First, the positives. I really like the art-style and graphics, the setting is a nice change of pace from the "historical" city builders and... Well, that's pretty much it. Beyond the steampunk setting in a fictional world, everything is just like the games it imitates... including all the parts I didn't like about them, most notably the complete lack of pathing AI for workers that forces you to build housing in a very specific pattern that's both unrealistic and pretty boring to look at. Even worse, a bunch of game mechanics that were staples of earlier games have been left out entirely: There's no crime, no fires or other disasters and no health system. There's also no combat, which is admittedly no great loss, but also no diplomacy or reputation system with neighbouring cities either. And that might be why campaign objectives were so repetitive: Have N population in N level housing, produce N of a certain commodity, rinse and repeat with a new building and item. There are apparently some monuments/Great Works projects further on, but to be honest I got bored and quit long before I ever saw those. The one innovative thing the game does try to do is the steam power system, but that's handled in such a half-arsed way that they might as well have not bothered; once you've connected the geothermal vent taps to the big central boiler, the steam supply is... dispensed into small gas bottles that walkers transport in carts to various buildings Only one building needs a direct connection, and you don't even get that until a fair way into the campaign. By a similar token, the walker system is used for distributing water no matter what level the building's at, whereas Caesar 3 managed to implement reservoirs and aqueducts that you needed to build in order to advance past a certain level. Eighteen years ago! All in all, this is a great looking game with a cool art-style and an interesting setting that just isn't very much fun to actually play. Which is a huge shame.
