Absolute Beginners Guide: Getting Started | Workers & Resources: Soviet Republic Guides | Tutorial

With all the New Features, its time to go over a new 'How to get started' tutorial. No Realistic Mode this time, just pure structure and building and making it work, just to speed everything up.
This is a simple series to get you started.
If you have any questions, please ask, and I will add a video to the Series that explains it in detail.
My tutorials and how to guides are aimed at new players, who may have skipped the in game tutorial or found issue with the same. This game has many hidden features, and I aim to show you all of them.
WR:SR is an amazing sandbox city/republic builder, that allows you to control all aspects of your new country, from citizens happiness, health, education to production chains, vehicle and resource production, import export. You can do all this by truck, train, ship, and in the near future plane. There are a million ways to make your republic your own and that’s what we will do.
If you read all the way to here, I appreciate your commitment and support and hope you are enjoying what I am creating.
All the best!
0:38 First Things
1:27 Series Notes: Ask Questions!
1:49 Actual Start
2:20 Starting Area Criteria
2:42 NOTES: shortcut menu setup
3:41 First Road
4:29 CITY: Center
6:05 CITY: Leave Space
6:36 CITY: Religion, Culture, Sport
8:11 Notes: Weather Requirements
8:25 CITY: Hospital & Firestation
9:10 CITY: School & Kindergarten
10:3 CITY: Crime & Justice
11:15 CITY: Utilites
13:45 NOTES: Delete Shortcut
14:18 CITY: Residential Buildings
15:55 CITY: Water & Sewage
19:56 CITY: Connect Heat
22:24 CITY: Connect & Import Power
25:10 CITY: Footpaths
25:52 NOTES: Check Connection
26:51 CITY: Monuments Placement
27:35 CITY: Add Waste Containers
31:01 CITY: "Get Citizens" Option
32:52 CITY: Auto Import Water
33:45 CITY: Buy Basic Vehicles
34:15 CITY: Waste Collection Setup
34:54 CITY: Fuel Setup & Auto Purchase Check
35:43 CITY: Turn on Heat
39:15 CITY: Adjust Worker Numbers
40:08 CITY: Kindergarten(s)
40:49 CITY: First Bus line & Line Spacing Options
44:00 CITY: Upgrade Rodes
45:43 NOTES: Take Score of you City
47:52 Outro & Next Topic
HAVE FUN!
Patreon: / bballjo
Twitter: / bballjo
Discord: / discord

[@siriusczech]

Finally a good tutorial for newbies to recommend that doesn't take ages and is spot on. Good job, BB.

[@bballjo]

That means a lot from you... waiting for the critique;)

[@siriusczech]

@@bballjo none here. Yes, I would make it a different way = no police at start and university right from the get go instead, but you wanted to show it this way, cool, you have your reasons. And I really like the short and thorough version

[@nathanwells4809]

My biggest lesson learned from playing is… always build dedicated storage and switches.

[@AbhraBasak]

There is a city level setting to switch off “Get residents”. You can click on city name and set “Allow residents to fill buildings” (or something similar).

[@bballjo]

Yes....what about it?

[@thadollagenerale]

Just got this game and am glad I found your video. Thanks!

[@pinkpanther8427]

Thanks for explaining in an understandable way and not taking 500 Hours doing so. This Video was very very helpful for me to get started!

[@sullivan6475]

Oh, this is great. Based on your most recent videos, I bought this game yesterday, but I wasn’t sure I wanted to jump right into realistic mode so now I can follow along with you in this series. Thanks for all your hard work.

[@Cables_]

Just bought the game and loving it, you seem to be the premier channel for this games content so thanks dude you are awesome

[@Ozon29]

This beginner guide is so good! Thank you! 10/10

[@bballjo]

Thanks! Tell all your friends 😉

[@BenchongDy]

Great tutorial for newbies! Everything is concise and direct. Love it!

[@VampiroGaming]

Fantastic beginner guide. Great pacing, on point all the time. Also I like that you start with the more advanced settings! This is the guide for me!

[@bballjo]

Awesome!

[@Eyeslayer]

I found your channel not long ago and commented on some of the features you used while playing after finding this tutorial playlist i'm really happy that you go into so much detail about a lot of functions of the UI that I have missed. Please keep up the amazing work you are doing fantastic.

[@bballjo]

Thanks!

[@infinight8890]

Thank you for your very useful tutorial videos!

[@jekanyika]

I've got over 300 hours in this game but I still learnt something

[@bwort007]

Thx a lot, keep up the good work. Subscribed.

[@mky2567]

Awesome starting tutorial.

[@frozenn00b]

Thank you for this!

[@adolfmiksik2755]

Hi bballjo. Good video as always. One small piece of advice that will make the start much easier. It is advisable to start by finding a place somewhere in the middle between two border crossings that are relatively close to each other and to create a connection between them. This will allow the use of both border crossings at the same time from the beginning.

[@bballjo]

I've found that this little piece of "requirement" often means loading new maps for 20+ minutes, and without realistic mode it's not a requirement anymore, as you can autopurchase whatever you like... With realistic mode it is however something I usually point out.

[@markkussusa]

great tutorial! Im beyond this already but still learned new tricks😂 Was watching it coz im expiriencing some hiccups with trash management (whats the next step up after taking trash to the border?) and while you cover it well in the new update introduction video, im still not 100% adept even from watching other channels. Now, in one of the past videos you mentionned building a universty as early as possible... That tip has made WONDERS in my gameplay. Can't imagine how was i making it work before with late coming univs!

[@emilygordbort7300]

Ever since I was a little kid playing Civilization 4 and Tribal Wars on my old brick of a laptop, I was always really into the whole "building up a civilization from nothing" aspect of those games. It was a lot of great fun at the time, but those games tended to focus a lot more on the war and conquest aspect than the parts I was actually interested in. The diplomacy and battle strategy was always fun in and of itself, though it's a bit annoying sometimes when I have to put everything on hold because George Washington keeps building all the monuments I like and threatening to shove his freedom boot through several internal organs. I've found a few games that scratch that itch since then, but the more I look into this game in particular the more I realize it's pretty much exactly what I was looking for. Thank you very much for making this tutorial so I can actually understand how to play this game and get into the fun of building and maintaining my own little communist utopia. Also, the developers of this game have a lot more games which have piqued my interest, too. I'm especially looking forward to Espiocracy in 2024!

[@bballjo]

You are confusing developers (3Division) and the publisher (hoodedHorse)...the publisher just joined a few weeks ago...they've done a good job, but there is no other game like this on the market, 3D has done a few other games, but different genres.

[@emilygordbort7300]

@@bballjo Oh cool thanks for telling me :0 Either way, very good game

[@letsgo2u770]

@bballjo with Research set to ON - there will be no separation of waste by your population unless the research has been completed, so the setting on the trash stands will not work and just keep those bins empty until the research is done. Effectively reducing your total garbage space until then. Industries separate from the start, so it works for the hazardous waste from the hospital.

[@letsgo2u770]

should have waited until the last 2 minutes of the video . ha!

[@bballjo]

You should always wait for me to correct myself... just sometimes it's in the next video 😂

[@dane4890]

BRILLIANT

[@bballjo]

Thanks!

[@Misthema]

"We're almost done, BUT..." Good tutorial, but omg, didn't think this game would be this complex! (Haven't yet bought it)

[@bballjo]

And this is the abridged tutorial version;) the full blown in 3 hours and uses realistic mode;)

[@Misthema]

@@bballjo Oh boy... xD

[@bballjo]

Exactly:)

[@sapper5095]

Great video. I do have a question. The High voltage priority switch. What it's for and can you use it at the border?

[@bballjo]

It's a normal one directional switch...it lets you select which power you want to use first second and third, and also where you want to send it to. You can use it at borders, but it gets complicated because it's 1 directional, which will cause a loop at some point

[@drml8224]

In difficulty settings can you explan what traffic simulation does? It's the only setting I set to "simple" as I have no idea what complex does. My assumption is complex will prevent vehicles from overlapping after a cooldown period of traffic jams?

[@ArtypNk]

It's a very confusing game to get into but a very great one once you finally start understanding it. I was so absolutely lost at first, I tried realistic building mode and couldn't build even the basic stuff, because, how the hell do you get 30 tons of cement? Where from? With what? How? Playing around on sandbox with unlimited money and instant build is absolutely crucial for your first time playing, IMO.

[@chotafallen8390]

Great beginner tutorial. Do I see it right, we loose money all the time in the beginning?

[@bballjo]

At no point in the game so you "lose" money. Not sure where you got that from...

[@Legolas936]

I am probably clinically insane going for a full realistic playthrough first time ever touching this game :D

[@theprofessor1554]

You and me both brother

[@dealler669]

me too, I don´t want to cut corners I want to learn the hard but proper way.

[@thomasbayer1843]

Man what a difficult game. The in game tutorials really need some work. I think they should not just SHOW how to do something, but give you some kind of goal that'll take maybe 5 minutes, so that you can actually grasp what's happening and see everything run a bit.

[@dealler669]

So basically make a game for a gen Z crowd with the attention span of a goldfish. Plenty of games like that out there, no need to fuck this game to accommodate low-IQ players.

[@zach6867]

Good video. Can I place a bus station in the industrial area and not create direct buses to every workplace, to make it easier to manage in the long run? Or will citizens not consider that they can walk from the end bus station to their respective jobs?

[@bballjo]

You are asking a with a bunch of phrases that mean different things...so I'm not sure what you are actually asking? Can you place a bus station in the X area? Yes, what makes you think you can't? Can you create direct bus routes to each workplace? Yes, you can also do that if you have to. Can citizens walk from the end bus station? No, the end station is not a station, it's a depot. Can citizens walk from a bus station? Yes, otherwise bus stations would be kinda stupid.

[@14Trenlover]

I think he means if you can route buses from city to a bus station in industrial area, and make the workers get of there and walk to their workplaces, in my experience it does not work, you need to get busses to each workplace, but I might be wrong.@@bballjo

[@bballjo]

@14Trenlover you're definitely wrong...I use a bus station 99.9% without any issues. It's rare that you want to drop off directly at the industry.

[@MistaH1N1]

I have yet to play this for the 1st time and this vid makes it seem too overwhelming. Before I even start I have to place all these things. Kinda feels too difficult for me.

[@M1GHTYM4VS]

Hey bballjo! Could you give us a realistic start on the Slovakia Map. I've tried several times with your latest Realistic Tutorial but I've come to a few difficult terms that stall and hinder a successful start. I've used the Workshop to get the realistic vehicles etc, but started with the base buildings. What I usually happen to have is after building the coal to electricity plant connected to the heating factory to run out of power or rather it getting a loop with the voltage beeing there but no power transfer I expect there to be a loop with either the external connection that doesn't deliver until researched or some sort of bug with the way the powerline connects to the AC/DC switch or a mess between the large and small powerlines. The other thing I have problems then is to move workers from the next village to the plants via bus for some reason. I've tried a northwestern start to built towards Bratislava and the village near east, so to have one village connected and sprawl to the capital with the bigger city center. But because of the power issue I tend to loose the people in the winter once I assemble the infrastructure (heat, water, electricity etc.) and because the electricity is mostly not functional towards it for the power loop I assume, I struggle to get going. I added buslanes from the citiy center and the village with a stop to the electrical and heat facilities but the passengers won't board the buses so I rely on about 4-5 foreign workers that undersupply the shift so on top of not distributing constantly I also have difficulties to disect where the loop starts. It seems straight from the electric plant the voltage goes into the entire powerline, but the power distribution not even switches on to the nearby next substation or the switch properly. The Wires are puzzling since you've made a back and forth connection without gridsnap in the realistic tutorial, I'd think you need to have one line going in and one going out on the same spot but having merge points from large to small wires create a tertiary connection that doesn't work at all for me. So I usually run out of money with the initial starting capital for the intial setup and take the loan about extra 2 mil. and then run out of that with the construction finishing and the supply imports (food, clothing, coal) eating it up significantly faster. So I'm unable to have any sort of established money makers going. I've had wood going once but food with the fields or meat won't get finished in time to get any proper income from exports. Without the Geological Map Overlay on Realistic getting a coal industry can be a bit more difficult, so I've gone with the coal mine hover until I found a spot of about 30% just to get going but that is also far removed from the intitial setup and seems like a hinderance. May I just get some Uranium instead and use a Nuclear Plant instead for a bigger import to consumption value until it's possible to get the tech research going. I've had the Tech Universtiy Setup but there were no professors for it so I had students but no knowledable oeople which also seemed off for picking a larger town even

[@bballjo]

I make it a point to start on generic maps, as the more designed maps generally create silly issues... That said, I'm happy to take a look at your setup once you start running into hickups on the map.

[@Coyotehello]

Nice video and good information. Well, right at the start if my map does not have a road connection or power connection or train connection or no custom house???? We just have to "go without"? How do I ad nodes? From there to 20:13 I will say that this tutorial is medium level not beginner, certainly not "absolute beginner" . Thank you.

[@veevoir]

>Well, right at the start if my map does not have a road connection or power connection or train connection or no custom house???? This sound.. impossible. In this game the way you make money by exports through custom houses, that is a basic mechanism. There is always some custom house at the border and even the smallest one will have some connection. But if you took a random map and had a super bad luck where that is the case - re-roll the map, to be honest. Those connections from border are important in early game, because it will take time to get self-sufficient and you need to "prop up" your economy with imports/electricity imports.. And once you have self-sufficiency - you make money by exports.

[@Coyotehello]

@@veevoir Thank you for the reply. I did as you said and reloaded a new map and it has custom houses etc around the borders. I did run into another issue if you do not mind assisting me with... In your: Absolute Beginners Guide: Getting Started | Workers & Resources: Soviet Republic Guides | Tutorial it starts at 22:52. Electricity I have the switch and the connection to the border and the H-V powerline to the transformer, all have V, now I take a L-V power line and run it to a building (any building) instead of connecting it gives me a message " There is a building in the way" !! Well yes, it is the building I am trying to connect to !??? What am I doing wrong? Even in the games tutorial a Low power lines connects to building and does not see them as "obstacles". BTW I saw that you have many tutorials on many aspects of the game: Thank you! I will have to watch them all! I ended-up spending about 8 hours playing that game last Sunday, my first real venture in trying to understand that very complex game!

[@bballjo]

@Coyotehello power lines block everything but roads, and are also blocked by everything. Idk what the tutorials do, but you need to use substations for the last delivery of all utilities, you don't directly connect to anything but the substations, and they have "ranges" in which they satisfy buildings needs, you can see that range when you place a substation near buildings. For all utilities, possible connections have specific icons your should look for. Also, all of that is in this video, at least it's done that way...don't fight it, nothing is easy in this game, and I'm doing my best to bring you those concepts, but because nothing is easy, most tutorials are longer because everything affects everything in some way, so it's hard to decouple things.

[@Coyotehello]

Keep up the good work! After playing an entire afternoon I had a semi functioning city yesterday! My map is pretty hilly (I might start a new one as this is a pain) and so I keep fighting the connecting of pipe, like sewage I get the message require proper slope to connect a pipe to a pipe or to a switch. I it indeed a learning curve. I was playing the game while having your video on play/pause just to follow and try to understand the game! I am just back from work and will get back into the game. It is addictive and I am just at he very beginning!

[@weshenriksen2481]

Would anything change in your Getting Started plan if Realistic Mode is turned on?

[@jeppenielsen6942]

It disables the option to build with money, and makes it so you can only build with construction offieces. this makes the game take more time, so time mannagement more important, and makes it so having a preplaned economy is much more important since you cant just add something quickly

[@bballjo]

Besides it taking a lot longer, you also have to handle all logistics...so kinda everything changes. You can check out the how to get started in 2023 live stream to see what I mean.

[@weshenriksen2481]

@@bballjoWhat I meant was I'm curious what your Getting Started plan would look like for realistic mode. My first steps are CO and nearby storage to reduce Custom House traffic. Then get a small town up and running to increase the supply of CO workers before starting on industry.

[@tboneisgaming]

Excellent. This is exactly what I was looking for. What's the best way to start with an existing town on the map?

[@bballjo]

I'll get there... eventually

[@CtrlAltJon]

I can't for the life of me place these sewage discharges buildings. I have utterly defaced all my lakes to no avail.

[@bballjo]

A little bit straight and above 0m is all you need.

[@stuartp2006]

Also, I've been obstinately trying to connect every apartment with roads (for like... Fire trucks and moving vans, I guess). Do I not have to do that?

[@bballjo]

All the vanilla residential buildings are accessible via footpath, and they will have an error message if they don't. Buildings also can't be constructed if they are missing a connection like that, so that's a good check. Technically every building with a parking spot needs a road connection, no parking spot means footpath is fine

[@stuartp2006]

Wait, how do they get built without the road connection? Do construction vehicles not need roads? @@bballjo

[@bballjo]

Specifically, only the ones with parking spots (white squares with X) need road connections, but when in doubt, just build a road connection.

[@gaberobison680]

This game really needs a better UI but otherwise seems awesome

[@alainpascalrouthier5827]

bb, it just occured to me. Are you part of the Soviet Republic building team? If so there are many feedbacks you would need. Game crashing, Sewage system not working etc. Cheers, a.

[@bballjo]

I'm not a dev, and not directly associated with the devs, no.

[@marcrouhana8932]

what modes are u using?

[@bballjo]

0

[@marcrouhana8932]

do u recommend mods ?

[@bballjo]

@marcrouhana8932 if they fit your play style....sure. it's a sandbox game. Play it your way.

[@alexandergordon3432]

What difficulty are you playing on in this?

[@bballjo]

I'm not sure how that matters? What is your actual question?

[@alexandergordon3432]

@@bballjo Well I wanted to know the difficulty because in the easier ones things like water require less management, and because I'm new to the game I want to play on the easier ones first.

[@bballjo]

My tutorials are generally on the hardest settings, and then you can decide to turn off features as you go, you can always enable/disable in game. In this case, it's hardest but research and realistic turned off. In your case, playing on easy is fine to learn, but I think you'll get more value out of playing with hardest settings, then turn citizens reactions to easy, and money to unlimited, maybe research off, then play and if something goes wrong, use your infinite money to fix it. Turning off other settings is fine, but they aren't always isolated, and harder to turn on later, and as it takes a good hour to setup a city now, it would be really annoying to restart with other settings and then just spend time setting up again.

[@alexandergordon3432]

@@bballjo I didn't think about playing on the hardest settings before with unlimited money. My plan was to just play on easy settings, and infinite money would allow me to fix any screw ups, thank you for the advice.

[@szita2000]

I would love to play this game! But the more tutorial I am watching the more I face the fact that they took out the fun from this game with the unnecessary micromanagement.

[@bballjo]

There really isn't much micro....you can set it and forget it in almost all cases...you just have to do it right the first time. It's really the opposite of a micro game, macro management republic simulator is probably not a bad summary

[@stuartp2006]

Doing realistic mode on an island that doesn't start with a port o_O idk where to start

[@bballjo]

I mean...you could start with the realistic island challenge I made??

[@stuartp2006]

haha, I made my own based on a local island. I thought I was just missing something really basic (still hard though).@@bballjo

[@bballjo]

Well...it's technically impossible in vanilla right now, but maybe with 1.0 there will be some options...you either cheat, start on a peninsula and then move to the island, or use mods to make it work right now. I'd recommend cheats to get a base going

[@NB_-gs5pj]

667th like

[@youtubevanced4900]

do you have to play like this? laying everything out before the game starts? thats a bit lame. isn't there a progression system where as the town gets bigger, there are more needs so it grows over time?

[@perfectlyfine1675]

Welp, I'm replying three months later, but whatever. No. No, you have to plan a lot of thinfs out from the start. In cities skylines people are immortal until a certain arbitrary point in population. This isn't the case here. You can at any point in the game enable or disable complex education, research, crime, and so on in the settings. Have you decided to build a city of a million people, yet you still don't care about managing electricity? Turn that off! Do you want ro manage universities already at population 2? Go for it!

[@spartainman6410]

You don’t have to play the game like this, but it is recommended that you do it. Because you could build a small town and just build housing, but when your citizens move in and they don’t have a place to buy food, or infrastructure to give them, electricity, plumbing, sewage, they will get upset and potentially flee. The country, which will then cost you more money to invite new citizens back only for them to get upset and leave again until their needs are met.

[@monkusaugustus4017]

It would be quite unrealistic if the citizens could live without food, water, electricity, waste management, heat, clothes, education and a justice system

[@AdamL_18]

you just need to build the basic services at first. it look like it takes alot of time, just because he is explaining everything. in fact you just pause early on. Once early set up its done, you are good to go

[@gaberobison680]

It’s actually more accurate to how sane countries do urban development. Build infrastructure before the NIMBYs and land prices rise (if you mistakenly allow private property)

[@nomedocanal8496]

15:32 What happened there? hahahahaha

[@bballjo]

Lol...you came here to see me do math wrong live, didnt ya?!? 😂

[@nomedocanal8496]

@@bballjo just thought it was funny lol

[@bballjo]

I think it was too :)

[@larrylindgren9484]

The game has great depth. And I'm sure having its knish. But boy it's a tedious mess. I can see why it never caught on with most. Having to micromanage every single thing it tedious. But you tip your hat to them. It's what they have designed, and they stayed with it. It's not as hard as it is tedious. You can be too easy, and you can be too hard. What makes this hard or painfully tedious is having to click on every single thing in the game.

[@Viruz5884]

using words like "this, that and those" are not recommended for a tutorial... be spesific and dont go forward so damn fast... i had such a hard time following this guide :I

[@loln00bsify]

bookmark 7:12

[@loln00bsify]

bookmark 10:51

[@loln00bsify]

bookmark 12:36

[@loln00bsify]

18:30 bookmark

[@loln00bsify]

25:09 bookmark

[@loln00bsify]

32:00

[@janusx66]

I am kind of interested how this game works, because the Sovjet Republic did not go out for nothing, i could not support itself annymore. So i am currious how this game would work, money is not important in Socialism. Coffee, check, now watch!

[@wiwit1337]

26:15 Good to know that my people can't reach bus station or shopping center after I placed the entire city and not mentioning it early. Time to spend another 2 hours building a new city :)

[@dr.bherrin]

A guide really needs to tell you WHY you are doing certain things, not just how to do them. The games tutorial is trash, this guide didn't help me understand the why of things. Figuring out how to build things is easy enough, I need to know WHY I am building these things, what effect it is having on my game, etc. Thanks for the video, just was not helpful to me.

[@bballjo]

There are about 60 tutorials on this channel...if you don't actually ask the question, how do you expect to get a useful answer?

[@dealler669]

yeah, it´s really rocket science why you have to build a hospital or a sewage system in a town. Try to use your brain.

[@monkeytime9851]

Thanks for this. The tutorial in the game isn't good at all.

[@Subscribe_to_faledy4]

whats the diference between bus stops and bus stations?