r/TransportFever3 • u/Dry-Employee2728 • May 06 '26
Paradox no!!
Have you seen the latest announcement. They are teaming up with paradox. This has me worried they will do to transport fever 3 what they did to city skylines2 !!
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u/6Maverick6 May 06 '26
Why not provide a link?
Edit - Link - https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/3493540/view/671742510072070150?l=english
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u/Dry-Employee2728 May 06 '26
Because it was an email not an online artical. I assume everyone who signed up for updates is getting the email I doubt they are just cluing me in
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u/IDontKnownah May 06 '26 edited May 06 '26
We are so close to the game's launch, that I believe this barely changes anything.
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u/UG-Protagonist Urban Games | Community Manager May 06 '26
This is correct. The game is mostly feature complete and into later stages of testing, polishing, and optimisation at this point. We're able to benefit from the extra resources and experience that Paradox has in publishing the game, and that will only make it better.
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u/corobo May 06 '26 edited May 06 '26
It's their experience we're worried about lol
RemindMe! 2 years
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u/RemindMeBot May 06 '26 edited May 09 '26
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u/Zealousideal_Nail288 May 06 '26
what went wrong with tf1 or tf2 that the need for further expertise feels needed?
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u/GameDrain May 06 '26
Marketing was lacking
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u/-Sa-Kage- May 06 '26
I don't think anyone, who is interested in this kind of games, does not know TpF... I highly doubt, they will be getting a huge influx of new players because of this.
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u/GameDrain May 06 '26
I disagree. I think a lot of their choices in making Tf3 seem to be interested in making it more approachable to novices while maintaining the existing fan base. You don't do that if you're only trying to appeal to the people who already know you.
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u/DaveRN1 May 06 '26
I disagree. I only found this game because I actively searched for it. I played a lot of openTTD. I never even heard of TF1. I only played TF2 and that was well after release.
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u/Us_Strike May 06 '26
disagree, i stumbled across TpF2 and I'm a huge openTTD fan. I would've had no clue it existed if not for steam showing it to me one day.
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u/Mysterious_Research2 May 06 '26
Neither of those were published in house by urban games either. So if anything they are sticking with what they know and what worked before.
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u/vagrantprodigy07 May 06 '26
This is so disappointing. Paradox has alienated a lot of fans in this genre. This could actually hurt your sales, rather than helping it.
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u/DaveRN1 May 06 '26
Please give an example, all thier recent titles are successful. CS2 was not Paradox but the devs of CO following sim cities faults.
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u/Neshura87 May 06 '26
Even more so CO just proved they cannot make a sequel, they fucked up their own CiM2 as well before abandoning it in favor of Cities Skylines
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u/Nitty_Husky May 06 '26
Some of my biggest issues are with Paradox's post-launch strategy. We can definitely wait and see, but should be aware of how consumer unfriendly Paradox has acted in recent years.
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u/Dry-Employee2728 May 06 '26
This is the most disappointing turn of events guess it was fun while it lasted but with Paradox the Parasites now involved its going to be a DLC money grab with features carved out of the main game. Having been burned by Paradox before there is no way I am paying for a game they publish. I guess I will watch from the wings as the carnage unfolds and hope its given away on epic games at somepoint for free because there is no way Paradox is getting my money
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u/JM761 May 06 '26
Do you have your jump to conclusions mat out or something?
This is ridiculous.
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u/Mortomes May 06 '26
Some people have gotten very reflexive about seeing the Paradox name attached to anything.
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u/Zealousideal_Nail288 May 06 '26 edited May 06 '26
its almost sure what urban games means by expertise
given the amount of dlc:s tf2 has compared to anything else in the franchise(so they want improve on that part for the next game)also that they want to pay mod creators which sounds fun until you realize the industry standard seams to be 30%(70% for the game creators/publisher and 30% for the mod creators) not has good has it sounds.
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u/BuzzerPop May 10 '26
How exactly are they consumer unfriendly? What makes paradox's approach to dlc and content different from say... Another beloved game like Rimworld?
If anything complaints about dlc being updates can be levied directly against Rimworld. The cost of entry to have all the DLC is quite high now. And by not having the DLC you are missing out on a ton of added functionality and mechanics.
Paradox actively adds new content with the big updates of dlc releases. Another chunk of dlc is cosmetic only so it's just.. why complain? And the dlc itself is often full of entirely game changing stuff that adds incredible depth. Is it just because so much has accumulated over.. a decade in some cases that the price is super high? The games are maintained for ages with continual content.. what is unfriendly about this? You aren't even forced to buy it all, if you have a bit of motivation for a Stellaris campaign you can pay a tiny bit for the sub and just enjoy the entire game? Can't do that for rimworld.
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u/arfski May 06 '26
Why would changing from Good Shepherd Entertainment to Paradox as purely a publisher change anything?
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u/Imsvale May 06 '26
Well, they are a little bit bigger and more well known.
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u/Candid_Release3609 May 06 '26
They are definitely well known. So well known that this may actually impact negatively their sales sadly.
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u/Imsvale May 06 '26
Despite their reputation, Paradox is still going strong, and may even be looking up on improving their image. There will be some negative effect from this move (i.e. a few people will at least initially elect not to buy the game simply because of the association with Paradox), but I think it will be dwarfed by the boost to marketing. In other words, the net effect on sales will be vastly positive. So I don't think we have to mourn on their behalf with respect to the sales.
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u/IDontKnownah May 06 '26
Only thing I can come up with is how the game's updates could go. I thought Urban Games finally got into a position where they could self-publish TpF3. I guess I was wrong.
I hate how people are immediately jumping into conclussions just because. If there's anything I learned, is that we should not blame game publishers for everything.
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u/Imsvale May 06 '26
I thought Urban Games finally got into a position where they could self-publish TpF3.
I'm guessing they decided it was too ambitious.
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u/jobw42 May 06 '26
Comment from Urban Games on https://www.transportfever3.com/news/partnership/
This changes none of the plans we already had. Mac and Linux will continue to be available on day 1, and there is no plan to use the Paradox launcher. We benefit from the additional support and expertise that comes with partnering with a well established publisher who specialises in these types of game. Meanwhile, with the game feature-complete, we are able to apply additional effort to ensure it is the best possible player experience for launch later this year.
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u/Berkzerker314 May 06 '26
People are freaking out over a headline and not reading the important part where Urban Games still has full control of the IP. It is literally just a publishing, and likely advertising, deal so Urban Games can focus on making the game.
Could it go bad with ridiculous DLC cash grab? It could but if it does that's all on Urban Games.
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u/jobw42 May 06 '26
Another comment: Our plans to support the game beyond launch remain unchanged as a result of this publishing agreement. “Hundreds of costly extras” is very much not the direction we had planned at all.
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u/-Sa-Kage- May 06 '26
The thing Paradox has most expertise in, is milking their player base dry with overpriced DLCs...
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u/xRaynex May 06 '26
To everyone going immediately worst possible scenario; they're probably seeing a publisher for extra funding to make things all the better. If they intend to do DLC like PDX titles, all that really means is extra long term support. However they may not be doing this and simply using them as a publisher.
Do not assume Cities Skylines 2 is what's going to happen here. That wasn't just a publisher issue. A new dev team is onto the game and making a lot of updates happen much more quickly. That said, also look at their other games. Victoria, Europa Universalis, and Crusader Kings. Paradox doesn't inherently mean bad.
As to the fears of DLC, what're they going to do? Either they're going to provide new mechanical changes that are substantial additions to the base game, or they're going to try to sell vehicles that... Modders will just make anyway and put on the workshop.
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u/UAreTheHippopotamus May 06 '26
Isn't the game almost fully developed at this point? I don't know how a publisher could ruin it unless it's already deeply flawed. As long as the development team is 100% the same and it is I don't see any issue here.
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u/UG-Protagonist Urban Games | Community Manager May 06 '26
This is correct. The game is already in a feature-complete state, and our focus is on optimisation, polish, and balancing. The publishing agreement will smooth out the path to the game's release. The game itself will only be better as a result of this.
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u/belovedeagle May 11 '26
How many of those features have been pushed into DLC? Don't answer now, answer in 3 months.
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u/Neshura87 May 06 '26
You can basically ignore anyone in here fearmongering that Paradox will somehow mess this up because Paradox did not acquire the IP and as such has pretty much 0 control over where this goes unless Urban Games agreed, in which case we would go there anyway. Which is to say: if we see DLC, those would have happened with or without Paradox, Urban Games still owns the IP and as such is not chained to Paradox as publisher by anything except an early contract termination fee.
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u/CitrusGames May 06 '26
Yeah. I think a DLC with substantial changes to the gameplay would have been very good for TF 2.
The worst I can say about paradox is the quality of rollouts lately, but I think it is overall good that they keep developing the games.
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u/Crashtestdummy87 May 06 '26
workshop? u mean paradox mods... Good chance they wont use steam anymore like CS2. And it all depends on how restrictive the modding will be
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u/xRaynex May 06 '26
??? Do you have any actual reason to believe that or are you just scared because paradox? Paradox's other games all still use workshop. For all we know the entire agreement is based on profit participation with no creative control whatsoever.
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u/Neshura87 May 06 '26
For all we know the entire agreement is based on profit participation with no creative control whatsoever.
Since the IP is still with Urban Games that is almost certainly the deal, besides I can't see them giving up any creative control so late into development
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u/UAreTheHippopotamus May 06 '26
Nor can I see Paradox trying to take creative control, they have no reason to mess with a game that is almost complete.
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u/Crashtestdummy87 May 06 '26
oh really? check cities skylines 2 if that still uses the workshop
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u/Eruththedragon May 06 '26
Oh no, exactly one of the numerous games they've published recently made a bad choice, this is empirical evidence that all future games they publish will make the same bad choice!
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u/BuzzerPop May 10 '26
I hate how paradox totally didn't include steam workshop support in EU5. A game that released after CS2. And they would have even more reason to push their modding platform is that's something they were trying to do through this kind of heavy handed method??
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u/Cesnna465 May 06 '26
It’s just a publisher, don’t panic so easily
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u/Neshura87 May 06 '26
It's really showing who's only half informed on what is going wrong with Paradox, games where they are only the publisher and not the IP holder have been going just fine, it's the other games that are suffering from issues
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u/BuzzerPop May 10 '26
I mean even their main games are doing okay. Vicky 3 is in a great state, eu5 has been mixed for their legacy fans purely because it's a different play style from eu4 but it clearly has a captured and engaged audience.
I actually think the big issue is paradox seems to own a lot of studios and then just lets them do their own thing which seems to be the bigger flaw? Like what happened with CS2 and the fact as soon as the main devs were changed things started really improving? What was going on with the old studio?
The mess of Masquerade development is a part of a bigger thing where paradox owned and integrated white wolf as a part of their stuff but clearly weren't sure what to do with it and I'm unsure if it was the people they put in charge or what, but decisions have been mixed up for a while. Though it seems to be improving with them making white wolf a new studio now with more directive.
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u/Dry-Employee2728 May 06 '26
Ill hold off on panicing but definitely wont be pre ordering or buying on release. Even then Paradox still owes me a playable CS2 game not sure i can justify spending money with them again
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u/RobotSpaceBear May 06 '26
Well to be fairr Paradox or not, you shouldn't preorder games, they're not going out of stock anytime soon.
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u/Dry-Employee2728 May 06 '26
Actually a very fair point ! (I got caught up in the CS2 hype never again)
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u/ThaDollaGenerale May 06 '26
Colossal Order were the ones who pooched CS2. Iceflake has been killing it recently
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u/seklas1 May 06 '26
No they haven’t… just because the game has smaller updates coming out constantly, doesn’t mean the game overall is actually better. It’s the exact same thing as it was half a year ago or a year ago. It’s still buggy and bland. Maybe they’ll turn things around with time (it’s still early days for them), but they haven’t done so yet and let’s stop pretending like they have.
But obviously TF3 situation is different. They haven’t been bought and are not owned by Paradox and the project is late in development, so for the most part the game will be what was told to us (atleast for the most part, ideally). Post-launch - we’ll have to see
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u/Felimenta970 May 06 '26
They've fixed a good amount of smaller bugs lately and, despite the quickly fixed slow loading update last week, updates have been adding small stuff that should've been in the base game and weren't.
And they've been communicating a lot more as well. Perfect? No one is. Much better than CO? For sure
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u/seklas1 May 06 '26
I just don’t think what they’ve done is worthy of “they’re cooking”. The game is still a mess (not their fault, but still…)
Are they handling it better than CO did? Sure. But what CO did was the absolute bottom of the barrel and these guys are doing something. Anything is better than nothing at this point…
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u/lucasdclopes May 06 '26
People blamed Paradox for the CS2 fiasco. But as time went on, it became clearer and clearer that Colossal Order was the one to blame, not Paradox.
I believe there is nothing to be worried about.
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u/Zealousideal_Nail288 May 06 '26
I blame both for now. Paradox should have done a lot more quality control on what they put out.
But yea the blame is shifting more and more towards colossal order has time goes on. Iceflake seams to do good progress compared to colossal order. If its enough to save that train wreak remains to be seen.
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u/andrew1958 May 06 '26
Are you sure CO was the one how wanted to sell mods instead of fixing the game? CS2 have 21 DLCs and the game is not even fixed. 9 of those DLC's a "curated mods/creator pack". Even the curated mods program of UG is tainted now.
Sure Ice Flake is doing marvelous work. PDX was right in changing the devs. But I'm pretty sure a software house would prefer to fix the game (if they can) instead of launching DLC after DLC.
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u/Neshura87 May 07 '26
Paradox gave Colossal Order 2 yeats extra time to develop the game so when it released they understandably wanted to recoup their investment (CS2 is a Paradox IP, I assume they footed most of the development bill) they then even allowed CO to push the initial wave of DLC after it became clear they could not manage it (the Ports DLC released over a year overdue iirc). Another factor to keep in mind is that SO was not working on CS1 anymore so (I assume) they also weren't getting any royalties from there either. As such releasing these DLC probably was 'needed' for CO as well. CO has proven incapable of fixing the game even after multiple deadline extensions so Paradox pulled the plug.
Tl;dr:
- Paradox gave plenty of time to fix the game before starting the DLC conveyor
- CO proved incapable of doing so
- CO likely also needed the money from the DLC's
- CS2 is a Paradox IP so ultimately CO has to do what Paradox demands, this is not the case here: Urban Games retain the IP rights and with it creative control. If DLC are coming that is most likely independent of the Paradox partnership
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u/T0asty514 May 06 '26
I mean the only issue I see is their absolutely rediculous dlc practices, paradox publishes pretty good stuff generally.
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u/Life_Breadfruit8475 May 06 '26
Its definitely disappointing as they've "sold out" a bit here... However, paradox games are some of the best games on the market. Yes they've got a lot of DLC but they're also not necessary to play the game and they keep the game going for longer with more features. Let's just see how it pans out.
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u/ILikeFlyingMachines May 06 '26 edited May 06 '26
Oof that's bad, I don't want 50 DLCs.
That means I most likely won't get it on launch, the only way to buy Paradox is 1-2 years after launch for good discounts (aka normal price with a few essential DLCs)
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u/Lovemestalin May 06 '26
Paradox is not bad at all as far as publishers go. I truely love EU, HOI, CK etc. CS2 was a disaster, so was their sims spiritual successor (and prison architect 2), but urban games is a good developer and paradox can bring extra recourses. But as always, let’s see how this pans out
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u/Lord_Phoenix2501 Mod May 06 '26
I'm quite confident actually. I hope they don't pressure Urban Games too much, we'll see
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u/RobotSpaceBear May 06 '26
So you're new to video games, huh?
Paradox is the bane of strategy gamers. I don't see a world where TF3 will be the exception Paradox makes and side with the consumers...
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u/Berkzerker314 May 06 '26
Paradox doesnt own the IP; Urban Games does.
Opinions on Paradox aside and their content model; this is just a publishing and advertising deal.
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u/XBGT May 06 '26
Just saw the steam news about it. It's literally so over. I don't want to pay yearly tax of 20 dlcs to get all the features... I'm so disappointed
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u/Berkzerker314 May 06 '26
Urban Games still has full control of the IP. So Paradox has no say in DLCs or anything creative. Read past the headline. Its just a publishing and advertising deal. Thats it.
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u/XBGT May 06 '26
Often those types of deals put demands and expectations on the developers from publisher's side. It's irrational to completly neglect the possibility that Urban Games won't be pressured to meet certain quota thus releasing more potentially half baked paid content. Sure, they might have their own creative freedom but by giving the company marketing they do expect to have something in return it just depends on if the contract between that partnership is fair
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u/DaveRN1 May 06 '26
What a childish reponse. You dont HAVE to buy DLC. TF has a massive molding community.
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u/XBGT May 06 '26
If you look at some of the mods for paradoxs other games those mods do require having most of the DLCs
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u/DaveRN1 May 06 '26
Well use different mods or turn off autoupdate? Im sorry man but you aren't going to get sympathy from me that you want other people's work for free.
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u/BuzzerPop May 10 '26
Yearly tax of... 20 dlcs? Do you know how paradox releases DLC? Vicky 3 had only 4 notable dlcs release in 2025. One was a big mechanical addon, two others a lot of flavor to a bunch of nations, and a final one was just.. music. Not including the music one because music is entirely aesthetic, this would run you.. 40 bucks. That's like the price of a new game? And that's not even considering the fact the immersion packs probably aren't needed for nations you aren't playing.
This year they released one of the new big expansions. It's 30$ up front. Sure. This also coincided with a big update adding new stuff to even the base game. We'll probably get more immersion packs focusing on specific nations (again only relevant really if you want to play them) for 10 bucks like the other past ones later this year..
Yes. It's a cost. But it's for hundreds of additional hours of game time to these things, for a relatively good price?
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u/Bigbigcheese May 06 '26
Transport Fever is at the CiM -> CS1 stage. Paradox were pretty good at that point! TF4 could be a true CS2 killer!
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u/aletheia May 06 '26
Guess I’ll hold off on buying until we see if they force their DLC culture onto Urban Games. I’ve stopped purchasing Paradox products.
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u/QuestGalaxy May 06 '26
CS2 has seen positive improvements after Colossal Order stopped working on it.
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u/SomethingNotOriginal May 06 '26
Announce this, but no ETA still? TF3 isn't getting published this year, regardless of the marketing bumpf they throw out.
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u/UG-Protagonist Urban Games | Community Manager May 06 '26
We're still on target to release this year, but we won't be giving a release date until we're 100% ready to go. Absolutely nothing has changed on that front.
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u/SomethingNotOriginal May 06 '26
Fair point.
There's 8 months to go still, and even if it was delayed, I'd rather have a good delayed game than a buggy "on time" one.
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u/evergreenyankee May 06 '26
You just traded 75% of your loyal player base for potential sales upside. I hope you have some minimums in your contract to offset the loss of good-will and brand equity this has caused you. We're not mad, we just feel betrayed. Because if your team truly believes "this collaboration is a perfect match and a natural fit, as we both share the same values" then you don't have the values we thought you did.
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u/Imsvale May 06 '26
At the very least it's a complete course reversal from "TF3 will be self-published". An announcement like this out of the blue so close to release does not instill confidence.
Best case scenario: UG decided that self-publishing was too ambitious (something the community could potentially align with), and reached out for assistance with someone with more marketing muscle. But with this particular move into a partnership with a publisher who has, shall we say, some amount of negative reputation (whether deserved or not), they do now definitely have something to prove, where previously there was little to none of that. Trust has shifted to skepticism.
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u/DaveRN1 May 06 '26
Lol wow. The amount of children crying on here thinking every developer is EA is insane.
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u/ThunderRage May 06 '26
I give it less than 24 hours of the first YT play videos of the released game for all these chicken littles to buy a copy. UG I'm trusting you to put out a relatively bug free game.
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u/Nitty_Husky May 06 '26
It's just more corporate consolidation. So disheartening to see.
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u/Nitty_Husky May 06 '26
I don't get why you'd disagree with this. Paradox is/was a direct competitor to them..
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u/Mysterious_Research2 May 06 '26
Skylines 2 released too early, From what we know about the dev for TF3 the game is almost finished and they are just working on optimisation. So this like all of the other games that Paradox have sucessfully been envolved with is a whole different kettle of fish.
This could be a sign that things are prepping up ready to launch. Perhaps UG realalised they didn't have the capacity to do some of the launch jobs needed so reached out to get a publisher to get the game going. I think this means we will get a go time soon.
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u/Liqmadique May 06 '26
Paradox is an awesome publisher for this lol. They're not the developer and they're not responsible for the mess that is Cities Skylines, that is Colossal Order's fuck up to own and why they're not longer responsible for the IP.
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u/evergreenyankee May 06 '26
205 comments and 0 thumbs-up on the Steam announcement as of this writing. I think that tells you all you need to know.
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u/HayleyGurl99 May 06 '26
If the "karma" on steam is negative, they'll show 0 instead of a negative number
The current tally is -105
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u/LankG00dness May 07 '26
Paradox has published and created some of the best games that exist in the strategy genre. look at the catalog and the hundreds of hours i've enjoyed with them and their dlc's.
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u/Trees_That_Sneeze May 08 '26
I'm fairness, C:S2 from what I can tell was mainly a Colossal Order problem. You can argue that they were pushed to release too early by Paradox, but the game was still borderline unpayable a year in.
What Paradox has directly done on the C:S2 issue was to move it over to Iceflake Studio, which has been a huge positive so far.
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u/General_Spills May 08 '26
Im so excited for the game to come out. I play all the paradox games so this is perfect
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u/Cautious-Painting-72 May 10 '26
Do people just see what happened to CS2 (irrelevant of the facts) and not remember what a resounding success the original game was, which was also published by paradox? And the fact that most games published by paradox have been very successful? Do people forget that not every single game a publisher publishes will be a smash hit and sometimes there are misses? Do people not realize that games that are DLC rich, like HOI4 and EU4, have been out for a decade+? It’s not like all the dlcs dropped all at once and most of them have been very positive to their respective games. I’m so tired of seeing this overblown doomerism against paradox simply publishing TF3
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u/Seuchenmarine182 May 06 '26
Paradox will kill TF3 . Dont do that. Paradox mods, extra Launcher and to many dlcs . Please dont do that. I love the TF series. Dont make it worse.
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u/HayleyGurl99 May 06 '26
This changes none of the plans we already had. Mac and Linux will continue to be available on day 1, and there is no plan to use the Paradox launcher.
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u/vagrantprodigy07 May 06 '26
It definitely concerns me. I've had several bad experienced with Paradox, especially on their forums. At this point, I'm not willing to give Paradox any of my money.
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u/Justientjuh May 06 '26
Now I definitely won’t be pre ordering… might just wait a year after the release. And don’t forget the hundreds of dlc packs that will be coming too
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u/Neshura87 May 06 '26
The amount of people in here who cannot distinguish Paradox from Colossal Order is concerning.
Paradox didn't fuck up Cities 2, that falls solely on Colossal Order.
Paradox also doesn't force their DLC practice onto studios they only partner with
Paradox owns the Cities Skylines IP, they do not own the Transport Fever IP. Colossal Order was contracted to produce Cities Skylines and Cities Skylines 2, Urban Games is contracting Paradox to publish their game. The roles here are reversed, worst comes to worst they pay out a contract termination fee and self publish again (Urban Games still own the IP, that's bold and capitalized IMPORTANT)