Tycoon City: New York Review
04 March 2006 | By Alexandra Jeffreys
This is a game about making monstrous amounts of money by building things and preying on peoples need to buy them
There's nothing quite like taking something that already exists and trying to make it all over again. That's why movie sequels are always so excellent and clones have been approved as a really good idea. Oh I'm sorry, did I drip some of my sarcasm on you? Send the site owner the cleaning bill.
The premise of Tycoon City: New York is to rebuild New York. Now, whether you think that New York is the best city in the world ever, or a steaming cesspit of humanity, there's really very little reason to try and build the whole dammed thing again. Surely Donald Trump's comb over wasn't that compelling?
However, as this game proves, build it and they might come and buy stuff. You have to love Atari, it's mandatory, there's like a charter about it or something. Unlike Atari, you don't have to like this game, though it is very possible that you just might. Aficionados of the Tycoons series in general will be excited to experience the depth of design that has gone into this game, others might prefer one in which they get to dispatch each of the possible 65,000 New Yorkers that populate this game with a sniper shot to the animated head.
To be clear, this is not a game about killing people, this is a game about making monstrous amounts of money by building things and preying on peoples need to buy them. Communists beware, this is capitalist consumerism at its worst, and it's prettiest, and its most impressive.
It's not hard to play though, which is nice. Essentially you have to create Manhattan, building all sorts of essential and utterly frivolous services up. You must at least construct accommodation, schooling and businesses in order to get people in, brainwashed and ready to buy. You can then move on to the next section, or trick the one you have already out with plenty of bright signage and whatnot.
That's the basic game play, the Sandbox mode as its been titled. You can stick with this mode, or go much more free ranging and meet the needs of specific characters who are littered about the place just waiting for you to build something so that they may avail themselves of the facilities. This is where you learn that people can easily be treated like farm animals. Instead of milking stations you're building bars, but it pretty much all works out to be the same thing at the end of the day anyhow.
Building stuff, the right stuff, that is, keeps people happy and makes them happy. If you keep them happy and consuming, then your power base grows, and your reputation increases. You get the chance to open chains of stores, perhaps a covert monopoly or two if you're sneaky enough.
Graphically this game is quite excellent, the developers have put plenty of work into the overall environment, capturing the grandiose aspects of New York's sky scraping towers, all the while keeping some love and attention in reserve for the little details. There are some nice audio touches too, but nothing to get particularly orgasmic over.
This is essentially a simple game that looks good. There isn't really much of a strategy element because the game works with you, rather than against you. Which is where I guess it differs from the real New York. It's easy to make in in Tycoon City: New York, you just need to click around and see whats needed. If you've been indoctrinated into the color scale of green being good and red bad, you're going to have all the market research you'll ever need right at your fingertips.
In order to make your buildings more successful, you upgrade them with upgrade points. Isn't that nice and simple. You need to work on the appeal of your building, the amount of satisfaction it gives customers, beauty, which is always important in New York, and fancying the place up with some nice advertising and whatnot so that people know it's there.
could pretend I was the Trumpmeister himself as I upgraded my way to being the biggest, the best, the most important person in Manhattan.
 |
 |
|
| Ahhh, the Big Apple... | Home of Lady Liberty... |
The premise of Tycoon City: New York is to rebuild New York. Now, whether you think that New York is the best city in the world ever, or a steaming cesspit of humanity, there's really very little reason to try and build the whole dammed thing again. Surely Donald Trump's comb over wasn't that compelling?
However, as this game proves, build it and they might come and buy stuff. You have to love Atari, it's mandatory, there's like a charter about it or something. Unlike Atari, you don't have to like this game, though it is very possible that you just might. Aficionados of the Tycoons series in general will be excited to experience the depth of design that has gone into this game, others might prefer one in which they get to dispatch each of the possible 65,000 New Yorkers that populate this game with a sniper shot to the animated head.
To be clear, this is not a game about killing people, this is a game about making monstrous amounts of money by building things and preying on peoples need to buy them. Communists beware, this is capitalist consumerism at its worst, and it's prettiest, and its most impressive.
It's not hard to play though, which is nice. Essentially you have to create Manhattan, building all sorts of essential and utterly frivolous services up. You must at least construct accommodation, schooling and businesses in order to get people in, brainwashed and ready to buy. You can then move on to the next section, or trick the one you have already out with plenty of bright signage and whatnot.
That's the basic game play, the Sandbox mode as its been titled. You can stick with this mode, or go much more free ranging and meet the needs of specific characters who are littered about the place just waiting for you to build something so that they may avail themselves of the facilities. This is where you learn that people can easily be treated like farm animals. Instead of milking stations you're building bars, but it pretty much all works out to be the same thing at the end of the day anyhow.
 |
 |
|
| Build it up... | Build it and they will come... |
Building stuff, the right stuff, that is, keeps people happy and makes them happy. If you keep them happy and consuming, then your power base grows, and your reputation increases. You get the chance to open chains of stores, perhaps a covert monopoly or two if you're sneaky enough.
Graphically this game is quite excellent, the developers have put plenty of work into the overall environment, capturing the grandiose aspects of New York's sky scraping towers, all the while keeping some love and attention in reserve for the little details. There are some nice audio touches too, but nothing to get particularly orgasmic over.
This is essentially a simple game that looks good. There isn't really much of a strategy element because the game works with you, rather than against you. Which is where I guess it differs from the real New York. It's easy to make in in Tycoon City: New York, you just need to click around and see whats needed. If you've been indoctrinated into the color scale of green being good and red bad, you're going to have all the market research you'll ever need right at your fingertips.
In order to make your buildings more successful, you upgrade them with upgrade points. Isn't that nice and simple. You need to work on the appeal of your building, the amount of satisfaction it gives customers, beauty, which is always important in New York, and fancying the place up with some nice advertising and whatnot so that people know it's there.
 |
 |
|
| You can make it... |
So very beautiful... |
could pretend I was the Trumpmeister himself as I upgraded my way to being the biggest, the best, the most important person in Manhattan.
TYCOON CITY: NEW YORK VERDICT
In spite of what is arguably over simplified game play, this game really does have a certain charm. Nothing has been over thought, but plenty of research has been done which will be appreciated by locals or anyone familiar with Manhattan. Chinatown, Little Italy, Soho, just to name a few, they’re all there, and appropriately populated as well. If you play your cards right you’ll also enable various parts of the city to hosts events and celebrations, which make everyone, including you, the player god, much happier.
TOP GAME MOMENT
Trying to convince the cat to sit on my head so that I
