Recent reviews by Pyro

Best played in your bed with a wireless keyboard

very good

good story

A bit costly after all that time, but I'd still recommend it.

This game is easy-peazy and relaxing... but will keep you doing something and ready to react to incidients.

Light puzzles
Very fun interaction mechanics
High added value: Great musics, beautiful environement
Everything you keep in your ship never despawns and is YOURS FOREVER! >;-)

Meh... I liked it in the end, it became good in the quarter half...

Early game rooms are cramped and too simple on the mobility side.

I can't stop myself from playing the hardest difficulty, so ... there's a point where you might die a lot and get frustrated but it's not too bad. The issue is that you can't really tell if you won a fight or died because of RNG... you couldn't tell if your ability to pass a level is reliable enough to the point that you could come back and beat everything like a pro with everything you've learned. Positionning can be important, but enemies alway react differently and you can't look everywhere at the same time. There can be a leap of faith involved in the process... I'm not fan of it...

Appart from that, glory kills are a bit too slow and become old fery fast.

humanity doen't deserve this game.
A must play!
Bully those who haven't played it yet!

You could replace "policies" with any cat pircutres on the internet... There is no simulation. Some policies are assumed to be good or bad. If a bad policy combined with another bad policy could in fact have a "good outcome", it will happen because the dev hard-coded it, not because of meaningful simulation of populations. Citizens are not agents, there's not deicisions. Simple number incrementing values with names such as 'crime' or 'health'.

It is interesting to crack the code, but most of the time, what influence an action will have is given to you. It's all about adjusting sliders and influx to balance output values. balance 'health', 'security', 'random cat picture1' and 'random cat picture 2'.

It can be fun but it is mostly frustrating since you feel like playing excell with an extra animation step. NO SIMULATION, GOD IS DEAD!

It's a good game... but it's a grind.
If you are a completionist and if you really want to finish this game, you'll be cursed. You'll feel the pain.

Don't optimize, just enjoy the ride. It's worth your time, the trailer shows everything you have to know. There's nothing more to say.

Jumping feels great, it's fluid, responsive and nervous.

If you only want to play creative mode, this game is for you.
However, if you play for the simulation, THE GAME WILL CHEAT TO PREVENT YOU FROM BEING SUCCESSFUL!

Let me explain:
If you have money in the bank, the game will drastically and artificially lower your income into nothingness: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dMdAM2eqroA&ab_channel=perafilozof

Do you want to deal with roads? If cars are stuck for too long, they will disappear for you. Also, cars will have the most detrimental behaviour. For example, all vehicles going forward will pile up on the left lane on a six-lane road while letting the rest empty. So why even have more lanes? Redlight are dumb and will allow left turns into oncoming traffic (no way to change it without mods), leading to massive Indian road syndrome despite using red-♥♥♥♥♥♥♥-lights!

Do you want to go green? No worries, the game will force your hand into it. No thinking is needed; going green will always be the best option without considerations, be damned tactical choices and realism. Two thousand windmills to replace a nuclear power plant? Lol, no, barely 10, with fewer maintenance costs!

Don't get me wrong, mods may fix some of it, but it all leads to a final point: What mods modify are things that were initially part of the simulation. Devs willingly changed it for what I think are political motives. Their choices render obsolete most assets and any technical/situational thinking.

If you want a game that respects your intelligence, play TROPICO! TROPICO has a complex and honest simulation that doesn't lie to you. You will make choices depending on your current situation. The best option may not always be available at the right time if you lack the funds.

TL;DR The game will lie to you and let you waste time on it while you figure out why it behaves so strangely.

The game already had the simulation working, but the devs willingly neutered every simulation mechanic and let you play in it, believing the lie. Expect frustration! You are in the hands of big mommy helicopter dev.

Try to add mods to become independent, and big mommy dev will remove achievements. Because why let you have fun when we can punish you for not playing "the right way".