It's nothing to complicated. Ya have a base, ya add your rooms, ya hire people to tend them (and special beings too) and ya try to make a profit (plus sex). Game has events, it has specialty clients, it's well put together for a management. But if ya click a bit more, look a little harder, you'll find stories/games that breaks the tetiuom a bit. Having said that, it is still tetious; and there really isn't a concequense for failure, like if your under budget for the month the main will just ask you to do better next month. In the end, it did what it sets out to do.
This game probably has the most pacing control that you can find in a video game, you can make the game as involved as you want. Want it to be a strategy simulation space fighting game, you can do that; want it to be a idle resource clicker where you fight once in a while, you can do that. Things still get unlocked helping with either side, new buildings, new research, etc. And the space battles are as the same; each ship has extra actions that you can prompt (or does it automatically), and there's a space lazer that you can install to help the ships themselves (or you can just level them up alot and have them take care of themselves). Having said that, there are some problems. It isn't too in-depth with the base building and it's difficult to know when your project is autosaved (I usually wait 1 min before I exit out). But it executed the concept flawlessly.
Strategically placing gaming setups with limited space while managing the needs of your power and customer's wants. The campaign does a good job showing the mechanic's of the system, while the levels are short enough that you won't lose alot of work if you just restart. Not making enough to get through the next month? Start again, your missing something about what the game is trying to tell you in that level. As for the Sandbox, it's almost unlimited. You can make it as hard or easy as you want. Having said that, I think the selection of games to put on your floor is limited, you can't make new games either. Also, at least for Sandbox, it's a bit buggy. I've ran into an issue where when I load a save from sandbox all the bought tiles that I have not used for game or decoration placement during the last save get's re-established as unbought land (even though the game doesn't give that option to buy it back) and I can't put games or decorations on it. Otherwise, I think you'll get hours of entertainment out of this is sim/strategy is your thing.
What do you get with your money? - 9 different monster each with gameplay unique to their own - 6 stages to challenge each with, including endless mode - 48 different pets that can accompany your monster, to give you monster buffs, pet attacks, and much more - unlockables, creating perminante buffs for your monsters - leaderboards, connected directly from GOG Galaxy for top scores on all endless modes - achievements, that also give buffs to all your monsters - tamagotchi??? Now don't get me wrong, it's not a well devised story or narrative, this is just pure unadulterated dopamine gameplay. The different monsters ensures that you have the kind of game play that suits you, the achivements are not hard to get, the skill tree on each monster is easy to understand. Pet's might be a tad tetious to get, but there is a currency recently released in the game (that all you have to do to get is destroy buildings) that acts as a sorta gacha system that keeps it from being too random for the completionists out there. Having said that, the stages can be a bit overwhelming if your not paying attention. And there's really nothing more to this game than just the game design; well, outside of tamagotchi but it's really basic. But I'm getting my fun from it, I think you will to.
Level based open area's to explore, crafting system, shops, but also a tad hard and sometimes, and controls are a bit slow and clunky. For the price, it's fine, you can do alot worse.
Yes it is a simulation game, but I akin more to it being a programing game. Alot of commands that you put on the residents, grouping them into systems, giving permissions of allocation of resources. I mean you could say the same thing about being a king, but that's just how it feels to me. But hey, know's what it is, isn't buggy, and everything is layed out. I do wish the tutorial was a bit more intuitive, it's a bit of "do this" kinda feel. But hey, if you really like dwarf fortress and want a sim that's a tad easier, go for it.
Yes the presentation is rough; the models are more polygon, and they look more unfinished from lighting and gestures (though I kinda find that charming), and that's ok. Because it doesn't take away from what works with the game, it being a FPS Zombie survival shooter with date-sim mechanic's. You go out to the world through levels to achieve objectives, picking up new weapons as you move from area's, and also to find items along the way. Maybe you find resources for your base so it can open new area's up, or maybe you find gifts for your girls. And yes there is sex scenes with them (that you have to build up through working on your relationships), and there's some gore fetish content if your into that. But compared to it's predecessor. Haven't played it myself but it seems a bit more polished than before, 3D models instead of 2D images so the scenes are rather different, interface has improved, some of the zombies have a different look to them, new character, base building mechanic's and all that gives in return like shops. Otherwise not much difference. So that's what it is, it doesn't try to be anything else, and I wouldn't have it any other way.
I wish I could give it a 4 1/2 for it does have problems, but many upsides. The story and interactions is well tuned to any kind of spy thriller story, and the RPG elements are well diverse enough to support them. You want to play as James Bond, you can do that. You want to play as Jason Bourne, you can do that. You want to play as John Matrix, you can do that. Yes it does have the stiff presentation akin of the 360 era, with things lying around like intel and weapon mods just yours for the taking or popping out of enemies when they are defeated, and the movement is a tad clunky especially if your using keyboard and mouse, and it's just one guy with the same voice unto which you can only change his clothes, beard, skin color, and eyes. But it also has great voice acting, not terribly deep conversation system but still has a timer so they still give choices importance, and if your a completionist type it pays you more because you can open up more dialogue options the more you find out about the organizations or people involved with them. Having said that. The game is based on a checkpoint system, that's where all of your saves are going to go; on the one hand it's good you can't go back to a choice you made a while ago, on the other only 2 saves for your whole game. Also you only can work with one character at a time, you cannot make multisaves on different playthroughs, the checkpoints will be overwritten, so you'll have to stick with the one Michael Thorton you make. So, yeah, want a SPY simulator game? Give this a shot.
