Football Manager is in a fortunate position of having no meaningful competition. Most other sports properties have at least one contender tilting at the windmills, but for Football Manager, the biggest risk has always been that people simply get bored with it. And given that this is a series that tends to occupy hundreds, if not thousands of hours of…
Of all the empires in all of history, the Roman Empire seems to have a unique ability to captivate. Perhaps because it was the first large-scale European empire – the one that “tamed Europe” as such, and so people look to it as the genesis of “Western civilisation.” It’s certainly…
One of the things about J. R. R. Tolkien’s vision of Middle-Earth…
In The Wandering Village, you build a small community for survivors of…
Once, many years ago, I read an argument that the enduring popularity of Harvest Moon/Story of Seasons in its homeland in Japan has to do with a very real desire for a “sea change” or “tree change” among Japanese urban populations. If this is true (and I believe there is…
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Bee-keeping sim Apico is quite bee-loved (Matt even featured it in his interesting games on an itch.io roundup), and is currently available basically everywhere… except anything Xbox. Well, that’s set to change – though I can’t tell you when past it will happen “soon.” As it does on current platforms,…
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There is no shortage of choices when it comes to city builders on the PlayStation 5 (and PlayStation 4). There is the recently released Anno 1800 and Transport Fever 2, but then there are also older titles like Cities: Skylines, Tropico 6, and some of the more out-there efforts like…
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Transport Fever 2 is a celebration of the value that transport networks bring populations. It is a “builder” simulator, but similar to the likes of the classic Transport Tycoon and A-Train, you don’t build the building directly. You build the road, train, ship and air transport networks that the cities…
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I haven’t played an Anno game since Anno: Create A New World on the Wii and DS, but I absolutely loved those games, and I likewise love Anno 1800, the first game in the main series to also get a console release (the Wii and DS titles were spinoffs). If…
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I often wonder how successful I’d be working as an air traffic controller. It seems like it would be a stressful job, given how quickly air flights can turn deadly, and how busy airports are these days. I also suspect I’d be less-than-good at the job, given how many nightmare…
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I love the Airport Hero series, which has been kicking around for many years now. Out of nowhere the most recent one for Nintendo Switch was released this week, so that’s what we played on this stream! Come see what it’s like to be an air traffic controller!…
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The “Golden Age of Piracy” will never cease to fascinate historians and amateur enthusiasts alike. While the caricatures of peg legs, eye patches, and parrots on the shoulder might not fascinate the imagination long past childhood, the political environment that allowed piracy to flourish, the role it played in the…
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People often forget that Game Freak is more than Pokémon. Certainly, that’s where the big money is, but as a developer, the team have come up with some excellent smaller ideas too. Pocket Jockey on the Nintendo 3DS was one of the finest download-only games on that platform. Thank goodness,…
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You probably haven’t heard of Sailing Era, a new simulator our of China, but it just launched on Steam and the Epic Games Store. It’s one worth checking out, because it has some gorgeous aesthetics and sounds really interesting. Also, it’s coming to PlayStation and Nintendo Switch later on, so…
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