Cartel Tycoon

TL;DR This is a logistics simulator. It's a pleasant game for a relaxed, customizable experience at mostly your pace. This is not a difficult game unless you go out of your way to make it difficult. It could use tweaks on performance. Long version: I enjoy this game considerably as a busy individual who needs to be able to pause regularly and keep an eye on other things. Which means if you want a challenge this is not the game for you. The biggest challenge is your patience and your attention to detail. It's incredibly forgiving to a point of it almost being impossible to lose. The mechanics are straight forward: You have Legal money and Dirty money with their own uses and drawbacks. Legal money goes directly into your bank account. Dirty money moves around on the map. Heat and Respect. Respect is of the people of the nation to tolerate your existence. If it reaches 0, you lose, and at various levels you get bonuses. Heat is the nation's tolerance of your existence and at max Heat, you lose. At various levels of Heat, you get more law enforcement actions against you. You have lieutenants who help move things around for you, seize territory, fight the cops, etc. They have different abilities based on their rank and character. You play as a "Capo", who functions identical to a lieutenant. If your capo dies, you select a new lieutenant to play as the Capo, as well as a moderate amount of destruction to your buildings across the map. If all lieutenants die, you lose. Yes, you can recruit more. Lieutenants have a loyalty mechanic. At max, they are at max loyalty. At low, they're roughly the same as having an angry 3 year old around. Some lieutenants like certain levels of heat. There are other gangs on the map. They can be assets or enemies. You can make deals with them. They can shoot you. You can make alliances. The game is about supply and demand. You manage logistics. You can get drugs from either your own production or rival gangs. You can ship them out of the nation or sell to other gangs. You get dirty money in return that gets shipped back to you. Then you take your dirty money and launder it into legal money. You can pay your businesses with either. And yes, you can just legally make money. It's less profit. But, I mean. Friendly neighborhood gangsters, am I right? You got various modes of play. They all resemble each other. If you like the campaign, the sandbox is that but freeform. You also select your leader in Sandbox. Campaign gives more guidance. Survival is just that, try to survive. I thoroughly like the aesthetic of the game. I find the artwork cute. The in game dialogue is fun. But this is an easy game that's more about your patience. Each game can take a LOT of time. But, likewise, you can also win it without firing a single shot. Or you can go in guns blazing and make a lot of chaos for yourself. The game looks scarier than what it is. The game, story wise, glamorizes the criminal lifestyle and emphasizes your power and status. You're all about seizing power, being stronger and smarter than everyone else, and an all around power fantasy. It actively shields the players from the reality of this lifestyle and the effects on its victims. So don't worry about your conscience being throttled on being scum of the earth and a parasite on society. You're portrayed as smart, cunning, powerful, wealthy, and important and you can safely look the other way. Even taking a wisecrack at Big Pharma as being too evil for even your taste. For a game about being a ruthless, murderous, drug dealing sociopath, this game is shockingly tame. I enjoy this game thoroughly. If you're looking for a challenge to prove yourself? This isn't that game, it's easy. If you're looking for a deep plot? This isn't that game either, it's a blatant power fantasy game. This is a laid back management game centered entirely on logistics whose difficulty is mostly about your patience and how you want to play. When playing for that purpose? This is a really fun game and adds a fun flavor.

For a game based on logistics, the UI could benefit from a more intuitive design to streamline interactions. The tech tree gives the false impression that we have a lot of variety and options for development, when in fact we don't; for a tycoon game, it shows everything it has pretty quickly, and there's not much to explore beyond building basic supply lines.

1. The game's tutorial is really good. If you're playing for the first time, don't skip it. It's easy to understand. 2. Once you get used to the mechanics, it's a really enjoyable and sweet gaming experience. 3. Capturing other rival gangs and strategizing is incredibly fun. I don't think there are any downsides. Even if you're not interested in this type of game, play the tutorial. It takes five or ten minutes. If you don't like it, you can return it. I think it's a great game. 9/10

It's a game with heavily unbalanced mechanics, unpolished and with missing QoL fixes. I really couldn't decide whether to recommend it or not, but the latest frustration during one of the missions (failing an objective without understanding why, after holding for so long) swayed me towards no. The studio was shut by the publisher, so expect no changes nor improvements. If you're really interested in what the game looks like, just buy it with a heavy discount. But I warn you - after a few hours of play you may end up frustrated like me.

Fun at first, but once you have done a few games you start to realize its quite shallow in its depth.

This game inspired me to create my own narcotics trade in real life just like my best mate Pablo! Update: I got arrested, cops are no fun :(

Combat system makes the game unplayable and a giant waste of time. Ah well good scam I guess...