As a simulation of the gaming industry that places you in the driver’s seat of a studio making games, Game Dev Tycoon is meta to the point of textbook definition, but its execution is infectiously charming. Each industry has tricks, tools, hazards and obstacles, and Game Dev Tycoon functions as commentary on the very nature of the gaming development industry.
I have to admit that I was expecting a bitter undertone or perhaps an overabundance of snark but it simply isn’t to be found anywhere in any notable quantity. The addition of achievements and the process of adding achievements within the titles’ internal game development process could perhaps be interpreted as a jab but this is the closest to the envelope-pushing that Game Dev Tycoon comes – it’s more of a wink than anything else.
Overall: 6.2/10
Gameplay: 7 out of 10
The central tenet in Game Dev Tycoon is planning: risk vs. reward choices and making smart business decisions. Several factors determine your title’s quality: platform of your title, the efficient focus of personnel on your staff and the sum total of their experience (read as: level of your programmer) and the choices made during development. There is some mystery as to the direct effect the individual choices that say, ‘Level Design’ or ‘Engine’ have upon the finished work, but those choices determine the number of ‘points’ that are created during the process: Design, Technology, Research and Bugs are the resultant stats by which your title is scored, with the choices of genre and platform and factors like timeliness and current market trends factored in.
The final bit of the development involves Bug Fixing: allowing your team extra time after the title is finished reduces the number of Bugs present in the final product but continues to spend your budget without any other appreciable effect. Presumably a large number of bugs results in lower reviews and on several occasions I allowed a title to release without clearing these out, and was greeted by a fan petition to patch the title after launch.
Oddly enough, at the very end of the process you are given a choice to scrap a title without releasing it, but it is hard to imagine a circumstance under which this would be sufficiently beneficial. Consistently poor execution seems only to result in limited sales and loss of fans but never once during testing did I find a title so poor that it didn’t outsell its production costs.
The choices made in development are reflected back to the developer in the experience they gain after the title is released, and this is modified by factors like the chosen genre or subject materiel (the developer ‘learns’ more if they haven’t been exposed, but the quality of the game is higher if they have previous experience in the field).
After the title is released, it is reviewed, and these reviews are relayed to you with a score and a sound-bite, from somewhat familiar industry standards like: Informed Gamer/Game Informant (Har har har) and you have the option of running a game report, a post-mortem on the choices you made that provides an insight into what is a ‘good’ or ‘bad’ choice in genre or development. These good or bad choices seem to be very concrete in nature and while they often remain true to form, I found on occasion that recreating certain triumphs of game design resulted in a Poor combination (LA Noire cognate The Angel in Black did VERY poorly despite relatively good statistics) and recreating industry jokes sometimes resulted in great sales and reviews – I’m looking at you, Fifty Shades of Grey’s Anatomy.
The revenue from a title is bestowed shortly after release, as well as the number of fans that a title gained for the development house. Several months after the title hits the market it is discontinued and provides no more revenue. Carefully balancing your costs in the short-term is usually more advantageous that exceeding your budget and hoping you’ll be able to make it up in an extended sales period or with one blockbuster.
Between developing titles, bits of pertinent industry news will be shared, providing information that may be beneficial to choices, like the market share of a particular platform, the introduction or discontinuation of a console and so forth. Over time, these bits of industry information and experience in the genre will grant you the boon of an indicator on choices made in development, such as the pairing of a Detective-Themed Adventure title is a good one, or that a specific platform is better suited to certain genres of game.
As your development house rises in the world, you may be contracted to do certain products by larger companies. You have the option of choosing what sort of contracting you’ll be doing, and run the risk/reward gauntlet of working on a tight deadline with stringent and often challenging goals – these are really only useful for amassing quick cash and usually it’s not worth wasting time better and more beneficially spent in development.
As you gain experience, you also gain research points, which can be used to unlock new genre choices or develop proprietary technology inside your engine. Choices to change offices, upgrade buildings, advertise your title or sabotage other studios add a touch of freshness to the game-play but these are limited fare.
The unfortunate irony of Game Dev Tycoon is that there isn’t much game to play here. Once you divine the logic behind the decision making process you’ve done pretty much all there is to do. As soon as you add staff, there’s a bit of micromanagement to be done, but it doesn’t add anything new to a formula which already isn’t particularly deep or fascinating.
Visuals – 4 out of 10
Game Dev Tycoon’s design is clean and the visuals get the point across, but that’s about it. It features some rudimentary animations in the scoring process – and oddly enough nowhere else – that are charming at first glance but quickly become tedious.
The re-imagined computer and home consoles are the real high point of Game Dev Tycoon’s visuals; the charmingly and authentically rendered consoles are unmistakeably handled.
The menus are very clean and easily navigable and overall the user interface is very well thought-out and manageable.
Sound – 7 out of 10
There’s basically nothing to see here: some rudimentary sound work and a soundtrack that isn’t memorable enough to be annoying. It works and that’s about all that can be said for it.
Tech: 7 out of 10
No hard- or software issues to speak of and nary a bug to be found. The design team would be proud of themselves, if they designed Game Dev Tycoon inside Game Dev Tycoon.
Intangibles: 7 out of 10
Here comes the funny bit: Game Dev Tycoon, for all its surface faults, is actually a really neat experience. Its a clever idea that, while not unique or peerless within its genre, feels very different while doing nothing tangibly innovative. While the obvious criticisms of the work made themselves quickly and clearly apparent, the title is enjoyable in spite of its weakness. It’s a well-thought-out experience and I look very much forward to the future work of Greenheart Games.
Overall: 6.2 out of 10
The major complaint here is a lack of direction, of specificity. It functions as a light-hearted quasi-history of the industry at times but it also feels incomplete. It’s not nostalgic enough to be a tribute, it’s not historical enough to be educational and it’s not enough of a simulation to be a sim, with the unfortunate result that it’s almost not enough of a game to be a game. It’s a valid effort, and an interesting idea, but there’s not much of anything to unearth past the surface.
But despite its missteps, Game Dev Tycoon is still an interesting and valuable experience.