Afterlife

I've ever played! As a God simulator, surely Afterlife resembles a lot a classic city builder, but it does have some unique features, which makes a LOT harder ( at least for my capabilities) than any other city builder I've played. Which means constructing cities, building zones, universities and other classical features of a city builder but with a more.. heavenly charm ( ...sorry). However, as stated above, it is really obscure in some way and ''difficult''. To be more specific, earning ''money'' here is quite a lot more difficult.. or at least, it does have a hellish ( pun intended) way for earning cash. Moreover, the micromanagement in this game is incredibly massive, and that's also one of the reason that this game doesn't get the five star. The other reason is time: the game has 4 time mode, but only 1 seems to bring fruition to your choices ( the faster one), while the others.. are simply to slow. Perhaps that's why this game didn't shine like the rest: it does have a lot of charm thanks to its two counsellors ( the literals ''angel and devil on your shoulder'') and excellent writing, a truly fantastic graphic engine with a lot of personality ( like almost every single game from the 90's) but the pace is simply... off putting, to say at the very least. So, if you have patience and a good sense of humour, give it a chance! It does a lot of positive factors.. but a devilish learning curve ... YUCK!

Afterlife was published among a flood of other world-building games in the late Nineties but differentiated itself with its unique theme and clever writing. You play a deity charged with simultaneously constructing a Heaven and Hell for the recently departed to spend eternity. Similar to SimCity there is zoning, power stations, transport, and other structures to build while trying to balance the budget against the needs of the growing populace. Every building has amusing flavor-text and the whole game is permeated by an ironic, sometimes sharp sense of humor. There’s an almost fiendish amount of data available for the obsessive player to pour over from heatmaps of the afterlife to information about the still living humanoids on the planet. Assisting you throughout is Jasper and Aria, a demon and angel respectively whose fantastic voice-acting alone makes the game worth purchasing. There is a surprising amount of depth and the difficulty ramps up significantly once Heaven and Hell have grown, prepare for a lot of scrolling, clicking, and some swearing. Some of the mechanics in the game are not explained well and it’s recommended that you hunt down a scan of the official guidebook.

This is not intuitive gaming. Moving around the map is difficult, lots of pointing and clicking. Tutorials took a secont to find and covered very little information with a lot of words. Hotkeys are trial-and-error. There is no way to see what you've done. I think playing this game is like a little slice of hell.

I like this game, it's where I playing god by building both Heaven and Hell where reward and punishment buildings are very funny(there's reward building that works like Maxis' Spore while there's also punishment buildings that mocks Conspiracy Theories and Pseudoscience: Illuminatiland and New Age Hells respectively). roads as umbrella substitute for both Power lines and Water Pipes works best here(definitely better than Simcity 2013 did it) not only electricity here are replaced by something that more capable of making impossible possible (as a resource that works like Electricity/water in Simcity games). and the closest thing to be win condition in this game is building Omnibolges(for hell) and Love Domes(for heaven) though there's also true lose conditions: visited by 4 surfers of apocalypse and EMBO's extinction(latter is either caused by Nuclear War(when EMBOs are still particularly warlike even after reaches nuclear technology level) or Natural causes(much more unlikely unless when cheating)) after all, this game might be better if there's also mode of playing as The Powers That Be(aka the mode of terraforming Heaven and Hell aswell Planet where EMBO lives) in addition of playing as Demiurge as Usual

This was an all time fav game way back when, even had the strategy guide in paper, Heaven and hell have so much personality and charm, a warped sense of humor as well... Glad it has been preserved by GOG rather than lost to the winds..