UBI Soft Capitalism 2 Simulation Review

Overall Rating
 4 of 5

Visitors rate this review
4.40 of 5,
1 votes

Price Paid:  $10.00 from EB

Summary:
Capitalism 2 pretty much screams out exactly what the game is about - running a business. The game takes what would be the most boring and lackluster game concept in existance and turns it into something exciting and interesting. Don't mind the cheap price tag and a box cover that was the result of a five dollar advertising campaign, if you enjoy a good sit-down-and-spend-five-hours-straight-in-front-of-the-screen kind of game, this one is for you.

Overall Rating
 4 of 5

Visitors rate this review
3.00 of 5,
2 votes

Summary:
This is the most realistic and indepth business simulator made yet. No other business simulator comes close including Industry Giant 2.Although it would be impossible to recreate such a dynamic environment as the business world where companies are not confined to certain rules and great thinkers and entrepranures alike are forever pushing the boundries of what is standard and safe strategies. This game alows you to take control of nearly every important part of an organisation including marketing, finance, logistics, human resources, research and development, stock market, mergers and takeovers and manufacturing. The game also supports this with the most comprehensive amount of supporting information and statistics that I have seen in any game of any genre including full balance sheets and financial information, market share stats per product per city, market dominance in particluar strategies, information graphs with information going back 30 years and so much more. As I am a product manager emersed in the marketing environment I can say the marketing function of the game is dissapointing because you can only have three brand strategies and consumer loyalty and awarness is measured soley on how much money you throw into advertising, (its lucky thats not entirely accurate in real life)

Overall Rating
 5 of 5

Summary:
TO be honest, I didnt really expect much from this game. I had been playing transport tycoon and a trians and trucks tycoon demo, and just got in the mood for running a company!! So I bought this, thinking it should be ok. Its brilliant. The two hours I have spent playing this so far felt like 5minutes. I was trully shocked at how quickly time flew by!!
The one prpblem with it, for some people, will be the complexity. I've played it on 3% difficulty and some others as well and the only one I've managed any success at is the 3%. there is just so many things that you need to do!

Overall Rating
 5 of 5

Visitors rate this review
1.00 of 5,
1 votes

Price Paid:  $25.00 from Electronics Boutique

Summary:
Generally, this game is exactly what I expected: a business simulation. The fun comes from watching your company's profits and cash flow increase and getting the feeling of success from seeing it. I suppose this game fits a certain niche in the RTS market, much like how 'The Sims' fits a different niche.

I've been looking for a while to see if a simulation covering a well-rounded real-world business environment could be found to tinker and fiddle with, and was not satisfied when I found the demo for 'Railroad Tycoon'. Needless to say, from my ratings, this game was a good find.

Yes, this game has a LOT of information. So far, I've completed 6 of the campaign scenarios and the entire tutorial without having to access half of the vast amount of corporate info in the information screens. Mainly, the game involves finding profitable venues, be it real estate (which comprises probably 2% of the gameplay) to horizontally or vertically integrating a product line or lines (which comprises the rest of the 98%). This involves just about everything you can think of in real-world business management, from a choice of branding strategies to finding or creating suppliers to price management to quality control.

Also, before I forget, there is a stock market as well. I haven't played any scenarios which deal with acquisitions and mergers, but those scenarios are there. The real time element of the game makes this added feature all the more realistic...especially seeing your stock price soar or tank (hopefully the former). I'm sure that scenarios that either require M&A activity or personal wealth-building will involve the stock market far more than what I've seen to date.

Overall Rating
 2 of 5

Summary:
Not so much a game as a business simulator, Capitalism 2 is fairly interesting for a short while, but quickly becomes a tedious exercise in micromanagement. The complete lack of "chrome" in the game means that the spreadsheet nature of the play isn't hidden very well and the game lacks any real "personality". There is also way too much repetitive and pointless grunt work. Reading an economics textbook is probably a better and more enjoyable way to learn about business than this game is.