A lot of reviews here are fairly old, and it seems the game has improved since they were written. Endzone is very similar to Banished, with a lot of familiar mechanics. There's a lot of resource management to do, and I've found myself restarting several times when I realise something I did early on ended up being completely wrong. Occasionally you'll get a request from the population to produce a number of resources, usually resulting in a happiness or stock increase. There's also a research element which I've not reached yet where you develop new buildings and upgrades to existing ones. My only gripe is the Prosperity DLC - it's just decorative items, and so is pretty pricey for what it is. If you weant it, don't pay full price IMO. On the whole, if you like(d) Banished, you're going to like this too.
I've kept my eye on this game for some time, but £34 is way out of my spending limit so I purchased while it was on offer. It seems a more detailed version of Sid Meier's Railroads!, which IMO was a flawed game and not as good as the old RR Tycoon games. RW seems to have a lot more depth and scale. My biggest complaint with Railway Empire is the control system; using WASD to move around actally buffers keystrokes - hold a key for longer than half a second or so and the game sweeps away across the map for many seconds afterwards. This makes it extremely difficult to navigate. Another review said the controls are "fine" - they are absolutely not fine and not worthy of the premium price they are asking. Placing signals is also an excercise in frustration, as mouse input is repeatedly ingored. A much better UI is needed for this. I'm still evaluating the game but I'm minded to get a refund until the shockingly bad controls are corrected.
I like pirate games, but I prefer *finished* pirate games that are actually playable. I gave this a go and it crashed within minutes. Sadly, GOG are not as keen on refunds as they like to claim and they were more interested in keeping me waiting for the game to be patched so I basically consider this game a waste of money. I might revisit it at some point once it's been updated a few times but it'll have to be a good deal better than it is now. In the meantime I'll stick to Port Royale. It's reprehensible to release a game in such an unfinished, unplayable and bug-ridden state without it being an early-access or beta - GOG should really be ashamed of themselves over this.
