Hi
Im doing a criminal management/strategy game where an important component (but not the only one) is selling drugs. I want to keep the number down and mix the styles a bit. This is my plan:

GROWN (by player)
- mushrooms
- cannabis (possibly split into weed and hash)

CHEMICAL (manufactured by player)
- Ecstacy
- LSD
- Speed (amphetamine)

IMPORTED (cannot be produced. Bought and sold for a profit)
- Heroin
- Cocaine

Any comments? I might include GHB as a forth chemical drug but im not sure.
Thanks a lot
Erik

Most good game designers try the actual experience if they can't think of how to do something.

Just kidding, of course.

Are the drugs just categories of market commodities that are being traded for the point of trading... or do they have some kind of effect - e.g. PCPs let you ignore being shot, or Crystal Meth makes you more likely to fight cops instead of run away from them, etc...?

the types are just for trading. Gangmembers will have a addiction rating that may go up if they have too good access to drugs and this may differ a little for different drugs.

But is anything important missing in terms of inclusion? Should something be added or replaced?
Thanks
E

I would rather invent 3-5 drugs which give various in-game buffs but which have little or no addiction properties. Preferrably, choose an odd number, because that allows for a variation of the traditional rock-paper-scissor balance, which is a proven successful recipe for balancing powers.
So, the market value of the drugs would be determined by being effectively "heal potions" or "strength potions" or whatever, just they'd be called "cool sneeze" or "filth weed" or "neurobang" or whatever you like.

Trading real-life hard drugs as one of the major game elements not only calls for being blacklisted, but also for getting a dozen death threats per week and soccer moms spitting and throwing things at you as you leave your house. You should think carefully if this is what you want.

Even with invented drugs, you'll probably not get anything below a "16+" rating anywhere in the world if they're referred to as "drugs" that are sold by "kool gangstas". This idea just doesn't go down well with a lot of people.

Yeah i know this is how it works in the US and similar countries. But Im not gonna sell this game anyway.

It always struck me as double-standards. Killing people by the hundreds, slicing them up with knives and gunning them down is ok. Starting wars and burning down cities are ok. Exterminating indians likewise. But to make a game about urban criminality (which is largely about drugs and the economy around them) is unacceptable?

Anyway the drugs will not have WOW-buff abilities. Thats just silly.

Those things sure are double standards, but alas, the world is not fair! Display of forcing a girl under your ward into fellatio and violently butt-raping her is perfectly acceptable for 16 year olds to see (seen this kind of thing on a public television station last month). Mowing down two dozen zombies (e.g. the "Dead Alive" movie, or any of the "Resident Evil" games) on the other hand deserves being censored. Or, shooting roughly human-like things in dark corridors.

However, whether that's right or not, you risk getting in serious trouble if you do something that is against public morals (no matter how rotten those are), and you should really think twice about it. Endorsing the trading of drugs is asking for trouble, even if you give your game away for free.

I think the listed assortment of drugs is good. It is diverse enough to work as a background for a variety of interesting in-game effects. I wouldn't add more stuff unless there is an explicit need for it. The difference of weed and hash, for instance, isn't clear to many (most?) people.

Also, lol @ worrying about death threats from rabid soccer moms. If the game is non-commercial and no imaginary drug effects (best matched with imaginary drugs) are desired, then real-world drugs constitute superior design thanks to instant recognition.

I think in-game drugs are meaningless without more or less explicitly including people who use them, so you should approach your drug design from a social and marketing angle: who are the various categories of drug users that are actually important in the game? What do they want from drugs? As a consequence, what drugs do they buy? What are suitable ways to sell specific drugs to specific categories of people? Given retail and wholesale distribution channels, what sort of people is qualified and/or likely to traffic drugs in your game's setting?

You seem to have a very realistic setting, but consider inventing synthetic drugs with peculiar effects and side effects that are interesting and appropriate for your world. There are many such drugs in the real world, from GHB to amphetamines: introducing new substances, even ones with a large social impact, is perfectly realistic