So I'm playing through the updated version and noticed your request for feedback/experience on how the mod is playing.

I set up a modifed hard difficulty start amd set my HQ to NY in the Base City Map with I recall the 70 AI Companies with Full Cash option in 1900.

Early game is always a struggle with so little cash, but I muddled through. With the big cash reserves, all the AI companies put dealerships and factories across the globe, but while it broke a little immersion to see Nissan pwning in the US market in the teens and into the roaring 20s, I had a pretty successful run myself and it was great to have real car companies to watch and compete with.

I managed to dominate the pickup truck and compact car market by the mid 20s. Had maybe 8-10 different body styles in 3-4 year trim update cycles, with new generations every 10-12 years starting in the early teens. Raked in about 1.3 billion cash before the 1929 crash. Continued to develop parts and cars on a smaller scale/longer cycle throughout the depression, taking losses on many models to maintain market share while losing about 30 million a year most years. Some years, especially approaching WWII, I managed to eke out a profit, and when I felt safe, I bought back about 70% of my stock.

The depression never hurt us too badly, but I'm sure the furloughed factory workers felt differently.

The AI took a hit, but had so much cash that it never put a dent in their reserves. Deusenberg even managed a healthy profit as did Nissan and Ford fared pretty well.

Early on, maybe 1920, I set the lobbying slider to a very low percent, and when the US entered the war, I elected to forego munitions and risk losing in the contract race. I set lobbying to maybe 60-70 percent and began immediately developing diesel engines for my utility vehicle models. Throughout the war, I managed to win nearly every vehicle contract in the US, pulling in about 300 million to put me back roughly to my pre-depression cash levels.

After the war, I am looking at the other manufacturers and wondering when they will start selling cars. It has been about three months and so far, I have a seeming monopoly on car sales in the US while everyone retools and reinvests in dealerships they must have closed down.

I'm weighing different component strategies now, but probably the biggest shift has been setting up 3 marquees. -REX- will take over all utility vehicle lines and focus on diesel engine technology and fleet solutions. -OG- will produce my pre-war economy car lines. -Sunracer- will handle my high performance, affordable sports cars. And my main brand (...) Ellipsis will do quality midsize and luxury cars and focus on our prestigious and experimental race cars and prototypes that built the brand in the mid teens and early 20s before I got out of racing to save money for the GD - an overly cautious decision as it turns out.

At some poont in the late 1930s, I spun off a wholly owned subsidiary just to see how the mechanic fared. They are almost out of cash, so, oops.

And while I'm loving the game and am totally addicted, I find the development cycle with so many models and components to be a bit overwhelming. At some point I may spin off my Marquees as well to reduce the workload. And I'm constantly plaging around with naming conventions as I see you are as well.

I know some of this isnt related to the mod specifically, but it may have some useful info for you.

My experience is positive and if I start a mew game, I'll probably use the low cash option as I think a few bankruptcies during the GD and the possibility of buying out some competition would be fun, however, since most of the AI automakers have 3-4 billion in cash following the war, I doubt I'll be walking that road anytime soon.