The campaigns are basically sandboxes. Or at least that’s how it was in the original. The “scripting” is very light touch, other than having a tutorial and a specific win condition, and unlocking stuff gradually. But, yes, there’s a specific sandbox mode
I can’t recount the number of hours I lost to the original game, despite how shallow and buggy of an experience it was. The hotel/casino “front business” aspect of it never worked properly, and your lair would eventually become impenetrable to any of the agents…but I still had a lot of fun anyway.
Steam forums are talking like the review embargo lifts tomorrow, guess I’ll see if that’s the case and what’s getting said about it before the pre-order cut off end of day…
I pre-ordered it. However, I plan on waiting a few days before playing it to see the reviews. I can always refund it if it turns out to be a bad game.
Evil Genius was one of many games that for me fell into the genre of “half strategy, half The Sims” where I wanted to love the premise but wished it was just a straight up strategy game instead of relying so much on the blind random AI wanderings of your Sims npcs: Evil Genius, Dungeon Keeper, and Ghost Master.
I watched some early footage from some of the big name 4x/empire building type YouTubers and I don’t believe for a minute the game will be bad - in fact, it looks pretty slick and polished, with a lot of promise. My biggest concern is, would this be a game I would end up actually enjoying or one I want to like but as with so many games in this genre before it, I play for a few hours and then never return to it? Unfortunately, I won’t really know until I start playing it. It’s only $40 at least, so I may grab it and give it a spin, but I want to see reviews - if they are in the 9’s it becomes a no brainer, but given how safe they seem to play this, I suspect it will be a “7 to 8” kind of genre game.
From what I’m seeing so far it’s 7’s and 8’s and a 6 thrown in as opposed to 9’s.
So I’m taking that to mean from what I read of a couple of them that it could stand a bit more baking and some DLC flesh out.
I’m holding off for it till dlc’s are done and it’s on sale.
Look forward to hearing what anyone’s take is that decides to take the plunge of course!
So a remake with an updated UI and a tech tree? That’s fine, I’m keeping my preorder.
Circle back then when you get into it, want to hear your take!
Yeah, the biggest complaint I’ve seen so far seems to be “it’s just a prettier version of the first game” which is a bit of a disappointment as you’d like a sequel to have a lot more, fresh content (options, traps, research items, mission types?) but on the other hand, I never played the first one (not really) so it’s ALL new to me. Not a concern. And I love the art style/visual design.
Given the nostalgia factor and how much I played the original back in the day I had to preorder. Really looking forward to it!! If it fits the bill as a relaxing basebuilder to soothe away the tears of another horrific workday it will be more than enough to meet my expectations.
A prettier version of the old game is all I need really ;)
Yeah, these reviews are exactly what I expected based on the gameplay I watched, right down to the concerns about repetition - something I was anxious about, and the fact only up to “1 hour” of footage was every allowed exacerbated. It’s something I’d like to get but it has a lot of content coming via planned DLC, so I think I’ll keep it on my wishlist and grab it when it’s bigger and better than ever.
I’m still banging on this, but my takeaway after several hours, with my toes dipped into the mid-game, is that it’s pretty awful. It feels like it was made by people who don’t know how to make this sort of game, or at least how to make it competitive with more recent games like it.
The only reason I haven’t uninstalled and put it behind me is that we’ll be talking about it on this week’s podcast.
-Tom
What would you say is like it? I can’t think of that many Dungeon Keeper clones recently, other than that mini-wave of actual clones a couple years back. I think it’s a very different genre from colony sims, if that’s what you’re getting at.
Games about building rooms, putting items in the rooms, and using that base as a foundation for people management. Prison Architect and Rimworld come to mind. I’ve also been playing a game called Academia lately.
-Tom
That’s what I thought you might be getting at, colony sims, basically. For me they have a very different lineage (drawing more inspiration from Dwarf Fortress) and occupy a different mental space, though obviously there are similarities. I don’t really get on with colony sims, though I did play a fair bit of Prison Architect. I like the more direct/immediate feedback between your actions and outcomes in Dungeon Keeper type games. It’s simpler, sure, and not as rich in emergent storytelling, but it has its own appeal as a management game.
Tom how does it compare to Two Point Hospital, which IMHO is pretty fantastic.
I would rather be playing Two Point Hospital. Or Project Hospital. I only sampled both, but I recall preferring Project Hospital’s more serious approach.
-Tom