Central Intelligence

I recommend this game but with a qualifier: if you are a fan of espionage and/or spy games with a hefty amount of text and chess-like strategy, so much so that you could forgive this game's faults (and there are many), then pick this up. Otherwise, I would advise that you avoid this particular title as it stands. If you would like a little more detail before you decide, read on... First, the bad. Right off the bat this game is not a remaster, it is a re-release. If you were expecting an update to an old-game with better UI or graphics, you will be disappointed. Speaking of UI, it's terrible. It was bad when I played this back in the DOS and '95 days and it's still bad now. With time and a couple of playthroughs you will get used to it and everything will become second nature but I'll be honest, it is a slow, painful process getting to that level of comfort with this awful UI. Knowing what the different icons do, how to perform in-game actions, how to find characters, etc. You will NEED to know how to navigate the UI seamlessly in order to properly enjoy this game. While you struggle with the UI at the same time you are going to be confronted with another dilemma: "What the heck do I do?". Though the game will provide you with a grand total of two tutorials it barely scratches the surface of how to use your Specialists and Agents properly. This is one of those games where you have to read the manual (find that here: http://www.abandonia.com/en/games/28425/Central+Intelligence.html) to get context and understand what your mission is and why you are doing it. The manual will also give you a bit more information on what the various characters are, what they do and what purpose they can serve. Once you are familiar with this foundational information you can move onto the good parts of this game... *** Now the good. This game, as flawed as it is, gives a great amount of freedom to conduct your covert operation in Sao Madrigal (the island's name). Although your mission is to ultimately depose the President of the country and install a more western-friendly government, how you accomplish that is left up to you. Take care though, you have to somewhat maintain a fine balance between subtlety and Direct Action. Sure, its fun to have you Military Agents and Specialist go hog wild and blow stuff up. It'll even get you some support amongst the population early on. But the Pro-Government Forces will piece together that something is up and they'll start cracking down on your Agents and Assets or even worse, your Specialist. Also, if you attack properties with civilians and they end up getting killed or injured during the action, they'll turn against you and the Opposition Forces and directly help Pro-Government forces in taking you down. The character variety is another great dynamic to this game. Character motivations and loyalties change an awful lot from game to game, with exception of course for the Opposition Leader and the President. You have to be careful with who you trust. Some people who seem to be ardent supporters could, in reality, be double-agents and rip the rug right out from underneath your feet during a critical operation. They could also feed you bad intelligence and lead your agents, specialists and rebels right into an ambush. Even worse, they might be trying to work their way up through the Opposition Party in an attempt to gain the Opposition Leader's trust in order to take them out, effectively ending your campaign. *** In short, this game is deeply flawed but if you can get past its faults this game can offer a really fun and rewarding experience. But, I stress this again, you really have to enjoy espionage and spy games and be willing to sift through piles of intelligence and information to get any fun out of this game. You'll need to have a little bit of imagination as well since this heavily text based and not graphics based. If you read through all of this and still think this is your cup of tea, pick the game up, grab a drink, a snack and restore democracy.

I'm so glad I didn't have to grow up with "games" like these.

pretty epic. turn off steam overlay it glitchy then u PLAY GAME EPICCCCC

I know there is a "thing" in making retro games but this one is taking it too far. A DOS game in this day and age is just a facepalm, it makes it too hard to tell what anything is and how to play.

Good retro game.

18年的游戏，竟然是DOSBox启动的，游戏介绍里也没有任何提示说这款游戏的真实发行时间 总觉得除了是骗钱的外没有其他可以解释的了

People upvote it for nostalgia reasons and I believe they genuinely enjoy it, but as someone who just started to play it in this day and age I didn't get into the swing of it.

이런 고전게임은 메뉴얼을 보고 하는게 기본인경우가잇어서 제가 아는게아니면 일단 검색해보고 시작하는데 2016년에 드웨인존슨이 찍은 영화만 나오고 게임정보는 하나도없어서 찾느랴 진땀뺏습니다 결국 아무것도없이 시작했는데... 대체 뭘해야하는걸까 뭘누를떄마다 뭔가 소리가 이상하게 나긴하는데 뭘해야하는 게임인지 전혀 전혀 모르겟습니다 이걸 5500원주고사고싶진않네요

MÜLL!!

It is very much retro game