Author: Savior699

As always, huge shout out to the ladies and gents over at Astragon Entertainment for hooking me up with a copy of Bus Simulator. When I first got this one I thought to myself there was no way this game would be interesting or fun, and I would play it for an hour and regret that decision. Well before I go further here is one of my busses.

Cute isn’t it? Like the color? I got a bunch more some bigger some smaller, all different colors and designs. Yea what I thought would be a one hour and dislike game turns into one of the most relaxing games I have played in years. The graphics aren’t stellar but they are nice.

The game has some issues like any game. For example, pedestrians seem to just walk in front of your bus, which isn’t a big issue but it has still happened to me a couple times. This can cost you a lot of money. You also don’t get to see it, they just kinda disappear and your bus just teleports back to the road. You can however just plow over cars if you want. This will, of course, cost you money, but it is an option.

The real joy here tho is just making bus routes and taking a relaxing drive. The controller functions well with the L1 and R1 buttons turning on and off your blinkers, the D-pad controls other functions and open menus while you drive and you can mostly look around to hit stuff as well. You can also just use the square button, for example, to open and close the bus doors. Don’t do this while driving tho, it engages the parking break so to speak and slams the bus into stopping.

The game also sadly gets very repetitive quickly, like most driving games. This has less to do with the game itself and more to do with the genre itself. It is very relaxing tho and a joy to play, but it is a very niche game. For me, it is a 7/10. It is a must-buy for fans of simulation games, but everyone else should really wait for a sale. Best wishes and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

As always I want to take a moment to thank my friends over at Kalypso for hooking me up with a copy of this one prior to release. It is always great to be chosen to receive a review copy of a game but when it is a series you are a long time fan of, it is truly special, and this time I abused the privilege

For those that are unfamiliar with the Tropico franchise, you will play the dictator of a tropical paradise. You will run every aspect of this tropical paradise. You will choose what to build, where to build it, what to important export and who to kill and imprison. That isn’t a joke, by the way, you can imprison and kill people if their existence annoys you, after all, you are El Presidente.

We will get into all that in a bit, but one of my favorite things they added is the ability to customize your palace in new ways. You change the layout and color, the windows or even what it is made of. Want to change that fountain into a hedge maze, have at it. Here is a picture of mine for example. Honestly, I just wanted it to stand out so I could find it easily, plus I really just wanted to play with stuff and this is what I ended up with. You can also separate the building so it is on different spots of the compound, stuff like that.

Another great thing they have done is it is now easier than ever to sift through the information you need. There are separate tabs so you can see where the pollution is or happiness levels, just everything you can need. This for me made things run much smoother. All this info was available in the other games of course just this time around it seems much easier to find and utilize.

Speaking of utilizing information, you can now plan most of your island beforehand. You can now see the best places to build which types of plantations, where you can find what types of metals for you mines or even oil and fish. Honestly, I didn’t do this because I am kind of an idiot, but it can be done. I also encourage you to do this since you can for example build stuff on the best places to dig for oil or minerals.

Graphically the game isn’t a huge achievement but it does look great for what it is. I enjoyed watching the people run around and the fire trucks putting out my buildings that a volcano set on fire, a lot.

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The control are also great to me, tho I do have some minor complaints. For example, the combat is still pretty terrible. You basically just build towers and bases and attacks happen. You have some control obviously, but I feel like if you had more the game would really benefit from it.

Another small issue I have is trade seems to be a bit unbalanced to me. I always seem to have a ton of money, or I am pretty much bankrupt and it really seems like this kind of discrepancy shouldn’t be so frequent.

None of this hurts the overall experience too much, the game is still beautiful to play and fun and I will continue to play it long after this review is posted. It is also worth noting the console version comes with a few things that weren’t with the PC release and those will be listed below. As for a score, easily a 9/10 for me. If you enjoyed the rest of the games in the series or are looking to get into it, this one is a must buy. Best wishes and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

• Four new traits for El Presidente
• New edicts (e.g. Free Housing)
• New overlays
• Special effects of buildings are visualized
• Revised balancing (e.g. tourism, media building)
• Revised pathfinding of the Tropicaner
• New variations for parks and squares
• New Decoration: Space Monument
• New decorations for El Presidente in character adaptation
• The language can be changed at any time during the game.
• color-blind mode
• More than 300+ bugfixes