Just got into this game recently, so maybe this is well-known knowledge but... is there a point to upgrading to Central Market and Wall Street?
Using values for Hard difficulty:
- Marketplace costs $1350+$270+215+$3130=$4965, and generates $320 per round.
- Central Market costs $21,165 (Marketplace+$16,200), and generates $1120 per round (+ boost to merchantmen).
- Monkey Wall Street costs $85,965 and generates $5120 per round (+ 5 lives).
Looking at the math, Central Market generates 3.5x as much income per round as Marketplace, but costs. 4.26x more. Wall Street generates 16x as much per round as Marketplace, but costs 17.31x as much.
So unless you have a lot of merchantmen, wouldn't it be better to spam empty spaces with Marketplaces rather than upgrade them to Central Markets?
Similarly for Wall Street - without any knowledge points, I can see why the +5 lives generated by Wall St makes sense, but if you have the "Healthy Bananas" knowledge point, 16 Marketplaces is strictly better than one Wall Street - although I suspect available space would be an issue here.
I believe the biggest reason to upgrade is for space efficiency, even if the cost takes longer to recoup. Also, for the xx5 village, the output is based on the value spent on the farms it absorbs. So, the more expensive farms mean that the xx5 that absorbs them will give more income.
Without the upgrades (e.g., beyond marketplace), it can be hard to afford some of the most expensive upgrades/ the Paragon monkeys too.
I agree about the space thing. You really can't place thaaat many farm on most maps, so being able to place maybe 3-5 xx4 farms plus your boats is a good boost. And also, while it may take longer to pay it's self off, it is still better income per farm. So for late game it's good, but early-mid game maybe not the best option