight for the hills.

Tkyl wrote:

That's right, I forgot to fence in my inmates! Live and learn.

I made the mistake of trying to expand my cell block during Free Time. I ordered my workers to demolish a wall, and half of my prisoners immediately sprinted out through the hole and escaped.
/facepalm

Been following this thing for months and the company since Uplink, but like Tom Chick, I don't have any interest in spending my time on unreleased products. You guys can go ahead and do all the bug testing for me.

I do, however, have no problem giving them my money now. I have not yet contributed, though, only because I can't decide between the name-in-game ($50) and face-in-game ($250) levels.

I'm dismayed at how long their alphas have lasted? I guess with as much money has already rolled in, they can take their sweet sweet time and mess with the gameplay systems all they want. Still it would be nice if were ready for release sometime this year.

GiantBomb totally sold me on this - I will be buying this sometime, sooner if they release a Linux version, later if I totally space on it and see it on a Steam sale.

muttonchop wrote:
Tkyl wrote:

That's right, I forgot to fence in my inmates! Live and learn.

I made the mistake of trying to expand my cell block during Free Time. I ordered my workers to demolish a wall, and half of my prisoners immediately sprinted out through the hole and escaped.
/facepalm

It's almost like they don't want to be there.

It's worth noting that the chainlink fencing is free and is no less secure that brick walls (in the current build that is).

My 2 first steps when starting a new map.

1. Stop Prison intake (go to the Reports, then Prisoners tab, then click the "Open" on Normal Risk).
2. Ring the area in chainlink fence, 2 squares from the edges. The reason I do 2 squares is that there is pathing issues with the outer 2 squares.

AP Erebus wrote:

It's worth noting that the chainlink fencing is free and is no less secure that brick walls (in the current build that is).

My 2 first steps when starting a new map.

1. Stop Prison intake (go to the Reports, then Prisoners tab, then click the "Open" on Normal Risk).
2. Ring the area in chainlink fence, 2 squares from the edges. The reason I do 2 squares is that there is pathing issues with the outer 2 squares.

So you can stop the prisoner intake? I was watching the quick-look, and Patrick was trying to do that but he was still getting regular deliveries of prisoners.

Stair cars near the walls: Bad Idea.

Wembley wrote:

So you can stop the prisoner intake? I was watching the quick-look, and Patrick was trying to do that but he was still getting regular deliveries of prisoners.

Yup. As AP Erebus said you can control prison intake through Reports. I think there's still a bug when you start a new game when it comes to setting prison intake. You can turn it off when you're setting up your new prison, but it doesn't actually turn off intake. You have to do that in Reports. I haven't had time to play around with Alpha 9 to see if they fixed it.

You can also specify which type of prisoners you want to get: minimum security, gen pop, or high security stone-cold killers. The higher their security level the more likely they are to attack other prisoners and guards as well as make escape attempts. IIRC, I think you get paid more each day for the high security prisoners.

OG_slinger wrote:

I haven't had time to play around with Alpha 9 to see if they fixed it.

They have not. I played several long sessions thinking that option was faulty before I saw a video that turned it off in the clip board menu. Doh

THat would help me a lot. Also the free fencing thing.

The game is much easier when you know about the grants. But still very challenging.

Why are my prisoners so upset about clothes?

Robear wrote:

The game is much easier when you know about the grants. But still very challenging.

Why are my prisoners so upset about clothes?

Their clothing are getting dirty. You need a laundry and have unlocked prison labour via the bureaucracy menu.

Ah, cool. I just need *money* first...

Don't be intimidated by Prison Architect. You don't want to be the Female Doggo in this relationship.

Quick question. Is anyone playing this on the Mac? I bought this today and I can play it on Windows (my new dual boot), but not on Mac. It's not installable on Mac. Any reason why that would be?

Have they released a Mac version yet? I know the Linux version isn't out yet (which I'm waiting on).

Robear wrote:

Ah, cool. I just need *money* first...

Yeah, it's a real problem. Currently the economy is borked. Items are not correctly costed, etc.

I really recommend just hacking the save file and change the value.

The line you want to find starts with "BEGIN Finance"

trueheart78 wrote:

Have they released a Mac version yet? I know the Linux version isn't out yet (which I'm waiting on).

Can you buy it for Mac yet? I purchased it today, but I may have purchased it on my PC partition and then tried to download it on the Mac partition.

DSGamer wrote:

Quick question. Is anyone playing this on the Mac? I bought this today and I can play it on Windows (my new dual boot), but not on Mac. It's not installable on Mac. Any reason why that would be?

I haven't tried the latest builds, but the earlier builds worked on Mac.

ebarstad wrote:
DSGamer wrote:

Quick question. Is anyone playing this on the Mac? I bought this today and I can play it on Windows (my new dual boot), but not on Mac. It's not installable on Mac. Any reason why that would be?

I haven't tried the latest builds, but the earlier builds worked on Mac.

On Steam it's not even available to download for Mac.

DSGamer wrote:
ebarstad wrote:
DSGamer wrote:

Quick question. Is anyone playing this on the Mac? I bought this today and I can play it on Windows (my new dual boot), but not on Mac. It's not installable on Mac. Any reason why that would be?

I haven't tried the latest builds, but the earlier builds worked on Mac.

On Steam it's not even available to download for Mac.

Sorry, I bought directly from the devs.

OG_slinger wrote:
Wembley wrote:

So you can stop the prisoner intake? I was watching the quick-look, and Patrick was trying to do that but he was still getting regular deliveries of prisoners.

Yup. As AP Erebus said you can control prison intake through Reports. I think there's still a bug when you start a new game when it comes to setting prison intake. You can turn it off when you're setting up your new prison, but it doesn't actually turn off intake. You have to do that in Reports. I haven't had time to play around with Alpha 9 to see if they fixed it.

When you're starting a new game, the checkbox at the beginning is to disable the ability to control the intake via the Reports. In other words, it's a difficulty setting that makes the game harder by forcing a mix of prisoner types on you every day.

I have failed at this game so frequently to start out. Does everyone start by making a really small prison? I find I don't have the money for a cell, office, etc. right out of the shoot. Also, are doors entrances? That's not clear to me if a regular "staff door" is fine as an "entrance".

DSGamer wrote:

I have failed at this game so frequently to start out. Does everyone start by making a really small prison? I find I don't have the money for a cell, office, etc. right out of the shoot. Also, are doors entrances? That's not clear to me if a regular "staff door" is fine as an "entrance".

You need to use grants to start off - they give you extra funding to start.

DS - The Reports in the lower right hand has a Grants tab. First, use the Reports and find the prisoner intake list and turn it off. Then accept the grants and build the things needed there - an intake area, power, water, canteen, kitchen, some offices and a fifteen prisoner wing. Then turn on the prisoner intake and you're good.