Recent reviews by scottdoggaming

Check out my first look/overview video of GT Manager here: First Look at GT Manager.

GT Manager is a fun, easy-to-pick-up racing management game, but you can tell it started out as a mobile title. It guides you through the basics like choosing a team, car, and drivers, but if you’re looking for deep, detailed management, you might find it a bit light. Plus, with a lot of features locked early on, it can feel restrictive when you just want to dive in and explore.

The races focus on simple strategies—fuel, tires, and pit stops—with a “Push to Pass” option for overtakes. While it’s enjoyable, the lack of detailed data or advanced planning tools makes it feel more arcade-like than a true sim. Overall, it’s OK for casual play, but might not fully satisfy management game fans.

My Overview Video can be found here.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5e0lhJJg9Us

"Tennis Manager 2024" offers a robust management simulation where players build and develop a tennis academy. Key features include creating custom tournaments, detailed player training, and financial management. The game introduces new stats, enhanced UI, and improved training plans specific to pre-season and tournaments. The match engine shows some graphical improvements, but animations and ball physics still need refinement.

While the game is enjoyable and engaging, the changes from last year's version are incremental rather than groundbreaking. The new features and improvements add depth but might not be enough to justify a new purchase for those who already own the previous version. Overall, "Tennis Manager 2024" is a solid choice for new players looking for a comprehensive tennis management experience, but returning players might find the updates modest.

Having only had a very quick go on Moviehouse, which you can see here. https://youtu.be/Dv5jGUQvFD0 I think it might turn out to be a fun little game. It feels inspired by Game Dev Tycoon, however, there are just a few things where clearer detail or tool tips could help.

I do feel like learning in these games is half the fun. Its too early to give a full review, but as of now I’m falling on the side or thumbs up.

I’m not 100% sure how I feel about Match Point Tennis. I want to add a couple of caveats to this “review”. Firstly, I received the game key for free. Secondly, I haven’t yet played enough to give a full review.

You can see my first look video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MrBJ9pU4huo , where I dive in to the early stages of career mode

I would say Match Point lacks some polish, it looks good in the images, but when you start to look a little closer you realise this isn’t up there with a triple a title. It doesn’t look terrible just a little rough around the edges.

The game offers, career mode, quick match, practice and training options as well as an online mode. I will say I enjoyed the couple of online games I tried, but it’s a limited offering of rank or casual matches and all the matches are singles matches.

The menus feel a little clunky, with the mouse not selecting an option, it feels likes it built more for console than PC.

The career mode feels a little limited with a calendar to select a match, training or exhibition (which is where you unlock equipment). The player editor and progression feel a little restrictive, hiring certain coaches allow you to improve certain skill areas. However, with tennis being a sport that has very distinct styles of play it will be interesting to see how well this works vs putting points in to the specific skill you want. Lastly you can view your current rank and points.

On to the most important part, games like Match Point live or die on the gameplay. This is perhaps where I’m finding it so difficult to form an opinion on the game. The controller buttons are used to determine what shot type you are playing, once you press a button you are then locked in to an aiming mini game of a sort. You move a small shadow around your opponent’s side of the court deciding where to hit the shot. This in itself can lead to you working your opponent around the court and taking advantage of the space or playing a great passing shot. It can also feel rewarding as you get to grips with it; it feels like you can master the game. With all that said it did lead to some annoyance about where the shadow appears and having to move it to spot it on screen (that could just be to my age and eyesight.) As always how long the gameplay remains fun will determine the success of Match Point.

All that’s really left is the recommendation….

As always I think a lot of that comes down to price. The fact that the game is on game pass means that could be a way to try before you part with your hard earned cash. There is also a demo you can try on steam. I would absolutely recommend downloading that demo for a few matches to see if the gameplay is something you feel you enjoy.

I do feel Match Point has a solid foundation, yes it lacks some sparkle and options I would expect to see and I think some people will find the gameplay a little shallow in its current form. It will be interesting to see what the dev’s have planned, doubles, youth career, playing as a pro in career etc.

I would recommend the game, but I do feel it has a way to go to do something that makes it stand out.

I had a quick round of Stacklands, Lasted about an hour an enjoyed every minute of it. You can see that video here https://youtu.be/L_dL8cAAE2g

A card based city builder with roguelite elements, the game ramps up in difficulties with waves of enemies every few rounds. Get food, make building, train you villagers and survive all while learning new combinations of cards to make new items and objects.

My only concern would be replay ability but for 4 quid you really cannot go wrong

So I’ve played about 7 hours of Bus Sim since receiving a key from the developer.

My first look & multiplayer gameplay can be found here

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JUrqUowd7J0&t=1179s

The game is a massive improvement on Bus Sim 18, I found myself spending far longer than I anticipated playing in my first sitting.

The world looks great and feels much more alive than the previous one. I can’t really comment too much on the bus selection (not being a bus fan), but the range seems pretty vast with normal, electric, bendy and double decker all available.

Gameplay is pretty simple, buy bus, build route, drive route, earn money, buy bus etc. There is progression via to upgrade stops allowing more connections, unlocking other areas of the map, and customisation of paintwork and interiors of buses.

The multiplayer worked fine; although starting a new game was a little hidden (the video shows how, check timestamps). There are some quality of life things I’d like to see. Allowing the second player to see what route, stop and the sat nav etc. You can see some of the multiplayer gameplay at the end of the video.

I would recommend Bus Sim, although it can become a little repetitive. It was still fun to see progression and play with friends.

One word of warning, even before release there were already 4 dlc’s waiting for you to purchase. Granted they are only additional buses and skins but they could have been included in the game and not behind a paywall.

I haven’t played much of Murder Mystery Machine, so this is a very early first look review, so far I have to say I am intrigued to try more and see where it leads.
My first 30 mins of gameplay can be found here:
https://youtu.be/4_msVUZnBJ8
The premise of the game, is go to crime scene one and gather evidence link the evidence to piece together a timeline of events and a weapon. Head to another location to interrogate and search for more evidence. Whilst completing these tasks the evidence/ suspects and / discussion points are added to a organised board where you can link between any of the above. Before finally linking suspects and evidence and submitting it as the final part of the scene.

I enjoyed it, although I did find myself linking things that I wasn’t completely sure on to see if it gave new dialogue options. it will be interesting to know if they gives red herrings to divert your investigation.

Early days, and I will update more in future but overall I think it might be a fun little head scratcher

Having played the first story of Wildermyth I’m hooked, I played it multiplayer with a friend which you can see here.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JSb_10WJNDY&list=PLYX5Y-Bpyz3-9Q62ggHwO00w1Y1znjINp
The game itself doesn’t do anything extraordinary, the turn based combat doesn’t do anything new (although interfusion with objects is an interesting concept).

Where the game really shines is the story telling and character progression. For example, most of the small stories give you a chance to get items etc. but some actually impact your character. Replacing limbs, which in turn can give new skills. a I don't want to give too much away in terms of spoilers.

Characters can retire, form legacies and have children.

All in all this game is about roll playing and that’s where it really shines.

Some of the writing does feel a little forced with descriptions etc, but truth be told that just added a bit of character to the characters.

The multiplayer experience could do with a little improvement, but I still highly recommend it!

Quick Disclaimer then on with the review
I received this key from the developer for free with no obligation to produce content or to determine the outcome of this review. I will also add I have only been able to play for about 3 hours so will update this review as I spend more time playing.

You can find my lets play here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jGcGdINvW1k

Tennis Manager 2021 holds some promise. With its clean UI it looks more like Football Manager, East Side Hockey or Out of the Park Baseball than some of the other tennis manager games, its apparent some time has been taken to give it a fresh clean modern look.

That said there are some UI issues that give a little frustration, adding filter to a search involving click a tick option that isn’t needed, understanding and finding data come sometimes feel like you are heading down a random click spree until you find something. That said this could be my inexperience with the game and after a little more time it might become second nature

Jumping ahead the game does feature a fully 3d match simulation, this is ok (its early access) Sometimes the racket doesn’t hit the ball and is still returned. There could be some more on screen prompts or the option to fast forward to key points in the match etc. There is also the opportunity to simulate all matches.

I found simulation gave better results than playing matches. I am unsure if this is due to the actual simulation or to my managing the tactics during the played matches, I ended up simming more matches as time went on, in some part to the novelty of watching wearing off. However, truthfully it was to win some games. Again the basis in the sim could be due to my level of skill but I felt no matter what I attempted made much difference in the matches.

As always starting a campaign in game like this is tough and small errors can bring a campaign to an end. I hired some trainers and found that I was out of cash way before I could make enough money from tournaments. I additionally tried buying the business centre which brings in about 2k a month and still was indebt before it was built. Again this could be down to finding the right level to starting out and may improve with more play throughs.
The game is in early access, it feels like there is promise here to make a good tennis academy game, an area with not a huge level of competition. The real key is getting the simulation right, for players to progress of their staff and feel like they are achieving something. If the devs get this right I think they maybe on to a winner

Do I recommend it? At £25 it’s the very upper limit that I would pay, 19.99 is probably much more reasonable. As it stands I have reason to question the quality of the simulation but time may tell how good it is and can be

Having played about 6 hours of Cartel Tycoon, I am finding it hard to make up my mind about the game

You can see my first few hours of play here:

https://youtu.be/DjarIMkYGzc

I feel like there is a good game in here somewhere, and it has the potential to be realised during early access and full release. The tutorial is a little light on why you are doing things, the production line is limited a little by the number of connections you can make. The amount of money you can make is limited by the number of export options you have. All of these things can be increased by research, so maybe the later game can become a little more fruitful.

I found myself having issues with the warehouses and workshops and not being able to define which farms export to which location. This became infuriating while I was having issues with roads connection. (Although my first run didn’t have this issue, so there is a chance it was me)

There is a story in Cartel Tycoon, it could be an interesting one, but I found myself stuck in a loop of stopping and restarting exports based on the various law agencies making appearances. This in turn stopped my interest in finding out.

I would suggest waiting for the a few updates to see to see the route development takes. That said it’s a solid early access build. I just felt a little restricted, with a tycoon game I like freedom to make choices.

If there was a maybe option i would be selecting it right now, But i will revisit this review after a few updates and adjust if necessary .