arya126
Squad Leader
A new Golden Age has dawned on Hollywood and the Broadcasting industry respectively. Ever since Comcast, OCN, and Really Big Sausage revitalized the Broadcasting scene, and Rory Englehardt hit Hollywood with a string of several major blockbusters in a row, money has been flowing in like never before in history.
This newfound success of an industry not long ago thought to be doomed has given rise to another generation of producers and executives eager to make a name for themselves. YOU are a member of this newest generation, either an up and coming producer with more ideas than you could possibly commit to paper or a rising executive with the authority to purchase shows for primetime coverage in the evenings.
That is not to say that the Industry is immortal. Should you falter, should ratings once again go down, the favor might once again shift to online conglomerates such as Netflix and Hulu. Be wary. Now go and participate in A Fine Frenzy of television shows and Hollywood blockbusters!
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First off, you must choose whether you want to be an executive or a producer. Now, lets explain these two roles.
An executive will be the head of a staff of men and women responsible for the TV schedule of a particular network that airs on television. In the game, they must buy shows from producers, use those shows to form a schedule for their network, attract advertisers who will pay you to air advertisements during certain time slots, balance a budget from all this, and more or less run a successful network. They also have the option of running the network's film subsidiary, which would allow them to work with producers producing movies instead of TV shows. If the TV executive does NOT want to handle the Film subsidiary, then that position becomes open for another player to sign up for, and if nobody wants it, then it will be NPCed. More on that later.
Producers have less responsibility, but are just as important. They are the ones responsible with coming up with content, from a 30 minute cartoon to an hour long hospital drama. They then have to market their ideas to the TV executives, who can buy the rights to the show (either for a single season or for multiple seasons at once). Producers can also come up with ideas for feature length movies whose rights can be bought by one of the film subsidiaries. Movies take several turns to produce, but at the same time they can produce enormous amounts of revenue...or can drive a network to near bankruptcy if it does poorly at the box office. Producers can also finance a movie themselves if they are rich enough, and depending on their notoriety, their Independent film may or may not make it into theaters. However, a successful independent film could show the networks that this guy might have some merit.
Sign Up
Name: Your name.
Role: Executive or Producer
Network: The name of your Network for Executives, as well as any other information you may like to provide.
Film Notoriety: Only for producers, begins at 0 and increases with successful films (does not affect TV production)
Bank: How much money you start with. Producers have $6 million and must make their way up in the world with successful shows and movies. Network executives start with $60 million in order to get started with buying shows from producers, etc.
Making a TV Show
Producers, the first thing you need is a catchy name. After that, you need a description of the show. What is this show about? Preferably give the general genre, such as thriller, horror, comedy, drama. Decide whether the TV show will be 30 minutes long or 60 minutes long (this is important to the networks). Then you have to get to the money.
Spoiler :
Spoiler :
Ratings
Ratings are relevant to TV shows only. Once the Networks make a schedule, that schedule will be divided into time slots. For example, from 6 PM to 7 PM is a time slot. During this time slot, a certain number of viewers are tuned in to watch TV. These viewers are split across the 3 networks. These 3 networks are competing for viewers. These ratings are the report of how many viewers watched what TV show the past night. These ratings are the reflection of how successful a TV show is and subsequently determine how likely it is to be renewed. Certain time slots will have higher ratings than others simply because more viewers are watching.
These ratings also determine how much money you get from advertisers. Therefore, better ratings mean more money for the Networks. Networks begin with a base advertising contract of $1M/1M viewers. So a rating of 5M means you earned $5M that time slot.
A Network may also forgo the advertising in one slot in order to adverse its own shows that come on later in the night/week. This can help to increase viewership in certain time slots.
Also, after the first turn, you may get special advertising offers. Certain companies that want you to air their commercials during certain shows that were particularly successful, and are willing to pay extra in order to see it done.
Special Events
Special Events, such as football during the fall, new years eve, the world cup, etc. will be available as well. But since I do not wish to make it first come first serve since that would mean the first producer to come up with the idea would have the rights to it, I will be controlling these events. Individual producers can then bid on any of the rights that I have listed in every update such as 'Thursday Night Football', and the producer can pay for the rights, then sell the rights to a network. It isn't real world accurate, but it will do for a mechanism in the gameplay.
The Schedule
Network executives, you must be very curious by now what the schedule looks like. But it is rather simple. Essentially, each turn is 1 'season'. A TV show cannot be on for 3 seasons in a row (it can be on for 2 seasons in a row, or every other season, but after 2 seasons there must be a break of 1 season before it starts up again). Each season will consist of 12 weeks. You only have to fill out a schedule for 1 week, and it is assumed that it is repeated 12 times in a row. After each season, you can make adjustments to your lineup, replace underperforming shows with new ones, renegotiate the contract of shows that are doing well lest you lose the rights to another network, etc. Bear in mind that you can fill any empty slots with reruns if you find yourself short on material.
Schedule
Schedules are now 7-9 PM daily, with 10 AM and 11 AM slots to fill on Saturday mornings. This reduced schedule will increase competition between competing producers and their respective shows, decrease the need for reruns, and also reduce my personal workload.
Movie Production
Much regarding this topic has been mentioned elsewhere in this post, but there is some other information you should know.
Namely, Movie Production takes several turns. Generally, this will mean 4-8 turns, with most being 4-6 turns. You must pay the appropriate acting and staffing fees every turn the movie is in production until it is released.
It should also be noted that Producers of the movies typically receive a cut of what the movie makes at the box office and afterwards rather than the usual lump sum for TV shows. However at the same time, the network has to pay all the acting AND staffing costs rather than the producer paying the staffing costs as with TV shows.
Independent films, produced and created by a producer (or a team of producers working together to pool resources) only take 2-3 turns due to the lower budget of the films.
Foreign Content
Every turn, like special events, certain foreign shows, like popular anime, or Doctor Who from the BBC in England, will be available for the networks to purchase the rights for and air. This can be useful if you find that your content is lacking and you want to find a way to edge in on your competition in a unique way. The difference between this and special events is that the producers are cut out of the loop, although the networks still have to pay for the rights.
Finances
I should make a note about finances. First of all, when you are paid for a show, you cannot spend it until the turn after it has already aired. So for example, you sell Show A right now for 2M. Then the update goes up reporting the ratings and everything. NOW you can spend that 2M.
Now, you can go into debt and deficit spend if you so choose. This goes for both networks and producers. A useful tool if you are creating a potential big hit TV show or a blockbuster movie with an excellent staff and an A+ ensemble cast and don't have the money, but expect it to make a ton at the box office or to crush the opposition in its primetime time slot. However, being in debt for several turns in a row isn't very attractive to advertisers, and producers may look elsewhere if the bank cuts you off and you can no longer pay them. Make sure that if you choose to take a risk and deficit spend that you have a plan that will pay off monetarily.
There will be a limit of 3 TV executives until there are 5+ producers. Once there are enough producers in the pool a 4th TV executive can sign up and the Film executive positions may unlock. There will be 1 NPC Network.
Orders
Orders shall be streamlined this time around. A google excel sheet can be found here:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1jMtxpJUUwChxO64oIX8--3PztgR0L7w6nCIPOIsEpIE/edit?usp=sharing
In this sheet, networks shall be free to add their shows to the master schedule. In addition, all producers and networks shall be able to keep their stats and budgets in one place in their respective tabs, with an ease of access for both you and I. This means PM orders should be greatly reduced in this game, with the majority of input being done on the sheet itself. Any specific orders can be given either via PM or by 'Commenting' on the google sheet in your respective tab depending on the level of privacy required.
All costs and numbers are subject to change before and after game start in order to ensure a balanced game.
