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Okay, so I’ve been playing Empire of Sin a bunch, and it’s pretty mixed. There’s a lot wrong with it. But the core of it is actually pretty fun, so it’s been keeping me involved. At heart, it’s really not a management game. Yes, there are businesses you own and operate and you upgrade and decide which upgrades they get, but at heart this is “X-Com: Gangster Edition”. Creating businesses is mostly taking them over from independent gangs, which is a tactical fight. Defending them from rivals is a tactical fight. Taking over rivals’ businesses is a tactical fight. The overall management part of it is there as carrot and stick for the tactical game: use the management to make money so that you can hire better gangsters and buy better equipment so that you can do better it fights that give you more businesses that make you more money. And if you like tactical games, especially tactical games where it’s your few incredibly overpowered people against an army of stupid weaklings, that central mechanic is fun! But it’s not really much of a management game. Beyond that, it’s also... incredibly uneven on a lot of things. The character art is great, with detailed and well designed models; the voice acting for characters is uneven, and the animations are just bad. The set of gangsters you can hire from is always the same, and they unlock at tiers of gameplay, so you’ll have very similar teams from play to play, it’ll only be your boss that really shakes things up. Likewise, the game gives out random quests you can pick up, but there aren’t that many so you’ll likely see them each play through. The UI is okay but missing what I consider standard QoL features - like being able to jump to where your boss is, or select multiple characters from an overhead, or being able to click on a quest or quest marker and have the screen move to there. The city is huge, but there are places for business everywhere, so one city block might have two or three speakeasies in it and that seems to be fine. So I dunno. I’m enjoying it, but I’m not sure it’ll be worth more than one play through, and not sure it’s really worth $40.
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Dec 2, 2020 06:21
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Anime Store Adventure posted:I don’t know the exact logic for people finding jobs (or choosing to wait at a bus stop for one) but it seems like you need a buffer of people generally. I have a town that consistently has 100+ unemployed despite bus, train, and gondola space that links to several work areas with a lot of free jobs. I know they have some level of leisure time, so maybe it’s that? so basically either design all your stuff around one transit stop per settlement or be prepared to manually adjust all your lines whenever you add a new one.
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Dec 2, 2020 06:44
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In W&R is there a way to conveyor raw gravel/stone/whateveritscalled from a storage lot to the processing factory to turn it into gravel? It looks like the only way to get from one to the other is by transporting it in a dumptruck which works alright but it'd be nice if I could dump it in the storage and have it automatically feed into the factory. Also is there a reason why I'm only getting 1 or 2 workers at my quarries at a time? It's pretty far away from the residential area I built since I didn't realize I had to put it on a gravel spot before building a town but do have a couple buses going back and forth to bring workers.
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Dec 2, 2020 17:20
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explosivo posted:In W&R is there a way to conveyor raw gravel/stone/whateveritscalled from a storage lot to the processing factory to turn it into gravel?
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Dec 2, 2020 17:56
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WithoutTheFezOn posted:Doesn’t look like it. The gravel processing plant has neither conveyor input slots nor a factory connection. Okay thanks! I can make it work with the trucks but I wasn't sure if I was missing something like a way to toggle between conveyor or truck loading or something like that.
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Dec 2, 2020 18:16
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skeleton warrior posted:Okay, so I’ve been playing Empire of Sin a bunch, and it’s pretty mixed. There’s a lot wrong with it. But the core of it is actually pretty fun, so it’s been keeping me involved. This was exactly how I felt about Omerta, and I'm not surprised this game went down the same path.
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Dec 2, 2020 18:45
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explosivo posted:Okay thanks! I can make it work with the trucks but I wasn't sure if I was missing something like a way to toggle between conveyor or truck loading or something like that. I've found it's best to have a short, asphalt road between the quarry and the gravel plant, with a one way lane in so that trucks can queue nicely without backing up into traffic if you're using a shared road to connect them. Make sure there's a gas station nearby, especially if you're using a backhoe at the quarry, so that you don't end up blocking the whole darn road. Make sure the trucks have wait until loaded / unloaded set.
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Dec 2, 2020 19:21
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Volmarias posted:I've found it's best to have a short, asphalt road between the quarry and the gravel plant, with a one way lane in so that trucks can queue nicely without backing up into traffic if you're using a shared road to connect them. Make sure there's a gas station nearby, especially if you're using a backhoe at the quarry, so that you don't end up blocking the whole darn road. Make sure the trucks have wait until loaded / unloaded set. poo poo I didn't even know I needed a gas station. These are good tips, thank you!
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Dec 2, 2020 19:26
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explosivo posted:poo poo I didn't even know I needed a gas station. These are good tips, thank you! Oh, you will, when you see your entire city's vehicle fleet angrily drifting behind the one digging machine.
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Dec 2, 2020 19:31
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Grevlek posted:This was exactly how I felt about Omerta, and I'm not surprised this game went down the same path. Is it possible they just weren't aware of Omerta? Why did they basically recreate that game
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Dec 2, 2020 19:35
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Away all Goats posted:Is it possible they just weren't aware of Omerta? Why did they basically recreate that game There was a game before Omerta that did focus more on the aquisition of properties and less on the combat. Real Theme Hospital era game. But yeah, put 20 hours into Omerta and it has bad combat.
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Dec 2, 2020 19:45
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So who's going to write up all these tips into a coherent document and put it up on Steam? 😁
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Dec 2, 2020 19:48
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Away all Goats posted:Is it possible they just weren't aware of Omerta? Why did they basically recreate that game for some reason developers keep trying to make tactical/management/rpg lite games and all of them since jagged alliance 2 are bad. like if you want to make an xcom clone just do that and focus on that gameplay rather than forcing it into an unhappy marriage with a business clicker. the 'gangster 1920s' setting seems like a slam dunk for this hybrid genre but this and the 'hardbitten mercenary' and 'alien defense force' settings are big traps that require a lot of attention to game design or else you just throw it on the heap of failed and forgotten games. xcom reboot got away with it because the management is minimal and mostly revolves around collecting mana to make better gun, not like a payroll and property acquisition system. it is just awkward and never works, you have to either make a tactical shooter or a management game and not try to split the difference down the middle of all the things jagged alliance asked the player to do, the money and management bit was the least emphasized part and it was really only there as a constraint for the player, not as the focus of the game. imagine if you had to hire civilians to work the mines of drassen. ugh
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Dec 2, 2020 19:53
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im pinning my hopes on city of gangsters
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Dec 2, 2020 19:56
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looks kind of cheap but so long as they don't try to wedge a combat game in there and just make it purely a business sim then it would already be an improvement
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Dec 2, 2020 20:01
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Away all Goats posted:Is it possible they just weren't aware of Omerta? Why did they basically recreate that game I can't imagine. Omerta was either made by Kalypso inhouse, or directly under its umbrella. When it came out it was a huge deal, since it was "Tropico/City Builder Company expands into new game type" hype that Paradox is sort of reusing to be honest. Rather than not being aware of it, I think they are very aware and if they can somehow pivot from 'Grand Strategy to Xcom-Like' they would be succeeding where Kalypso failed. I really wanted to like Omerta. I never played 'Gangsters' on PC when it was current, but I did play 'Mob Rule' which I later found out was called 'Constructors' in the UK. That's actually a pretty fun game, probably the best mob game on the market. Well, that or The Godfather 2 for PS3, that was a very satisfying game mixing action and light strategy/empire management.
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Dec 2, 2020 20:16
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I honestly like the combat, but there really really needs to be a way to auto-resolve fights that aren't interesting. And a fuckload of bug fixes.
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Dec 2, 2020 20:27
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Grevlek posted:I can't imagine. Omerta was either made by Kalypso inhouse, or directly under its umbrella. When it came out it was a huge deal, since it was "Tropico/City Builder Company expands into new game type" hype that Paradox is sort of reusing to be honest. Rather than not being aware of it, I think they are very aware and if they can somehow pivot from 'Grand Strategy to Xcom-Like' they would be succeeding where Kalypso failed. it was made by haemimont, who at that time had made tropico 3 and was working on tropico 4. if you play one of those tropicos and omerta at the same time you can see how they use the same engine, in fact i think a lot of the limitations of omerta (aside from quick cash-grab game design) is that they were trying to do a tactical shooter in an engine otherwise used for city building games whether romero games, the developer of empire of sin (yes, THAT romero) was aware of omerta, i can't say. it is such a similar game though, and has such similar flaws that they should have been aware of it. i don't want to play a boring tac shooter in between watered down logistics management! make one or the other of those sides of the game really good and you can cut out the other part! paradox the publisher is defiintely moving in the same direction kalypso did, trying to be a one stop house for all manner of euro dev strategy games - which have an equal chance of being either pretty good or a janky mess. while my ears perk when i hear about a new game produced by paradox the dev studio, paradox the publisher is real hit and miss for me Mr. Fall Down Terror fucked around with this message at 20:41 on Dec 2, 2020 |
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Dec 2, 2020 20:35
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I never ever buy 1.0 versions of Paradox games, they always get better in months.
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Dec 2, 2020 20:58
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explosivo posted:poo poo I didn't even know I needed a gas station. These are good tips, thank you!
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Dec 2, 2020 20:59
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Quarries notably don’t need workers if they have an excavator, also. Only the gravel processing plants. I had one map where gravel was pretty far away, so I just shipped out some firefighters to within range of my quarries as the only employees for a depot that dumped all the quarried stone on a train and sent it off to the gravel processing. In retrospect I should have set up a super long conveyor but they still have to make the first and last mile by dump truck in any case.
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Dec 2, 2020 22:09
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If you make hotel rooms in Sim Casino you can charge more if the room has windows and people don't care if they lead outside or into a corridor, toilet or other room. I suspect they'll probably patch that.Grevlek posted:I really wanted to like Omerta. I never played 'Gangsters' on PC when it was current, but I did play 'Mob Rule' which I later found out was called 'Constructors' in the UK. That's actually a pretty fun game, probably the best mob game on the market. Well, that or The Godfather 2 for PS3, that was a very satisfying game mixing action and light strategy/empire management.
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Dec 2, 2020 22:26
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Mob Rule had cutscenes with cartoony, low grade CGI women distracting workers with their boobs.
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Dec 2, 2020 22:35
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skooma512 posted:Mob Rule had cutscenes with cartoony, low grade CGI women distracting workers with their boobs. hachi machi sounds like my type of game!!
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Dec 2, 2020 22:46
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Mayveena posted:I never ever buy 1.0 versions of Paradox games, they always get better in months. A while ago, I made this a policy for their current version of the game. I'm not buying Crusader Kings 3, for example, until 4 is out. No, I do not care if that takes 10 years. I'll just play 2, and not pay $600 total with all the DLC and such.
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Dec 2, 2020 22:48
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SlyFrog posted:A while ago, I made this a policy for their current version of the game. I do this with consoles. I just got a PS4 Pro for a great price recently and am enjoying an entire generation of games I haven't played for dirt cheap. When the PS6 comes out, I'll upgrade to the PS5.
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Dec 2, 2020 22:50
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SlyFrog posted:I'll just play 2, and not pay $600 total with all the DLC and such. I share your policy and Christ I wish they'd cut the DLC poo poo out. Though at this point it's mostly turned into "just don't give Paradox money", and I don't really feel like I'm missing out.
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Dec 2, 2020 23:07
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Mayveena posted:I never ever buy 1.0 versions of Paradox games, they always get better in months. They don't always get better, looking at you Stellaris. They also like to change game balance with patches, such that 1.0 and the version with 3 years of patches and DLC may be pretty different.
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Dec 2, 2020 23:11
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Poil posted:If you make hotel rooms in Sim Casino you can charge more if the room has windows and people don't care if they lead outside or into a corridor, toilet or other room. I suspect they'll probably patch that. Gonna put windows in all the bathrooms looking out into the hallway.
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Dec 3, 2020 00:54
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I've seen several Vegas hotel rooms with windows into the bathroom, so you can watch your roomie take a dump from the comfort of your bed.
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Dec 3, 2020 02:15
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fell down a surviving mars hole again, that game is so satisfying with the terraforming dlc, even if it's grindy
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Dec 3, 2020 03:11
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Poil posted:If you make hotel rooms in Sim Casino you can charge more if the room has windows and people don't care if they lead outside or into a corridor, toilet or other room. I suspect they'll probably patch that. Wait, so you're allowed to make hotel rooms that don't have windows? I've heard of that on cruise ships but never hotels. Sim Casino needs building codes.
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Dec 3, 2020 03:23
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Wooper posted:I've seen several Vegas hotel rooms with windows into the bathroom, so you can watch your roomie take a dump from the comfort of your bed. It's obviously so the person I'm travelling with knows I'm masturbating in the shower.
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Dec 3, 2020 03:24
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windows looking into a bathroom describes a love hotel, yeah
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Dec 3, 2020 03:29
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P sure these were the big casinos on the strip. Also had a window with a nice view of nothing/a roof.
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Dec 3, 2020 03:39
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Snooze Cruise posted:windows looking into a bathroom describes a love hotel, yeah They don't tend to love when I do that.
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Dec 3, 2020 03:39
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Grevlek posted:Well, that or The Godfather 2 for PS3, that was a very satisfying game mixing action and light strategy/empire management. I thought I was the only guy who enjoyed Godfather 2. Everyone said it was a massive letdown after the first, but I never got to play that one. I don't think you can get either of them nowadays.
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Dec 3, 2020 05:00
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Wooper posted:P sure these were the big casinos on the strip. Also had a window with a nice view of nothing/a roof. oh lol i wasn't replying to you specially, i was just making a general statement Snooze Cruise fucked around with this message at 05:55 on Dec 3, 2020 |
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Dec 3, 2020 05:39
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skooma512 posted:They don't always get better, looking at you Stellaris. Was going to post this, thanks for doing it for me.
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Dec 3, 2020 06:32
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Facebook Aunt posted:Wait, so you're allowed to make hotel rooms that don't have windows? I've heard of that on cruise ships but never hotels. Sim Casino needs building codes. I have stayed in hotels in Pensacola and New Orleans that were entirely interior rooms with no windows.
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Dec 3, 2020 07:46
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