Hello, so in update 10, there was a new system of trendiness that was toyed with where there would be added casual appeal and deducted hardcore appeal when a style was trending, and vice-versa. This system was replaced with the trendiness/obscurity bonus in Update 11.
I’d like to offer an opinion, and perhaps start a discussion over whether this change was for the better.
I remember seeing a certain feedback post about Update 10’s system, along the lines of: it makes the hardcore/casual appeal metrics of styles virtually useless as it can, for example, take enka, which usually has a +30 hardcore appeal bonus and -50 casual bonus, invert those appeals one month and then have them as described the next, and even hit unpredictable values above and below those metrics.
After having played through 10 and 11 and now 12, and taking time to form my thoughts on it, I agree to an extent: the trendiness system of 10 made picking a style useless, as you didn’t know if the styles you were unlocking would actually appeal to the demographics you wanted them to appeal to until you looked at their appeal during single creation. Want to balance casual and hardcore appeal with a pop/love song? Well too bad, cuz those two styles are trending for the next 6 months, and will result in a +50 casual/-40 hardcore appeal!
However, one positive I’d give for that system in 10 was that you had a loose understanding of what was trending, just by selecting your genre/lyric/dance on the single: the appeal percentage changing provided instant feedback. By separating trending from appeal in 11, your grasp of what is trending was weakened. I’ve had cases where I counted up the appearances of styles in each of the three categories, picked the most popular ones, and still got an obscurity bonus. I also don’t know /what/ determines how many fans you get with this bonus. It’s not as transparent as 10.
After playing for a couple of months, I’m of the opinion that 10’s system was better. It had tradeoffs and rewards for sticking with a style or adopting a new one/it made you ANALYZE the environment of the game. But the trendiness volatility should not cause the styles to become opposite of what they were originally. For example, adding bonus casual appeal to R&B if it’s trending would be good, but making Loneliness lyrics have massively negative appeal to hardcores just because it’s trending, or love lyrics have negative casual appeal because they’re obscure, is just frustrating. Personally, I could see maybe a fix where the appeal won’t dip below the style’s base/upgraded appeal? (Avant-garde can’t go lower than -50 for casuals when obscure, or elegant can’t go lower than 0 for casuals, etc)
And speaking of appeal, I do think we don’t get to “mix and match” as much as possible and that some demographics get covered overly-well while others are much harder to hit. For example, female/male both have +20 styles, but adult has a +50 style, while teen and young adult maxes at +10... There are some good synergies that this naturally produces, such as Adult-Male, Adult-Female, Hardcore+anything that isn’t casual.... but getting a major appeal boost is hard when the numbers simply aren’t there, or the bonuses contradict each other. I think what would solve this, and what I’d love to see, would be additional subgenres unlocking as you play with a style, them having unique /slightly different appeals and combinations to the main genre and being able to upgrade them as you do with genres currently in order to increase their efficacy. For example, maybe there could be splits like:
Rock>Grunge>Surf>Punk>alternative etc...
R&B>Jazz>New Jack Swing>Quiet Storm>PR&B etc....
Pop>bubblegum>electro pop>Retro pop>City pop>ballad...
Avant-garde>chorale>folk>baroque etc... (Maybe even with some genres crossing over and sharing occasional subgenres like funk/R&B/hiphop, pop-rock, rock/metal?)
...With these subgenres having different, more unique appeals to vary things up a bit (For example, grunge’s level 1 giving a YA +15 bonus, compared to rock’s YA +5/Adult +10, or retro pop adding an additional adult appeal). I’ve mentioned before how I was very intrigued to see a similar sub genre system hinted at in the demo here, and I think it would open up more choices for gaining fans/sales and help immersion-wise to keep single creation feeling fresh as you play more, since you’ll have more than 9 genres to toy with.
But what does everyone think of the trendiness/obscurity system as it differs between Update 10 and 11?