BUG - Prisoners won't use yard for jogging

[Giiizmo]

Hi there,

As the title says, prisoners in my current prison won't use my yard for jogging and will only use weight benches. Buying more weight benches as I expand instead of having the prisoners jogging around isn't only a money drain but would look quite unsightly. Furthermore, I've read that weightlifting doesn't improve the health rating although that could be outdated information.

However, having converted my campaign prison to a regular save file, I've noticed the prisoners using the yard for jogging (and not touching the weight benches). I cannot understand why this would be the case as the yard is even smaller than in my new prison.

Things I've tried: re-zoning the yard, splitting it into several yards, adding paths in and around the yard, making the yard more rectangular or squared, making a whole new yard, adding yard time, adding a fence around with several types of door, changing the deployment to "shared" or "open", combining several of these fixes and finally, reloading a previous save file where I hadn't built anything with only the planning markings on the map - nothing works!

Any help would be appreciated as I don't feel like spending hours playing on a buggy map (since a future update might not fix it).


Here's a picture where the prisoners jog:
http://imgur.com/yuKcCSg

Here's a picture where they won't jog:
http://imgur.com/j5GldqF

Here's a .rar file with both save files, their respective .png and the two .jpg showing the yards:
https://www.sendspace.com/file/292yeg

[Giiizmo]

Answering my own question.

So I've tried creating a new prison on small, medium and large maps with no options enabled other than fog of war. Sure enough, the prisoners used the yard appropriately. I then tried playing a prison on a large map with forests, gangs and events enabled, the same settings used by my current save and presto, the prisoners wouldn't use the yard for jogging again.

The "forest" option just adds trees to the map at random location so I figured it couldn't interfere with the game's logic. Remembering from another thread that the save file could easily be edited with a simple text editor, I opened my current save file and disabled both events and gangs, then removed all weight benches. The prisoners started jogging for exercise again. Figuring that "gangs" probably creates a weird conflict with yards, I enabled "gangs" again - and the prisoners wouldn't jog anymore.


TL;DR: BUG = "Gangs" map setting conflicts with yards and hinders prisoners from exercising normally by running.

Parting words: For a game that's been in alpha for so long this kind of sloppy coding is kind of disappointing. I'm not very happy I had to spend several hours troubleshooting this issue.

[bobybojunior]

i had the same problem. Thanks! This helps explains things.

[xander]

Parting words: For a game that's been in alpha for so long this kind of sloppy coding is kind of disappointing. I'm not very happy I had to spend several hours troubleshooting this issue.

First off, while the game has officially reached version 1.0 status, it is pretty clear from IV's comments that it is still being actively developed and fixed.

Second, gangs were only introduced in the last two or three alpha versions, so they have not had several years worth of alphas to get fixed. New features often break existing features. It happens. Even with incredibly careful coding practices, it happens. There are a lot of interacting elements, and it is basically impossible to keep track of them all.

Third, no one held a gun to your head and forced you to troubleshoot the problem---you did not "have to spend several hours" on it. Now that you have done the work, it is (I presume) appreciated (though a bug report to the Mantis tracker would, of course, be even more useful).

xander

[CumpyLustard]

(though a bug report to the Mantis tracker would, of course, be even more useful).

As xander said, if you could add your information on the issue here, that would probably be pretty helpful. I'm not really sure how much IV reads the general section for bug reports.

[Giiizmo]

I'd love to submit the bug but I don't have access to the private developer forum. If someone else does, feel free to submit the issue.

Parting words: For a game that's been in alpha for so long this kind of sloppy coding is kind of disappointing. I'm not very happy I had to spend several hours troubleshooting this issue.

First off, while the game has officially reached version 1.0 status, it is pretty clear from IV's comments that it is still being actively developed and fixed.

Second, gangs were only introduced in the last two or three alpha versions, so they have not had several years worth of alphas to get fixed. New features often break existing features. It happens. Even with incredibly careful coding practices, it happens. There are a lot of interacting elements, and it is basically impossible to keep track of them all.

Third, no one held a gun to your head and forced you to troubleshoot the problem---you did not "have to spend several hours" on it. Now that you have done the work, it is (I presume) appreciated (though a bug report to the Mantis tracker would, of course, be even more useful).

xander

When a game leaves early access, it is offered to potential customers in its final version. As such, it should be as close to as bug-free as possible. When it comes to continued development, contrary to bug fixes and optimization which are expected, new features are a bonus. However, these new features should be thoroughly tested before they are introduced because of the commercial version is always supposed to be the most stable version.

Sure, no one forced me to spend the time to understand the issue but In my case, it was either I find a solution or I stopped playing because I disliked the idea of having rows upon rows of weight benches in gardened yards and the drab alternative of having yards with concrete or metal floors with fences around to fit the "gym" aesthetic did not appeal to me.Don't get me wrong, this issue isn't a game-breaking bug like a save file corruption or a frequently reoccurring crash, but it could be annoying enough for the consumer to consider dropping the game for a while and wait for it to get fixed, like I almost did.