I’d like to buy a new video game, but the descriptions I’m finding on their “official sites” aren’t really the information I’m looking for. I need the suggestions of people who actually play other games! So I’ve turn here, to the straight dope, to ask for suggestions from the smartest gamers I know of
This is what I’m looking for in a new game:
Most importantly, the game should have mainly to do with creating a town/villiage/kingdom/country etc. It could be a real place, or a fairy kingdom, where it is doesn’t matter as long as you get to manage people and build things. And I like game play that isn’t extraordinarily goal oriented (bear in mind most games I play are of the ‘sim’ nature)
It can be about something other than creating a living place as well, as long as it doesn’t interfere too much with making the place grow. Castles involves fending off attacks as well managing the keep, which is fine; Black and White had a lot of goals not pertaining to do with the villagers, which wasn’t fine, and made me lose interest - I really liked the making a village part, though.
It has to be pretty.
What can I say, I need the game to be at least somewhat visually interesting. i.e. not like the original Colonization or Oregon Trail games. If it’s not as least as detailed as Simcity 2000, please don’t suggest it.
Well, that’s it for requirements, guess. I have 384MB of Ram and a pentium 3 (733 megahertz I believe) which runs all the games I’ve attempted so far, so it shouldn’t be too much of a limiting factor, although it makes me wary of buying SimCity 4 since I know I can’t get my $ back if it doesn’t work- store policies around here will only exchange for the same item.
Any opinions on whether the games I’ve heard the most about- Age of ____, Tropico, Civilization _ - fit the bill?
[sub] Maybe I should mention games I already own? So they wouldn’t be suggested, and to give people an idea of what I’m used to. I enjoy: The Sims; Simcity original - 3000; RTC 1&2; Zoo Tycoon(my current favorite); Theme Hospital & Park; Castles 1&2 [/sub]
You should try Majesty, I guess. Dark ages sim, where you build your little village up to the point that your little people can withstand the monsters in the wilderness and such. It does have goals, but it’s set up in chapters. So one chapter has: this magician is mad at your village because one of your villagers stole his magic book, and as a result, he has cursed your villagers to be stupid. You can either find the thief and give his book back, or build yourself up to the point you can kick his butt. But all the goals seem really secondary - it’s mostly about building your village.
Recently Extended Play gave high marks to a game I haven’t played, 1503 A.D. - The New World. It does look pretty neat, but as I say, I haven’t played it.
I third the Impressions Games City Building Series: Caesar III, Pharaoh, and Zeus. The latter two also have the Cleopatra and Poseidon expansions, respectively. I picked up the entire set (all 5 games) as the “Great Empires II Collection”. It’s available on Amazon.com for $19.99.
The games are episodic. You are usually given some cash, an empty region in which to build your city and certain objectives to meet, like population, prosperity, etc. Build up your town, worship the gods, exploit/import/export resources, produce goods. Every so often, Caesar or Pharaoh will demand certain things or you will have to defend your territory. The latter you don’t even have to do so much of, since you usually have the option of choosing an economic mission rather than a military mission. If you’re only interested in building up your city, Zeus has a “sandbox mode” where you’re given a large area with lots of resources and you’re free to do whatever you wish.
Startopia is definintely worth tracking down. Instead of a city or medieval village or such, you’re building up space stations in order to attract various goofy alien races. Should fit the bill.
I’ve enjoyed Tropico. It’s SimCity-like in that it focuses on designing & expanding the necessary facilities to make your territory function (primarily food and housing), but with a stronger economic element (building profitable businesses) and the added wrinkle of having to worry about cultivating the political support of your people.
The populace of the island is made up of multiple political factions, and while all like to be fed and employed, there are other potentially conflicting agendas as well (environmentalists want pollution limited, communists want higher wages for the lowest economic strata, etc.). In addition to cultivating support through construction policies (more schools for the intellectuals, etc.), wages, taxes, etc., you can resort to more heavy-handed measures, such as deploying more police or soldiers to keep order (though their loyalty must be monitored as well). Assassinating political opponants generally causes more problems than it solves, but I’ve had success throwing dissenters in jail, and stuffing the ballot box in a pinch.
While it’s apparently possible to fight sustained wars against guerilla movements, I’ve found it rare for a sizable armed rebellion to form if the island is reasonably prosperous. If the economy is in the tank, on the other hand, it’s nigh impossible to fund enough troop strength to keep a lid on it. I believe the expansions tinker with this somewhat, which should make for more interesting variations of play.
It’s graphically beautiful and detailed (zoom in on Pablo, the longshoreman, as he walks home to his shack after work. He’s going to vote against you? He has no relatives to be offended if you do something to him? Throw him in jail!), and has a fun and varied Latin/Carribbean soundtrack.
I’d suggest Roller Coaster Tycoon. The idea is to build a theme park. There are various different objectives in each scenario, but they all really come down to building the biggest, bestest damn theme park you can build. Gameplay is very addictive, although after a while it sometimes get repetitive ( the levels all look and play a bit sameish). It’s still great fun, though, and you can always entertain yourself by making up a theme for your park and all its attractions (it drove me and a friend out of my mind trying to think up a name for an Egyptian-themed roller-coaster)
Civilization 3 is my current addiction. The multiplayer aspect makes it even better. (when I can get it to work @#$%) Plus it is from Sid Meier, so you already know how cool most of his games are.
Tropico was also pretty cool, although I became bored with it after a couple of weeks. I believe it will be great as the series moves forward, because it is certainly a great idea.
Tried Stronghold? It’s similar to Castles, but with more resource management. It’s OK, and the campaign is quite good.
There’s also the 3D version of Themepark, Theme Park World. It’s pretty much the same as the original, but harder to balance the budget.
I’m also MeTooing Umbriel with Tropico. It’s possible to play the game nicely, or as a rutheless despot.
Umm, I’ve also noticed that you lists, Simicity Original and 3000. You do know that Simcity 4 is out? It should run on your PC if you turn off all the graphical options.
Another vote for Tropico here. Very, very nicely done game, but not a ton of replay value. But the first couple of times through, it’s a blast. Tropico 2: Pirates Cove will be out sometime soon. I only played it with the “Spring Break” expansion pack, which I hear improved on the original a lot.
Rollercoaster Tycoon is a great game and has sucked away many many hours of my time, but it’s not really city building. Maybe Railroad Tycoon, but it’s not so much about the cities as the connections between them.
You might want to try 1503 AD: The New World, which is the sequel (prequel?) to 1602 AD, a city-building game set in the time period. It sounds like a cross between SimCity and Tropico; I haven’t played the game yet but am looking forward to trying it.
I don’t think I’d recommend the “Age of” type games; I always get sucked into those because I think “city-building but medieval cities! cool!” but they’re really RTS’s, of which I am not a fan.
The OP mentioned SimCity 4, but his/her set-up is right at the edge of where SC4 will be painful to play. I think that it should still run okay if, as you recommend, the graphics options are turned down (plus with the forthcoming patch), but it’s not an unreserved recommendation. It’s IMO the best version of the game yet, but it does demand a lot out of your system.
If you can get past the unintuitive interface and primitive graphics, 1602 AD sounds like what you are looking for. You start with a ship with some tools, lumber, and money, find an island, and start building a city, from scratch. I hated it when I first got it, but once I learned how it works it was almost hypnotizing, and when I say you start from scratch I mean it…it takes a long time to build up your island to the point where you can use all the structures. You should be able to find it in a bargain bin somewhere for $5. There is a sequel, 1503 AD which is supposed to be a little slicker, but it just came out and I’m not sure if it’s as good as the first one or not.
A tough learning curve, but once you got past that it was a great concept.
If they did nothing but make better graphics for 1503 it would be well worth the cash.
I haven’t played it much but you might be interested in Capitalism 2 where you take charge of a business and try to make it profitable. Pretty good game.
Agree with Spit, I’ve always been a fan of “Civilization”. I also liked the old Sid Meier game “Colonization” from back in the DOS days, I wish they’d revamp that one for Windows.
