There are plenty of oddball simulation and management games out there, like PowerWash Simulator and Gas Station Simulator, and their popularity cannot be understated. Their nature, at least in part, helped inspire the creation of Martial Arts Tycoon: Brazil. Fans of simulators, martial arts, or both will be able to develop their own gym in the favelas of Rio de Janeiro, one of the hearts of Brazilian jiu-jitsu, where they’ll train and guide their students and build a martial arts empire when it releases. Though it is a tycoon game where players will experience business and finance management, there’s also one key element that makes the title stand on its own: environmental awareness.
After being in AAA development for several years, including co-founding Infinity Ward and the Call of Duty Franchise, Chance Glasco said he needed a change. Now, he’s the CEO and creative director of Good Dog Studios, which is the indie studio working on Martial Arts Tycoon: Brazil. At Gamescom LATAM, Glasco told Game Rant that his experience of living in Brazil, his love for jiu-jitsu, the lack of a tycoon martial arts game, and climate change all played a factor in the creation of Martial Arts Tycoon: Brazil.
The Weather Plays a Key Role in the Game
Martial Arts Tycoon was formally announced in July 2023 at BIG (Brazil’s International Games) and is currently still in development. Everything one expects from a Tycoon game is present, but it might be surprising to hear how much the weather and climate change factor in as well. This is partially because Glasco is a senior fellow with the Atlantic Council, which is working with the climate resilience organization Adrienne Arsht-Rockefeller Foundation Resilience Center (Arscht-Rock for short) to help keep people safe and informed about climate change through video games.
Instead of focusing on mitigation of climate where we’re trying to stop global warming and climate change, where we realize we’re already kind of screwed, we focus on things to keep people safe.
We’re seeing record-breaking heat every year in the south of Brazil and flooding that affected something like half a million people. We’ve always had climate affecting humans and so what can we do through games to actually keep people safer from climate? We work with developers, we do workshops. In the past, we’ve done some grants to basically help get some of these topics in the game.
The way that this has been translated into Martial Arts Tycoon may seem simple, but it makes sense in context and helps carry this message all the same. In the game, players will experience a daily temperature that is based on the real average temperature of Rio de Janeiro, which has warm or hot weather all year round, ranging from 70-to-100 degrees Fahrenheit. In Martial Arts Tycoon, there are occasional heat waves where, depending on their intensity, players will have to consider spending money to add more fans to the gym. They also have to make sure their fighters have water to drink or coverings to block the sun because, otherwise, their fighters can experience heat stroke or heat exhaustion. This condition could force them to be out of training and/or lower their attributes. The only way to fix this is to put the fighter through rehab.
We try to make gamers knowledgeable of the risks of heat. In this case, in the future, we’d like to add something like Dengue fever. When it rains and you don’t clean up the puddles, you have a risk of mosquitoes. Those mosquitoes can carry Dengue. If a mosquito bites one of your fighters, they might be out for three months and that’s going to affect your bottom line.
Martial Arts Tycoon Implements Combat
From Sim City to Rollercoaster Tycoon, open-ended simulation games have captivated gamers’ attention because of the way players typically begin with very little and expand it into something extraordinary. In Martial Arts Tycoon, players will become Lucas, a young boy who inherits a gym in the favela Morro Santo Amaro. Players will start off on an empty rooftop and must be strategic with how they spend their starting money on some basic equipment and a front desk (made out of beer crates). People will slowly start approaching the start-up gym and express their interest in training in jiu-jitsu; based on their background and traits, players can choose to accept or deny them. Every time a player trains, Lucas earns more money and builds towards upgraded equipment, reputation, and more.
But it’s more than business management. Players can develop personalized classes and workouts for their desired length of time to improve their fighters’ strengths and round out their weaknesses so that they can compete in tournaments. Glasco added that every NPC has their own character traits and life path, or their history. Based on that, players can watch how an NPC’s training has affected them and their lives.
There might be an opportunity for them to be in a jiu-jitsu tournament or maybe they run into their bully at school. Maybe this kid that joined the gym that was getting bullied and you get to see how that unfolds. You get to see that play out with a little bit of influence, but for the most part, you’re seeing how all those choices unfold.
…To summarize, people sign up, you train them, they fight, and they make money throughout all this. You’re investing back in your gym, more or less similar to a lot of tycoon games except there’s a combat phase.
Martial Arts Tycoon‘s combination of Tycoon mechanics, jiu-jitsu and its impact on people, and general climate change awareness ensure there’s a lot packed into this in-development title.
Martial Arts Tycoon: Brazil is currently in development.
