Dear Frontier Developments,
I'd like to take a moment to thank you for making a number of exceptional games during my childhood which have furthered my ambitions to become a Game Developer thanks to their realistic mechanics and little attention to detail things have made them stand out from the crowd. RollerCoaster Tycoon 3 and Thrillville: Off The Rails are predominate favourites, I could still contently play either for hours at a time without getting bored or losing interest... More recently I've been just as captivated by Elite: Dangerous and Planet Coaster.
A Theme Park wouldn't want me designing rides despite my years of in-game experience, based on my tendency to make roller-coasters full of sheer 90° drops (some of which in spiral or loop the loop form) which would most probably cause riders more fear and nausea than excitement, and potentially deal dangerous amounts of G-Force. Despite my lack of knowledge on how to properly build roller-coasters people actually want to ride... I've played games for almost two and a half decades, of the substantial amount of simulation games I've played, one thing I'm sure is that you continue to make some of the most immersive, realistic and enjoyable games in the genre.
More than a decade ago, Lionhead studios released their business simulation game, The Movies. It allowed the player to take charge of their own Hollywood Studio throughout the 1960s to 2020s by placing down sets, and casting, screenwriting and production offices, then employing the relevant people to write, shoot and star in the next potential blockbuster movie. Although, the best thing to do was to use the Custom Screenplay Creator to storyboard their own movies using simple and advanced tools probably best comparable to Source Filmmaker or Grand Theft Auto V's Video Editor. Lots of fans still do use these tools to create their own movies, most of which are uploaded to YouTube.
The Movies doesn't look or act as good as it once did due to a combination of outdated graphics, game-breaking bugs related to a custom-made engine and a reliance on CD Protection which has been blocked by Microsoft since Windows 7, I can only presume Microsoft halted any possible future development on the game and removed it from Steam so that Lionhead could focus their time on creating Fable Games.
There's a gap in the simulation market that used to be filled up by The Movies, but now can't due to the aforementioned reasons. My belief, and the reason for this open letter, is that with the drastic evolution graphics and computing power has gone through over the decade, and how well-regarded and well-respected The Movies is... It seems like the right time for something similar to fill that gap in the market, and I have no doubt that you would be the best company to create either a sequel or spiritual successor due to your tendency to create significant simulation games thanks to your attention to detail, please seriously consider buying the rights to The Movies from Microsoft.
Best Regards,
Christopher Smith.
