Crime City Payout Algorithm Explanation
Crime City (iOS) Payout Algorithm Explanation by Tramp Stamp
Crime City utilizes a simple algorithm to generate all payouts. It multiplies the base (level 1) payout against an indexed value of one of two lookup tables, which I have termed Growth Type A and Growth Type B.
Growth Type A uses a modified triangular sequence (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triangular_number):
1 -> 1
2 -> 3
3 -> 6
4 -> 10
5 -> 15
6 -> 22
7 -> 31
8 -> 42
9 -> 55
10 -> 75
Growth Type B uses a modified Fibonacci sequence (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fibonacci_number):
1 -> 1
2 -> 2
3 -> 3.5
4 -> 5.5
5 -> 8
6 -> 11
7 -> 14.5
8 -> 18.5
9 -> 23
10 -> 30
Buildings available under level 8, including Mafia unlocks, are Type A. All others are Type B. Complete lists follow.
Type A cash buildings, with bases:
Barbershop, $140
Deli, $60
Diner, $100
Gas Station, $55
Gun Shop, $300
House, $360
Italian Restaurant, $140
Laundromat, $5
Loft, $11000
Movie Theater, $3100
Nightclub, $175000
Pawn Shop, $125
Pizza Parlor, $30
Souvenir Store, $60
Tattoo Parlor, $105
Type B cash buildings, with bases:
Arcade, $50
Bagel Shop, $580
Brownstone, $12000
Casino, $900000
Chinese Restaurant, $225
Clothing Store, $300
Collection Agency, $325
Condo, $79200
Credit Agency, $75000
Crematorium, $30000
Electronics Store, $260
Fancy Restaurant, $1100
Fish Store, $840
Flower Shop, $4600
French Restaurant, $24000
History Museum, $3600
Hotel, $285000
Internet Company, $16000
Meat Factory, $1400
Modern Loft, $2500
Russian Restaurant, $10,500
Seafood Restaurant, $1000
Shoe Store, $1400
Sports Bar, $140
Underboss’ House, $4400
Warehouse, $1100
Type A gold buildings, with bases:
Basketball Court, $150
Empire Theater, $450
Ice Cream Shop, $95
Mansion, $850
Techno Club, $1000
Type B gold buildings, with bases:
Adult Movie Theater, $3500
Anchor Imports, $48000
Blues Club, $3500
Carousel, $110
Chicken & Waffles, $1400
Church, $48000
Cowboy Casino, $825
Credit Agency, $75000
Gaming Parlor, $280
Gentlemen’s Club, $360000
Jazz Club, $250
Modern Art Museum, $3000
Palm Hotel, $725000
Pirate Tavern, $100000
Rock Cafe, $110000
Smoke Shop, $2200
Sushi Bar, $250
Wedding Chapel, $8800
Zeus Theater, $8400
As an example, we will derive the payout of a level 7 Laundromat. From the lists above we see it is a Type A building, so we will multiply the base, $5, against the index of level 7, 31:
$5 * 31 = $155
So now with the algorithm known it becomes possible to fill (almost) the entire spreadsheet with mathematically accurate values, which is a good thing considering the volume of errors within. Particularly, a number of base values are actually Tycoon derivations, leading to a 10% base inflation and 21% Tycoon inflation. Others are clearly data entry errors, like the Fish Store. Through my derivations I determined the base value to be $840 but the spreadsheet shows it as $480. Deriving values in the spreadsheet can be as simple as a nested IF statement that reads another field for “A” or “B”. All one needs to get correct is the base value.
Notice that Type A yields substantially better growth and that most of the Type A cash buildings lie in the default set, with the rest being Mafia-unlocked. This is a large part of why their ROI is so strong. Later buildings need to make up for slower growth with stronger base payouts.
Also, the Tycoon bonus isn’t exactly 10%. It probably is at some point in the calculation but by the time it is displayed to the end user it’s actually slightly higher. This can be seen by comparing spreadsheet values to those in-game and noticing the off-by-one errors.
Thanks to contributors in this thread for corrections, algorithms, and data.
Those of you looking into buying gold and parlaying that into optimum-paying buildings, here is a metric for you. First I derived level 10 payouts of gold buildings with available data. Then I divided the payouts by collection times to get $/hr. Then I divided that figure by gold paid to get a kind of “return on investment” figure, represented as $/hr per gold spent. Sorting the list, we get:
Pirate Tavern, $3409.09
Gentlemen’s Club, $3000.00
Palm Hotel, $1937.50
Rock Cafe, $1571.43
Wedding Chapel, $1173.33
Adult Movie Theater, $807.69
Smoke Shop, $550.00
Church, $300.00
Ice Cream Shop, $296.88
Zeus Theater, $250.00
Chicken & Waffles, $194.44
Basketball Court, $187.50
Gaming Parlor, $186.67
Anchor Imports, $133.33
Carousel, $132.00
Sushi Bar, $83.33
Blues Club, $70.00
Empire Theater, $45.00
Moden Art Museum, $28.13
Jazz Club, $12.50
Mansion, $10.63
Cowboy Casino, $10.31
Techno Club, $7.81
IMO everything below Anchor Imports is a swindle and even Anchor is questionable. Personally I wouldn’t go beyond the first four. EDIT: exception being possibly buying two Basketball Courts with the initial 10 gold. EDIT2: this list was updated. “First four” previously referred to Adult Movie Theater, Smoke Shop, Church, and Ice Cream Shop.
Level 10 payouts were used to compare faster growth Type A buildings with slower growth Type B buildings. List positions won’t change based on level if restricting to one type class.
I also disagree about your brief assessment of the multipliers. What the multiplier tables give you is a whole class of buildings that outpaces their respective competition in the other class. It allows for the determination of THE highest earning building in the game, even if you only collect from it 75% of the time.
Also, given that costs grow at a fixed rate for both types, the ratio of income growth to cost is critical for effective analysis. Consider that the cost of building or upgrading is measured in Savings-Time. Literally the time it takes your entire system to save enough for the cost of a building. This coupled with the Upgrade Time (and also perhaps the lost income measured in Economy-Days), is the true cost of expanding income.
This is why, in my previous post, I claim space is a not a primary factor until it becomes grossly expensive. At that point, the space begins to cost you significant amounts of time needed to save the money value of the expansion.
I agree that area is a factor, but it is largely a factor for B buildings, and lower level ones in the mid game at that. The important A buildings are far enough ahead of most comparable B building competition that area is a non-issue apart from making sure you have space for it.
Otherwise, space is cheap enough compared to income that I don't mind keeping around lower level buildings. Yes, I still have my warehouses. Why? Space isn't so disgustingly expensive that I feel compelled to sell them and abandon my time investment. But do I build Magic Playhouses or Wholesale Warehouses when new buildings like them become available? No, by this point space isn't cheap anymore. It isn't worth expanding just to fit relatively ineffective buildings.
End-game, my goal is to collect every cash building available, not to optimize my hood for a set expansion point.
To maximize my economic growth, my method is to evaluate income growth per time cost of saving plus upgrade time. Ideally, this metric chooses the largest time-adjusted ROI available at my level. Realistically, I'm too lazy to calculate it for every building, so I choose longer upgrades with cheap prices to save for the buildings worth calculating. I can always buy more space, but I can only save large amounts so quickly.
Because all growth is based on a multiplier over the base income, the multipliers tell us nothing about the economic efficiency of each asset.
n order to have a true index of how each asset performs, one needs to also consider a critical parameter – 'Area'. The number of tiles each asset occupies is pivotal to the game.
Hence if:
A = Base price ($)
B = Base return ($)
C = Return Rate (hr)
D = Area (unit of tiles occupied by asset)
E = Rate of Return ROR = B/C ($/hr)
Then:
Index F = ROR/Area = E/D (higher score = more revenue output per unit area = better)
Index G = Price/ROR = A/E (lower score = cheaper price per unit rate of return = better)
Index H = Price per ROR/Area = (A/F)/100 (lower = more economically efficient)
Commentary:
Index F gives rate of return generated per unit area = The higher the index, the better
Index G gives a sense of how expensive and asset is by measuring the price to buy per unit of rate of return.
Index H is the final most important index of all, the efficiency index of each asset by measuring the base price to ROR output per unit area.
To illustrate index H, a tattoo parlour has a relatively higher index G to a gas station, but because it only occupies 16 tiles compared to a gas station's 36 tiles, it's efficiency rating is slightly higher than a gas station.
Also accordingly to index H, the warehouse which everyone goes so crazy about building and upgrading, has one of the highest index H score (less efficient) due to the relative area it needs to occupy.
Note however that the above does not consider the maximum potential output that can be generated by each asset at level 10. This max limit would ultimately affect the overall efficiency of the asset since the ultimate aim of the game is to generate largest ROR per unit area available rather than looking at the base price alone. Index H would serve as a good guide to which money buildings to build and upgrade first in order to maximise economic growth early on in the game.
By my index, the efficiency index H in ascending order for buildings available at my level are as follows:
Laundro, Pizza parlour, T-shirt stand (surprisingly), Deli, Pawn shop, Gun shop, Tattoo Parlour, Gas Station, House, Souvenir shop, Barber, Electronics, Diner, Arcade, Italian Restaurant, Warehouse.
Enjoy…
Vesimutt, you are quite incorrect. There are two growth rate formulas for buildings. One increases much faster than the other, the type A buildings. The slower growing ones are Type B.
The multiplier which determines the income of the building gets much larger with each level for these Type A buildings than the Type B. At level 10 for example, if you look at his charts, Type A buildings have 75 times the base income, while the Type B buildings only have 30 times their base income. Take a look at a couple expamples from his list.
You can go here to compare income per level of all the buildings in-game: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AgEHrvnoijXudHFVU2RxYUQzYXYtOURRd0d3M1hVR2c&hl;=en_US&pli;=1#gid=1
Also, you are incorrect about the upgrade price. Each upgrade increases the upgrade price by 67% of the previous upgrade price.
what the f man? the cost for every upgrade is 225% cash of the base price and the return just keeps adding up the base return level by level.
It is as simple as that. No type a or b, no fibunaccis….