Recent reviews by IL PALLINO

7/10: Casual roguelike deckbuilder with a wild west setting. Duel it out with baddies, bosses, and a final boss to unlock new maps, new MC's, and new final bosses to bring to justice. (Along with a new map for that corresponding final boss.) A great start for a three person team despite frequent typos, and great value for the money.


Ol' Il Pallino has a confession to make: He's never been a fan of deckbuilders, and seldom enjoys roguelike games apart from FTL: Faster Than Light and Rogue itself. Duelite is simplistic in nature: The player picks a hero and a final boss to duel it out with, traverses a map with randomly-generated squares in which they can either duel against generic opponents, a boss opponent, a store to spend their coins on useful cards, a loot square to gain various new cards (and possibly coins), and a question mark square for those adventurous players who want to throw the dice on either a positive or negative outcome. Whatever path the player chooses, they all end with a final boss, and the game ends... Until the player starts again, and presumably picks a different final boss.


The graphics are aesthetically pleasing for an economically-priced game. The board itself isn't so interesting to look at. The duel screens, however, are interesting. The shop screen is made even more interesting by the fact that the shopkeeper has an empty jar on their table, and the more money the player spends, the more the jar is filled with gold coins.

https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3393617070

The sounds work well for the most part. The only downer is that there's a lack of different sounds for the use of weapons. The music is a perfect fit for a Wild West gunfight.


Economically-priced casual games are always a good find, and Duelite is the sort of game that players can enjoy on the side when the AAA game they're primarily playing gets too tedious, and the player needs to relax.

It's not known to this author how Duelite compares to other deckbuilders besides 100% Orange Juice, but the rules seem interesting enough. There's plenty of different types of cards to go around. Some cards are used to attack the opponent, some cards are defensive actions, some cards heal the player (and with the possibility of removing adverse special conditions), and some cards can provide the player with gold in the event they think their opponent will not attack, and is willing to take the risk for the sake of more money to spend at a store.


What's luck got to do with it? Everything. One thing is for certain: The player is more likely to lose than win whenever they start a new game of Duelite. There's no telling what sort of cards that the player will receive, and the player may not get any offensive cards when they want them, and the player usually won't get a card to remove special conditions when it'll do them the most good, which is particularly troublesome if the player should get poisoned, and take an extra half-HP of hits in subsequent rounds until the poison runs out.

There are plenty of typos to be found in the game, and while this is to be expected for a three person development team that presumably speaks English as a second language, this still lowers the quality of the game. Despite there being typos, at least there were no grammatical or syntax mistakes on the developer's part, which is more than what can be said of a lot of other indie games.


Strongly recommended for lovers of deckbuilding games that are fine with a casual experience, but not so much for people who aren't interested in economical games. The achievements are good enough to keep a completionist coming back for more. Sorry if this review wasn't longer, but there just wasn't much that could be said about a small game with limited variety besides dueling, shopping, and throwing the dice on a question mark square.

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8/10: (Can be 10/10.) Adventure game featuring traveling in a big mean rig and light base building elements in real time (except for turn-based combat) in pixel graphics. Nominated for Most Innovative Gameplay Award of 2024 (and very easily the greatest indie game of 2024) despite enough straws to break the camel's back to result in a one point deduction, and a second point deduction for featuring a game-breaking bug. Relationships in this game are worse than the worst soap opera, but I love my infected cosplayer GF. (Spoiler over the pic for tastelessness.)

https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3373308730


Driving around a world full of infected mofos sure beats having to hold down the fort, but this is also possible in Dustland Delivery. With the fall of civilization and the rise of infected flesh-eating zombies, the player first makes their fortune in their newly acquired truck through buying low and selling high (along with some contract missions), increases their party size so that they can defend their truck against infected (as well as marauders who are just as heartless as any infected) while not only racing to help create a cure, but also rebuild various cities that the player can stake their claim to. These cities can be developed so that they'll produce stuff that can be either consumed by the player or sold, which is good, because scrap is heavy and slows down one's truck. (And finance charges are expensive if the player wishes to have their money deposited in a bank that's owned by people far more evil than the infected and the bandits that roam the world.) Once the player can craft their way to better weapons than what they can purchase, upgrade their truck, they can fight against Alpha Infected, which will benefit the player. (Just not through scrap.) A cure presumably is found, but a bug forced ol' Il Pallino to have to start over because a critical character presumably vanished forever due to not having enough space in his truck.


The graphics are pixely in nature, and have the same aesthetically pleasing nature of the highest quality games of the fourth console generation.

https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3368804852

The sounds are simplistic with the most complex sound being the chimes that notify the player that combat is about to begin. The music is ambient and western in nature, which perfectly fits the mood for traveling through a hostile arid environment where infected and bandits roam, but any headbangers out there are encouraged to turn off the music and play the Metal Church song Badlands.


The main reason why the positives and the negatives are being lumped together is because of how relationships can form between players. (At least in Hero Mode. Ol' Il Pallino can't be bothered to play Dustland Delivery without all of the handicaps being selected.) While marriage isn't possible, characters who do not have two certain traits associated with loyalty are going to be highly annoying in how the crew members are going to be repeatedly getting together and then breaking up. It's a good thing that Dustland Delivery isn't a drama or visual novel!

The concept of being able to develop various locations on the map so that they can produce items (and eventually get more people visiting at the local watering hole) for either personal use or trade is quite helpful. Apart from the player moving items out of their local depot and into their truck, with a high enough Prosperity score, caravans can come to a player's settlement where the player can sell their items for scrap. (Or buy items if they remembered to leave any scrap in the depot.) Just to make sure things do not get too easy, when a settlement's Prosperity gets above 10, the infected can start to attack the settlement in question. Ol' Il Pallino has only had to face attacks from lower-level infected to date, so the attacking hordes can be easily beaten back by one party member assigned garrison duty with decent stats in Focus and Attack, and armed with a shotgun and a top melee weapon.

The absolute biggest negative is that it's too easy to break a questline in the first adventure if the player isn't careful. Scientists want the player to escort a girl to a facility, which is only possible if there's an open seat in the vehicle. The game tells you that the girl will be waiting at a bar in one of the towns if there are no empty seats. Easy, right? Wrong! Bar patrons are annoyingly nomadic in Dustland Delivery, and the girl apparently vanished (along with some other potential crew members that would have worked for free) because when ol' Il Pallino tried going to the research facility without the girl, the quest totally vanished.

What's the point of armor? Some infected can explode, and if the player gets into combat with such infected, there's no avoiding the explosions in a melee, and regardless of how few are left standing. This obviously makes the player question why the most protective sort of armor is called a Bomb Suit!

The ability to craft weapons and items of many types is pretty cool. And not just craft, but can also make items of Advanced and Legendary quality. Yes, this absolutely encourages save scumming, but for non-scummers, these items can be sold in a town for pocket change... Errrr... Pocket scrap! Clothing and items are helpful for a plethora of reasons, and can bring out the best in your homeboys sitting in settlements who have to grow, raise, acquire, or craft crap. Trust me, a Crafting score is going to need to be high the player wants someone to craft jewelry.

One nice thing about crafting, is that the player can save time on constructing subordinate parts for the most part if they're looking to make a high level weapon. (And has enough raw materials.) This speaks to excellent coding in spite of some of the game's technical shortcomings.

The overall concept is interesting to feature both adventure and base building. The adventuring parts themselves are interesting, and if the player gets burnt out, they can see about buying Building Materials and focus on rebuilding whatever towns on the map can be redeveloped into useful places to do camping stuff, along with an actual apartment building to sleep in, along with the barroom and garage encountered in other cities. Players are encouraged to develop cities not just to produce items and earn scrap, but also lower the price of purchasing credits in order to pay crew members.

The create-a-character is really bad, and I mean incredibly bad! The player will be better off selecting a pre-made character instead of trying to create their own, because there's a character classified as a Runner that's by far considered the best. Rather than the game just giving the player a plain block for them to cut and polish, the "custom" character is going to have points in some skills in areas where it isn't logical to have a skill level greater than zero. If the player is playing in Hero Mode (as they dang well should be) this detracts from the ability for the player to imagine themselves inside the game.


Even at the full price of $7.99 USD and despite the shortcomings, Dustland Delivery is the best indie game of 2024 that ol' Il Pallino is familiar with. If the reader disagrees, then they can expect to be run over by a big ol' tractor trailer with a lawnmower on the front and a machinegun on top!

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5/10: Just because ol' Il Pallino loves playing World Diplomat doesn't mean that it's a perfect game, because over-reliance on artificial intelligence that almost always describes the culture of nations as "a tapestry" and the fact that the developer didn't pass on the savings to the player makes for a poor value game. At least the developer is a nice person, and has been hasty in releasing patches whenever ol' Il Pallino has brought bugs to the developer's attention. Players of Suzerain might enjoy this game, but wait for a sale.


The great thing about casual games is that the player can feel good playing them. Such is the case of World Diplomat in which the player brings world peace, prosperity, security, and happiness to our wonderful planet Earth in real time. But how does one go about accomplishing the aforementioned goals? By traveling the world and attending meetings where the player can engage in one of three actions (along with a certain posture) which will hopefully be successful, and earn the player a positive score with the mission patron, a positive score with the patron's nation, money, and XP. The player will certainly need a lot of money and XP so they can build their diplomatic skills, learn languages, learn cultures, and purchase technological abilities to make the game easier. Sometimes the player will receive missions from various bigwigs around the world, but as time goes on, the player will be attending conferences where they can meet new bigwigs who will have jobs for the player, along with news jobs in which the player can pay money and XP for a high stakes job. And with a favorable enough of a score, a player can call one of these bigwigs and receive a job at the expense of a lower favorability score.


The graphics are pleasing for the most part, but are limited in about how the main things that the player will be looking at, are the main screen which has either a man or a woman (depending on the player's gender) and a travel screen (which is also dependent on gender) of an airport. The player is also going to be looking at skills and technology screens frequently to keep track of their progress so that they can (depending on money and XP) upgrade another skill, learn (or upgrade) a language, or (if the player is in a nation) learn about a nation's culture.

https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3364986554

https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3364986858

Sounds are mostly limited to clicks and ambient music that sounds okay at first, but is liable to make a player sleepy. Players are encouraged to mute the sound and instead play the song Jet Airliner because the player will be doing plenty of jet-setting in their career of attending meetings, conferences, and learning cultures.


The main reason why the positives and negatives are being lumped together is that the player can pick a home nation for themselves. Certainly any player with half a brain is going to make either Canada, Chad, or Israel their home nation for the sake of starting languages (and more of them), along with the possibility of starting in Venezuela due to ability to speak a widely-spoken language in addition to the ability to make unlimited investments in oil and gas. The player can also pick a starting skill in which they will be at level three (the maximum) though it's to be assumed that the player will pick either active listening or public speaking for the sake of having a better chance at succeeding in missions early on.

If the player enjoys the original concept of the thought of making the world a better place through diplomatic means, there's not many games on the market that involves diplomatic efforts to make the world a better place. Maybe Suzerain and Hearts of Iron IV, but diplomacy isn't the primary focus of either game.

The ability to invest in some sort of business in a nation is a nice way of putting spare income to use if the player has the ability to invest in other nations. (The player has no restriction in investing in businesses within their own nation.) The developer claims to be looking into being able to build schools and hospitals in nations so that the player can give a struggling nation a hand at the expense of having to pay for an investment instead of receiving money from such buildings.

World Diplomat also has an unusual educational aspect to it in that the player can get exposure to languages by pressing a button to hear the pronunciation of a phrase... Especially since there's other people who likely needed to learn how to say "aishitemasu" upon meeting the Japanese woman of their dreams. (Other phrases are unlocked as the player progresses in the proficiency of a language.)

https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3364995572

Keeping in line with the education, cultural descriptions of nations are also given whenever a player gains an understanding of a nation's culture.

https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3364997016

But why even go to a nation when you can just pull up the map screen, and get a description from there? (Along with an image with limited movement.)

https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3364997720

The overreliance on artificial intelligence has lead to what feels like every culture being described with the words "rich," "vibrant," and/or "tapestry." Clearly a feeling of artificial intelligence at work. (If not, a highly uncreative human.) Somehow Saudi Arabia was described as having a rich culture. Anyone who knows a thing about Saudi Arabia would know that the only thing that's "rich" about their nation, are the bank accounts of it's citizens.

To say that a lot of bugs have been discovered in World Diplomat is an understatement. Fortunately the developer does care about his(?) product, and has been quickly releasing patches whenever ol' Il Pallino has been discovering bugs. Only one more bug is currently known to exist at this time. (A bug that causes conferences to glitch after the first contact is met. This bug can be avoided by not purchasing any resilience skill upgrades.) Ol' Il Pallino is confident that this bug will be resolved in good time.

One annoyingly huge gripe about World Diplomat, is that the names are purely random, and are without regards to the languages of the nations that contacts are from. Nobody from an Arabic-speaking country will ever be expected to have an Arabic name.

https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3353996908


World Diplomat can go either way, and that's assuming that the price of the game is discounted. If the game fits the player's niche, then perhaps the player will get their money's worth. Otherwise fans of other types of strategy games would be better off playing other games that are dramatically cheaper.

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9/10: Niche casual game in which the player colorizes 140 cute pixel pictures with a paint by the numbers mechanic. A point was docked because the player is only credited with achievements for colorizing the first one hundred pictures.


If you saw the name Colorizing and immediately assumed that the game involves adding color to pictures, you are correct. (You already read it in the TL;DR section!) The mechanic is paint by the numbers, and there are one hundred forty pictures in all. The player fully colorizes a picture, earns an achievement (for the first one hundred pictures at the time of the writing of this review) and moves onto the next picture.


The graphics are ever so basic, yet the images that need to be colored in are aesthetically pleasing before and after the pictures are colored in.

https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3303142406

The sounds are limited and even more basic than the pictures that need to be colored in, but the ambient background music perfectly fits the mood. But the music may fit the mood a little too well, because the music and gameplay may make the player sleepy if Colorizing isn't the player's cup of tea.


This game is the perfect gift for your achievement-loving friends, and the images are all family friendly, so the player gets the same (large) amount of achievements associated with, let's say, an anime tiddy puzzle game, only with perfectly safe graphics.

Personal preferences aside, there's bound to be other players out there that are disappointed that Colorizing only grants achievements for the first one hundred pictures. Why, oh why? Anyone who plays Colorizing is obviously a completionist who's out to sweep all of the achievements.


Ol' Il Pallino apologizes if the information in this review is lacking. What else can be said about a game with such limited playing characteristics and the only variety being the pictures?

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4/10: Casual management sim in which the player manages a funeral home in real time. Only purchase when on sale and if your gaming theology doesn't consider save scumming to be a sin. A game that's so classy that it allows people to stuff the dear departed into shoeboxes and then bury their remains in a landfill should be a Perfect 10, but games in which luck (and save scumming) has everything to do with success is a clear sign of a poorly-made strategy game. At least the (long-grinding) achievements count on the player's profile. It sucks that such a good idea for a game had to waste so much potential.


How hard does someone have to suck to make a game that allows people to cram dead stiffs into a shoebox and then toss their stinking, rotting corpse into a landfill and feature tombstones with vulgar messages, and not receive a perfect rating? This is exactly what happened with Undertaker's. (Sic.) The player manages a funeral home, hopes that customers show up with a stinking, rotting corpse on their hands, and hopes for the player to properly dispose of said corpse in the deep earth. (A plot at the cemetery if the profit margin is wide enough, and in the landfill if the customer has a low enough of a Religious attribute.) Hopefully customers come by often enough (and the supply of caskets, tombstones, and flowers is sufficient enough) for the player to make sales and stay profitable. When not dealing with stupid, annoying customers, the player can entertain themselves by standing around at the map screen by shooting at randomly-spawning Flappy Birds to the tune of five dollars each. (Which even in a best case scenario won't be able to cover one day's worth of overhead at the minimum level.) With enough money, the player can buy an inventory expansion which is incredibly helpful, along with buildings dedicated to creating caskets, tombstones, and flowers.


The graphics are aesthetically pleasing enough, and while the tombstones have great (and sometimes vulgar) messages inscribed on them, the messages get old quickly.
https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1370441492
The sounds are basic. Nothing special but nothing game-breaking. The music is nice enough in spite of the fact that it doesn't fit the mood... But that's probably for the better given how funeral homes are sad, depressing places.


Unlike other low-budget games, the achievements earned in Undertaker's actually count towards the achievements earned on a player's profile. The developer found the perfect way to sucker people into playing a schlock game by making an achievement in which the player has to earn a million dollars. Given the totally random nature of the game, players who prefer to play perfectly honestly are going to to be going bankrupt a bunch of times before they earn the 1% achievement. (Doesn't the developer know that "1%" is a slang term for an outlaw motorcycle rider/club?)

What's luck got to do with it? *EVERYTHING*!! You didn't get enough customers in a day? You might go out of business. Did a customer want items that are so expensive that catering to their needs will cost the player money? It's easily possible. Did that customer have a high Religious attribute to where their dear departed must be buried in the cemetery? That's also entirely possible.
https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1367861448
Do you think you can simply deal with that unreasonable customer by (justifiably) booting them out on their behind? That's a loss of reputation.

Unless the player is Joan Jett, the player will need to care about their bad reputation because if the reputation thermometer (who's mercury always stays blue, even at 100%) drops below a certain rating, it's game over. But maybe the player shouldn't care about their bad reputation because they'll most likely go bankrupt, anyway.

While it's nice that the player can build their own shops to craft caskets, tombstones, and flowers to meet customer demands (especially if the supermarket is out of one or more finished items, and a demanding customer wanders into the funeral home) the overhead increase pretty much off-sets the lower materials cost of crafting funeral items, and if the player isn't save scumming, they're going to be darn lucky to not go bust. (And if the player is really that lucky, then they're better off taking their luck to either a casino or a lottery ticket retailer.)

About the most positive aspect of Undertaker's is the tombstones. If the player can tolerate vulgarities, then they'll get even more humor out of tombstones as opposed to some dumb prude.


Only purchase Undertaker's if it's on sale and you have a high enough tolerance for a tedious, low quality game. The misuse of an apostrophe should tell the reader everything they need to know about this game, but there's another major mistake. The game has pictures of caskets, yet they're called coffins. Ol' Il Pallino knew as far back as elementary school that caskets are rectangular, while coffins are contoured. (The developer should be able to tell the players that!!)

Author's note: This review will be revised if the game is ever fixed by the developer. Until then, abandoned games with at least one serious issue do not deserve praise.


2/10: Making a Tropico 2 copycat is a good idea. Introducing a game-breaking flaw (especially in the tutorial) and abandoning the game with good potential really hurts.


Remaining patient and making three good faith efforts to enjoy Crow's Nest lead to this nearly one year later: Guard towers cannot be built, and without these important items, captives will have a much easier time escaping. If it's the player's first time playing and they feel like they need the tutorial, then the game becomes soft-locked and the player will be unable to proceed in the tutorial. As for the game itself, Crow's Nest is a Tropico 2 copycat in which the player manages a pirate haven in real time (and with a lot of recycled terminology) starting out by having captives cut down trees and then building a sawmill so that timber can be used to build a plethora of buildings to house and tend to pirates and captives a like. Farmland needs to be designated to cultivate a variety of crops. (In the current build of the game, only corn will be logical to grow.) Once a captain and enough pirates are assigned to a ship and provisions are loaded on to the first ship in the game, the ship sets sail, and comes back with looted goods and more captives. (And hopefully some useful goods.) The player will most likely will have reached endgame at this point, because guard towers cannot be built. Without guard towers, captives in remote areas will not be as fearful and will likely succeed in fleeing since there won't be any pirates standing watch to thwart their escape. If the player is playing the tutorial, then the player will find themselves unable to continue.

Someone is bound to say "don't you have to research guard towers or unlock something else"? The answer is no, because Crow's Nest originally allowed the player to build guard towers. (Only another issue was soft-locking the game, and when this issue was resolved, guard towers were taken away by this patch.)


The graphics aren't bad. There's a sad look to the graphics, which is a shame, because it goes against the nostalgia of playing Tropico 2 with it's cherry graphics.

https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3029889297

The music is ambient in nature, which sounds okay for a game that takes place in a remote location, but once the island is significantly developed (which is impossible at this point in time) the music does nothing to set the mood for a pirate haven.


Yes, the world needs a Tropico 2 copycat. There wasn't much alternative when Crow's Nest was released in 2023, but now that it's 2024, there's no logical reason to buy an abandoned game with game-breaking bugs when a player with money to burn can buy something much higher quality like Republic of Pirates (it is unknown to ol' Il Pallino if Republic of Pirates is any good or not) or save money and get the Tropico Reloaded bundle which not only has Tropico 2 but also Tropico 1 and it's accompanying DLC that expands on tourism.

The game is abandoned from the looks of things. It's been nearly a year since the developer has ever said anything or released any patches. If the player wants to spend money on a game that has a critical flaw, go ahead. But why not buy games that have lots of easy to earn achievements? The player will likely feel more excitement by using their hard earned money to buy trading cards to a favorite game.


If the developer never finishes this game, then the scurvy dog should be made to walk the plank!

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(Especially reviews to much better games!)

10/10: Slightly different mechanics from This Grand Life, but so much better even after being more complex with the ability to control an entire household. This version of the game also expands into life sim territory.

Normally altering the dynamic of a predecessor game and taking away at least one beloved feature makes things worse, but strangely, This Grand Life 2 is an improvement in the series. The same ol' "select a city and earn one's way up to riches still applies." What doesn't apply is that the player can start out at any age (but should have at least one adult in the household despite ol' Il Pallino doing alright starting out at the age of fifteen and balancing high school and work), turn-based mechanics changed to real time, and with a household of multiple people of different ages, and the ability in any occupation to be one's own boss.

It's just like the predecessor, except that the map of the city feels more pleasant to look at than before. The game still otherwise the same ol' looking at the map of the city the player choose to play in and the many information screens that the player will need to look at to either perform actions and review information.

https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3262779246

The sounds are all basic and too unremarkable for words. (i.e. Not good enough to praise, yet not bad enough to criticize.) The music consists of a wide array of genres which may or may not set the mood, but all make for great tunes.


With the dynamic including a life sim element, this may or may not be of interest to the player. Having a detailed family (and with more than just the spouse being able to earn money) makes for an interesting game, more people doesn't make managing multiple people any more difficult with the ability to auto-assign tasks to people so that the player can focus on whichever player they want for whatever reason. (Or just let the game auto-play everybody through a month.)

Another radical alteration to the This Grand Life dynamic, is that the game has gone from turn-based to real time. As much charm as the predecessor game had being turn-based, one nice thing about being able to play in real time, is that actions no longer have to be carried out to completion, and the player can feel free to cancel an action if the player deems it any advantage to cut something short to tend to a need. Of course, with the way households with multiple people are now possible, the game pretty much had no choice but to be in real time.

The ability to pick up either positive or negative conditions may or may not be interesting to the player. This feature teaches the player the importance of balance in one's life so as to not overdo it with exercising and to do a variety of things in one's spare time. Working leads to burnout which requires that the player to spend money on a vacation every so often to avoid even more negative consequences. The player will also do good to go to the hospital every so often for a dental checkup because tooth cavities can happen, and with no other way of decreasing the percentage of a cavity forming.

Unlike a lot of other games, This Grand Life 2 rewards the player for going above and beyond filling meters for entertainment and interest-related needs by providing points that the player can spend on altering a character's interests. But the potential interest changes may or may not align with what the player has in mind for their character. (Especially for an occupation-related trait.) The player will find a teenager's traits changing with age. (Sometimes in a good way, sometimes in a bad way, and this could throw a ratchet in the grand scheme of what the player has in mind.)

Most of the locations on the map are now obscured, and the player will need to spend time searching for new places to live, work, go to school, shop, and parks to frequent if the player enjoys the outdoors. This radically different feature may or may not bode well for people who played the predecessor game.


TGL1: Cities have unique events with the ability to celebrate New Year's Eve downtown, Octoberfest in Berlin, and throw shrimp on the barbie in Sydney.
TGL2: Cities have different maps and different difficulty levels. Players may appreciate the fact that there's more than just "white places" to play in this time.

TGL1: The player has a choice of avatars to select for themselves that never changes, and for any reason.
TGL2: Salons now exist, so the player can go change their avatar if they so choose. (Or just simply go for a makeover to satisfy creativity and hope they get the special perk associated with makeovers.)

TGL1: Not every career could lead to self-employment.
TGL2: Every career can possibly lead to self-employment.

TGL1: Employees only have one skill related to their occupation, nothing more.
TGL2: Employees come in all sorts of varieties. A single player with sufficient experience as a cashier, bookkeeper, and/or janitor can run a lemonade stand by themselves. (Or any other simple business.) A complex business like a restaurant requires eight different types of staff members, and the player will do well to have at least two of the required skills and hire five other employees.

TGL1: The value of stock prices are all affected by several factors.
TGL2: The value of stock prices can be affected by many different financial and field-specific factors. (These field-specific factors can also influence the performances of businesses on the local level.) On top of which, a company can have varying levels of financial stability and leadership which has an impact on what direction the stock price may go in.

TG1L: Had meters for needs to drink alcohol, smoke, or shop if the player was addicted to any of these vices. (Which could be eliminated through rehab "courses.")
TGL2: Did away with smoking, but the player may or may not have needs to drink alcohol or go shopping. If one of the nineteen preferences reaches the level of Love, then a need bar will spawn. If the player goes above and beyond filling the need bar for a preference like they do with Fun, then the player will earn happiness points, and if these preferences are encountered at a job, this proves the point that if a person finds their dream job, they will never have to work a day in their life.


Tell me, tell me. How to be (how to be) a MILLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLIONAIRE!

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5/10: The change of scenery, added variety, different mechanics, and the fact that bag sizes are no longer an issue are all appreciated. Maybe multiplayer games are interesting, but for some odd reason, playing solo feels like a far step down from the predecessor. The score is subject to change, and dependent on updates. The game plays well on computers that do not meet the minimum requirements.


Ol' Il Pallino is dumbfounded that the sequel to Drug Dealer Simulator fell so flat compared to it's predecessor. Starting out in a tropical archipelago of a Spanish speaking nation that somehow isn't Republica de Tropico, the player makes their money mostly by, surprise surprise, slingin' dope! (Picking amber rocks on the beach can also be done for money, but that doesn't pay the bills.) Tasks are given to the player, and when the player completes these tasks, they unlock new tasks, which ultimately leads to unlocking new locations on the map and unlocking more expensive forms of narcotics to sell. Instead of cops, thugs are the real worry, and going through their turf requires either buying them off, fighting them off, or gaining enough rep to scare them off.


The graphics are all correct for a tropical paradise in a developing nation. Just a shame that ol' Il Pallino finds himself unable to upload pre-release screenshots. (They keep failing for some odd reason. But the store page has enough screenshots for the player to make a judgment.) The waves of the sea look nice, and it is nice that the player can pick out a character for themselves to be. The main thing that stands out about the graphics, is the humorous effect of building sellers disappearing in a cloud of marijuana leaves whenever the player purchases a building. (You'd think that the seller would disappear in a cloud of smoke!)

https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3271660891

The sounds are all realistic enough, and the into music of hardcore rap beats with a Latin influence reminiscent of an early Cypress Hill song is the perfect mood setter.


The absolute greatest feature in Drug Dealer Simulator 2 is that bag sizes are no longer an issue when trying to sort a customer's product. Being forced to accept 1/2/3/5/10/etc. gram bags in order to get a customer's product together and then distribute multiple bags to said customer is a thing of the past. While it's not known at this time just exactly how many grams a regular sized bag can hold, the player now only has to designate how many grams of a narcotic they want to put inside of a bag, and then give only one single bag to that customer... However, there may be some cheapskate players who hate the fact that bags are now tangible items that are finite in quantity and need to be purchased in order to keep slingin'.

The game is different enough to call itself a sequel. Is that a good thing? Maybe, maybe not. Something feels off to ol' Il Pallino. Maybe it's because there's at least one other drug dealing sim out there to compare Drug Dealer Simulator 2 to? Maybe it's because the game has the setting of something other than a dingy ghetto? Maybe it's because the laws are considerably more lax? Who knows at this point.

Multiplayer is now an option that exists in Drug Dealer Simulator 2, which is something that some players is bound to enjoy. Granted, ol' Il Pallino would rather avoid other toxic players and play his own dang game, but whatever players think of multiplayer is purely a matter of personal taste.

The tutorial is lacking in some parts, and most notably in the concept of parkour. Rather than the game forcing the player to run straight at the gate at the beginning with the space bar held down, ol' Il Pallino found a way around the gate that didn't involve using parkour, which was good for awhile, until ol' Il Pallino realized that he needed to properly perform parkour elsewhere in the game, which is then when he had to look around through the keys to find the (definable) key to use to activate parkour.

Variety is good, and it does seem more interesting and more dignifying to pick amber rocks off of a beach than it is to poke through dumpsters like in the first game to see if anything interesting is inside. Given the relatively low value of amber rocks, the player shouldn't be looking to make money off of selling the rocks to the beach merchant. (Unless maybe an achievement is added for doing so.)

The quest system is helpful in giving the player direction as to where to go and what to do next. This is much more helpful compared to the predecessor game in which a friend of ol' Il Pallino had problems locating a merchant in the first game.

The ability to travel using various forms of transportation is a welcome addition. Apart from time warps via bus stop, each island has a ferry as a safer means of travel, and land vehicles of various types and boats also exist. Given how time is an issue with dope deals, speed is the next best thing to being there.


Honestly, the city that the first game is set in would have made a better setting for a sequel. (Especially since there's a mass transit tram that's visible, along with skyscrapers in the far distance.) If the player enjoys tropical settings, wants to have fighting apart of their gaming experience, or just really needs to play multiplayer game, then there's some value in Drug Dealer Simulator 2. But for some odd reason, ol' Il Pallino just doesn't feel the same sort of excitement that the predecessor game had. Still, it's early days, and given the sort of improvements that the predecessor game experienced (which was already an amazing game to start) there's a good chance that Drug Dealer Simulator 2 will improve into a more enjoyable and exciting game in the future.

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Author's note: Spaceport Trading Company is currently incomplete. The information provided in this review (along with the TL;DR score) is expected to change over time.


5/10: The time trial mode of play adds purpose to playing, but the price tag is heavy for a casual indie game. (And an incomplete game at that.)


Games featuring space travel are pretty cool, and Spaceport Trading Company is only a slight exception. With the campaign currently a work of progress, the player can either just pointlessly fly around the universe (or just a single galaxy if they prefer) or take on a time trial in which the player has to make as much money in a one year period as possible. The time trial seems a bit pointless in the sense that there's no rewards for making a certain amount of money or earning achievements. While it may be overly pessimistic to describe anything as pointless, there is a fun factor (and potential for improvement) in Spaceport Trading Company, and the chill experience is nice until the player gets burnt out.


The graphics are basic but do have a nice aesthetic to them. For the most part the player will be looking at three things: A top-down view of the map of the star system where the player is currently traveling through.
https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3259196790

The next thing the player will be looking at quite a bit, are the jobs that the player can take for heads of whatever faction is most prominent on a planet.
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And lets not forget about the planets themselves. Most planets have tangible graphics upon the player landing on them, while some places (most notably an asteroid belt called Far Point) are just merely scenes of open space.
https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3259196837

The sounds are all basic, and the electronic ambient music does sound nice while also being a perfect mood setter.


The player either gets casual strategy games, or they don't. While Spaceport Trading Company isn't going to be kicking the player's butt like FTL: Faster Than Light, players may or may not enjoy Spaceport Trading Company without campaign mode. For ol' Il Pallino, there's enjoyment, but the burnout is inevitable.

Spaceport Trading Company has great ideas, and who knows how many more are bound to come! Ideas for things like gadgets to add to one's spaceships made for an interesting experience, while the extra ships capable of intersystem travel adds an extra interesting element to the game. (Don't expect to raise enough credits in time trial mode to afford such a ship, and especially when such ships are only available in Far Point.)

The idea of adding jobs to survey planets in one of three ways is interesting, as is the idea of appeasing prominent people who will provide bonuses to the player as they progress through the game.


Incomplete, but the developer has made a good faith effort to improve the game, and with excellent communication, this proves that Spaceport Trading Company is not at all being abandoned. If the player likes the concept of the game and can wait for the best to be yet to come, the player is encouraged to buy Spaceport Trading Company to help out the developers, and let them know that they have an audience.

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7/10: Indie gold casual management turn-based sim. This game must lose all of it's charm after all of the achievements are earned, but it's pretty dang addictive for $3.99 USD.


Following a revolution, the fictional nation of Okinawa (which is nothing like the island owned by Japan) gets taken over by one of four types of socialist parties. Each party has their own ideals and ambitions, but all of which are socialist. What can go wrong? Most of the neighboring states do not appreciate the government of Okinawa, the standard of living is low, and the discontent tends to rise pretty quickly. Matters are also not helped by the fact that there's not enough housing and electricity to go around, and the military needs strengthening one way or another. Sometimes the player will need to meet with members of their cabinet, all of whom are anime girls, and a visual novel-esque scene appears, and the right choices in dialogue can lead to either a good or bad ending before the ruling party's ambition is accomplished.


The graphics to Socialism Simulator are basic yet aesthetically pleasing. For the most part, the player will either be looking at what to purchase for the nation and the map of the neighboring countries. The Easter cards that the player earns for choosing whatever option help to provide some extra graphics.

https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3229309775
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The drama scenes with the other advisors all consists of stock pictures with a filter applied.

https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3229309956

While the music doesn't set the mood of the game, the music is pleasing to listen to... Though you would think that the developers would have used some patriotic-sounding music to help set the mood for the player as a world leader.


The achievements that Socialism Simulator has is good enough to encourage replaying, but the player may be replaying more than what they care for if they unlock one of the endings with a cabinet member. This can be particularly frustrating if the player is trying to achieve a victory condition with one of the more difficult political parties.

As for cabinet members, players can avoid having the game end via a drama route with one of the cabinet members by having that member removed. This is an excellent mechanic that helps the player achieve a specific victory.

For better or worse, war is simplistic and in many case, the player can conquer a nation in a single turn. This punishes players for having too strong of a military, because if the player can win a war without conquering the other nation, then the player still gets their ability to claim more spoils. (Choices are given for money, agricultural machinery, or enemy weapons.)

The Easter cards are a nice touch to help dress up the background, and the player doesn't have to keep any of the Easter cards in the background if they don't wanna. (Although the card with what looks similar to an Su-57 Felon is pretty nice.)

Despite the name Socialism Simulator nobody said anything about equal pay for equal work. Of course, owing to real life socialist governments, the socialist government in this game doesn't have to have a centralized economy, because even having a market economy in Okinawa (all while billing the nation as socialist) is entirely possible.

Victory for every single party is the same: It is achieved by researching the final technological advancement in the party tech tree. At least the developers added some variety to the game by making all of the benefits associated with each upgrade different for each party, thus proving that variety is the spice of life.


"Anyone who doesn't regret the passing of the Soviet Union has no heart. Anyone who wants it restored has no brains."

-Vladimir Putin.

"Communism is not love. Communism is a hammer which we use to crush the enemy."

-Mao Tse Tung.

"Communism is like one big phone company."

-Lenny Bruce.

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