Interview: Bus Bound Devs Discuss Their Process and Their Plans

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Stillalive Studios has a history of making simulator games, including popular titles like Bus Simulator 16, 18, and 21. With their new game, Bus Bound, they’re building on that experience by focusing on a more detailed city and paying close attention to what passengers want.

I recently played Bus Bound, and it was perfect for me! I’m a big fan of indie games, simulators, and public transport, and this game combines all three. You get to drive a bus around a large city at different times of day and in all kinds of weather, which can sometimes make driving tricky. The more passengers you satisfy, the more money you earn, and that allows you to improve the city around you – you’ll see traffic lessen and pollution decrease as things get better.

I recently spoke with Andrei Pandalescu, game director at stillalive studios, and Florian Friedrich, a game designer there. Their answers were encouraging and suggest Bus Bound will continue to get better, as the team is clearly focused on future development.

Interview with Andrei Pandalescu and Florian Friedrich from stillalive studios

The developer diary mentioned wanting to move away from the ‘eye in the sky’ perspective of Bus Simulator and instead focus on the people and city in Bus Bound. What difficulties did the team encounter when trying to achieve this new approach?

From a design perspective, we quickly understood that passenger opinions were crucial. This meant handling a large number of people getting on and off the bus, which presented a major technical hurdle. We also felt that prioritizing profit clashed with our focus on the passenger experience, so we decided to create a bus simulation game where the company and the game world evolve solely based on rider feedback. Determining how that feedback would translate into improvements for different areas of the city as a reward system wasn’t straightforward, and required a lot of experimentation.

I’m a big fan of public transportation, and I saw firsthand how valuable it was when I was in college. Bus Bound really highlights the benefits of a strong public transit system. Was that done on purpose, to encourage people to recognize how important these systems are?

Absolutely! We drew heavily on research about public transportation and ideas from books and other resources that explore how to build cities focused on the needs of residents. To be upfront about our intentions: Bus Bound is actually a way for Big Bus to promote their goals of cleaner air and building more sustainable cities.

What positive changes in the real world would you hope to see as a result of someone experiencing ‘Bus Bound’?

You know, as a gamer, I’ve been thinking… it’d be awesome if we could get more people to consider how public transport could really help out communities that are totally reliant on cars. Especially places where they don’t have much of a public transport system, or it’s just starting up. It could be a game-changer, honestly.

We thought it was really interesting to show drivers how passengers were reacting to their driving as it happened. It’s tricky because everyone reacts differently to the same things! Designing a system that could handle those varied, real-time responses presented some unique challenges. What problems did we run into while building it?

We created a system that feels more natural than traditional game feedback. Usually, games punish or reward you through the interface. We wanted to make it feel more realistic, so we had the virtual characters react to your driving. For instance, if you skip your turn signal on an empty road, no one would actually notice in real life. This approach feels more authentic than a strict, ‘realistic’ scoring system that constantly penalizes you.

I often get funny feedback from passengers! One comment that really made me chuckle described how I went over a speed bump – they said it felt like an unplanned and unwelcome chiropractic adjustment.

Okay, so I’ve run into something kinda funny while playing. If I really push someone hard in a one-way situation, sometimes they’ll hit back with this weird complaint – they basically say it’s a ‘one-way road, zero-way sense!’ It’s a pretty rare response, but it always cracks me up when it happens.

I really like the notification “More honks than a goose” when someone uses the horn too often. There’s also a funny one, “Bus vs. Invisible barrier: 0-1,” which is meant to appear when the driver crashes. Ironically, during testing, it would sometimes pop up when we encountered a hidden bug in the code – a real invisible blocker!

I noticed the game includes emergency vehicle sirens, but you can’t actually get in trouble for driving violations. Could you explain how you decided which realistic details to include and which to leave out, to maintain the calm and relaxing experience Bus Bound provides?

One of the goals for Bus Bound was to create a relaxing and enjoyable experience for players. So, getting pulled over and disrupted felt out of place. However, the authorities do have a noticeable presence throughout the city – you’ll see them at events, and while driving past places like hospitals, fire stations, and police headquarters.

Bus Bound is already a huge game because of its large map. What are your plans for future updates or downloadable content?

We’ve discovered that enhancing and evolving the city’s areas significantly impacts how players see it, with a lot of potential content tied to the upgrade system. Regarding downloadable content, we believe it would be a missed opportunity to leave the large map unexplored, and we’ll be sharing more details about our plans soon.

The city looks really detailed, even when viewed from the bus. What’s your favorite part of the city’s design? Did you include any fun, hidden details that players can discover?

Driving a bus can become quite repetitive, as you often find yourself running the same route repeatedly. Once you become familiar with the route and stops, your attention naturally wanders, so we wanted to create a visually interesting world to look at. We’ve filled the game with lots of small stories and details that contribute to the overall feel of the city, and we’ve hidden a few Easter eggs for players to discover. For example, there’s a haunted house—I was surprised to find it myself!—and a cool club hidden under a bridge in the music district. I encourage players to explore and find these hidden gems!

During the making of Bus Bound, we had to make some tough choices about what to include in the final game. Can you tell us about the biggest decisions you made during development that affected the launched version? Were there any features or content you had to remove, and if so, what impact would those additions have had on the game?

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When we started, we carefully considered whether older features should be included in the game, as if asking, ‘Does this really belong here?’ It was difficult to admit that some didn’t align with our new vision. For instance, we questioned the need for players to walk around the game world. Making these tough choices challenged us as designers, but it also helped us concentrate on the core elements of this game – specifically, the driving experience and how players progress through the game based on their interactions with others.

The developers have been asked if they plan to add more cities to the game, and potentially link them with longer roads, giving players a middle ground between regular driving and completely open exploration.

We’re absolutely planning to add to the game world in the future, but we don’t have many details to share just yet.

Considering how stillalive studios has developed its games, do you think we might see a simulator in the future that focuses on very long-distance routes, similar to those driven by buses like Greyhound? It could be a fresh take on the genre, offering a different kind of long-haul experience than what’s currently available in games like American and Euro Truck Simulator.

Speaking for the studio, we find this game idea very interesting and see it as a good opportunity. We’ve been thinking about new ways to enhance our driving games, but we don’t have any concrete plans to announce at this time.

Step Behind the Wheel for a Relaxing Experience

Bus Bound is out now on Steam, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X|S. If you enjoy simulation games, it’s definitely worth a look – it’s a charming and relaxing experience, and the passenger interactions are often quite funny. I’m excited that the developers at stillalive studios are planning to add even more to the game, and I’m looking forward to seeing what they come up with next.

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2026-05-11 22:11