The game has been updated to Version 0.253. [u]NOTES[/u] If you are interested, you can follow the next update's development process by visiting this pinned forum thread (it is usually updated once a week, on Fridays): https://steamcommunity.com/app/1184770/discussions/1/3187989286464040136/ With any update, there is a rare chance of files getting corrupted. This can cause a black/white empty screen when starting the game. If you experience this problem, you can visit this forum post for instructions on how to fix it: https://steamcommunity.com/app/1184770/discussions/2/3085508296772338528/ If you experience any other problems, you can post a new discussion in the bug reports forum, by navigating to the community hub, clicking the Discussions tab, and clicking the Bug Reports link on the right side of the screen. [u]ADDITIONS[/u] -Added a previous budget button to the budget menus (mayor, governor, and president); it will use the values from the previously submitted budget. It uses percentages (so it essentially saves the percentage of the slider value relative to the max value allowed – if last year you granted the army 50% of its max budget, then clicking the previous budget button will grant the army 50% of its max budget for this year). -Added buttons to save/load budgets. After loading a budget, you have to click the Previous Budget button to implement it. -Added text inputs to the budget process (they have not been added to the amendment process). -Added a Relationships tab to the Politicians Menu. It displays all politicians with whom you have a non-zero relationship score. -Added a “Census” to the game. Every 10 years, the game collects and saves population data from every state. -Added population data for all states in the Metrics -> Nation -> Population tab. -Added a Historic Census Data button in the Metrics -> Nation -> Population tab, which compares current state data to the data from the most recent census. It is also possible to look at a specific state and generate a timeline for specific data (for instance, a timeline that shows how population has changed over multiple decades). -While playing as Party Chair, selecting a candidate for a position will increase your relationship score by 200 points. If you run a challenger against an incumbent, it will decrease your relationship score with the incumbent by 200 points. (200 points is equivalent to how many points you get for recruiting a protégé). -The Party Chair Menu now displays policy agreement with each candidate (to help in the process of deciding whether to replace an incumbent with a primary challenger). -Added a “Reset Treasury” button to the Mayor and Governor budget process. It can be accessed by clicking the Balance Budget button. Its purpose is to reset the treasury in instances where the treasury value has become so negative that the budget cannot be balanced (preventing the player from leaving the budget menu). -During party leadership elections, proteges will now vote for the same nominee as the player. -Added two new victory margin colors to the election maps (there are now 5 colors to distinguish different margins of victory – previously there were 3). -Added an option to select the running mate of any protégé who wins the party nomination for president. [u]FIXES[/u] -May have fixed an issue where buttons could not be clicked (or the screen might be black) when starting the game (if the player settings file was empty). The player settings file is never supposed to be empty, but in rare instances, it might be possible for the player settings file to become empty when the game updates (or for other unknown reasons). The game now checks for an empty player settings file, and if it discovers that the file is empty, it recreates the file (so that the game should work properly). -May have fixed an issue where the game would freeze on election night if any states had been set to have 0 congressional districts (in the advanced options). -Fixed an issue where the “Continue” button could not be accessed as part of the redistricting menu when playing the game on small monitors. -Fixed an issue where educational metrics could become negative if certain policies were set to true. -Fixed an issue where tax revenues could become NaN if certain labor force variables became 0. -Fixed an issue where senators might run for gubernatorial and senate elections at the same time. -Fixed an issue where carbon tax revenue was not added to the state treasury. -Likely fixed an issue where the state budget process would over-estimate gasoline tax revenue, which would ultimately lead to a budget deficit, creating a negative state treasury value. The process was not taking into account future road congestion or fuel efficiency changes (rather than actually trying to calculate those changes, the game just reduces the anticipated tax revenue by a specific percentage). This reduction to anticipated tax revenue has also been applied for city and federal budgets. -May have fixed an issue where gasoline tax revenue was not calculated during the city budget process (which means the city would have budgeted less for road construction/maintenance due to an anticipated lack of funding). -Fixed an issue where the player would appear in independent governor polls twice if the player lost the primary and decided to run as an independent. -Fixed an issue where the president would sometimes run for a third term (if they had mistakenly been added to another election at some point during their term). -May have fixed an issue where a former-governor would run for president and senate at the same time, creating the possibility of duplicate candidates. [u]ADJUSTMENTS[/u] -Political points for the Party Chair position have been significantly decreased. The requirements to be promoted to the next level of party chair have been updated accordingly. -The congressional districts of the mayor, city council members, school board members, state representatives and state senators are now updated if their previous congressional district is eliminated during the redistricting process. -Increased maximum gasoline tax rate from $1 to $4 (when creating legislation). -Adjusted Ohio law so that it no longer has same-day voter registration. -Adjusted the calculations used to determine number of retirees who are ineligible for social security. The previous method could have caused an issue where social security expenditure became negative. -If the city population becomes larger than county population, the county population is set equal to the city population and the difference between the populations is added to the state population. (May fix an issue where the city population can become larger than the state population; may also fix an issue where the city is not assigned enough congressional districts because the corresponding county population did not increase as much as the city population). -Increased the margin that politicians are willing to accept before moving to a more favorable district during the redistricting process. Previously an incumbent would move districts if the opposition party had an advantage greater than 3%. Now it is 5% for democrats and 4% for republicans. (Democrats have a slight advantage with independents, which is why they can accept a higher margin). -Reduced the democratic turnout bonus during presidential elections – if the incumbent democratic president is running for reelection. Previously, the democratic incumbent was getting more votes in their reelection than they did in their first election (which seems unrealistic). This change also increases the possibility of a democratic incumbent losing reelection (which happened once during testing – although it is still rare). A consequence of this change is that democrats may have a harder time winning a congressional majority during election years where the democratic president is running for reelection (but that might be realistic – see the 2012 election). The specific variables that were changed can be adjusted in the advanced option; they are called “Democratic Turnout in Competitive States (Incumbent)”, “Democratic Turnout in Non-Competitive States (Incumbent)”, and “Democratic Turnout in Non-Competitive States (Incumbent) (Wave Election)”. These advanced options can be found in the Elections -> All States -> Turnout tab. -Slightly increased turnout for democrats during midterms if the president is republican. The change may be small enough that its impact is minimal. -Adjusted the advanced options so it is now possible to specify negative turnout for a specific party during presidential elections (for instance, you could make it so democratic turnout decreases if a democratic incumbent president runs for reelection). These options are in the Advanced Options -> Elections -> All States -> Turnout tab. -Added a new advanced option to specify the “competitive state margin”, which is used during presidential elections to determine which states act as competitive states. Competitive states generally have higher turnout than non-competitive states (based on turnout variables in the advanced options); so this is another option that can be used to influence presidential election results. These options are in the Advanced Options -> Elections -> All States -> Turnout tab.