![]() ![]() The core of the game is researching technologies to advance civilisation to either one of these two goals. The mechanics are interesting, but fundamentally there are only a small number of play-styles that will get players to the end-state – either craft a virtuous civilisation (that will portal to another dimension) or an evil one (that will leave on a rocket). The second flaw is that it’s not that replayable of a game. This can be frustrating when you’re forced to plant tree after tree or cast rain after rain just so that the game will deal you a card that you want, and could also stymie your best-laid plans for civilisational progress in a game that relies as much as Simmiland does on timing your cards right. ![]() This leads to scenarios where the game randomly deals enormous amounts of unnecessary cards interspersed with cards you need. However, the game allows you to buy only a set number of each card, rather than letting you load the cards you want. On the first, as players continue playing, they get the opportunity to purchase more cards on the market, which is a good thing because it basically means they have more time and more chances to tinker with their civilisation before everything goes boom. Simmiland has two major flaws at this stage – first, its randomised and unbalanced card drops can make for a frustrating experience, and two, it’s not particularly replayable. I shan’t touch on the obvious messaging being put forth here – a blatant enlightenment-style ethos of religion as an opiate that holds back human potential – but nevertheless, it’s an intriguing mechanic – a literal creative destruction – that pretty much flies in the face of one’s usual city-building instincts. The player is soon made to realise that in order to save the civilisation – they must destroy the church with an appropriately cataclysmic event – even if that means reducing much of their painstakingly-built cities to rubble (and killing the bulk of their population in the process). For once the player runs out of cards to play, the apocalypse happens – and the only way to get humanity to avoid the apocalypse is to increase their technological level to the point where they can either build a rocket or portal to escape their doomed world.īut if you do right enough by your humans, they will start to build an edifice to your greatness – an act, that while made with the best of intentions, retards the pace of their technological development. One of the game’s most notable elements is that it forces the player to accept the notion of creative destruction. It’s highly satisfying to see the civilisations grow from a collection of straw huts to a confluence of sky towers. Provide the basic ingredients for life – food, minerals and technologies – and your civilisation will thrive and start spreading across the face of the planet. Playable cards allow you to place plants and animals, manipulate biomes via weather effects, summon meteor strikes, or even just murder your citizens on a whim. The game deals you a dozen or so cards at random from your overall deck (which is finite) at any given time. In Simmiland, you play a god one who is able to interact with the planet only by playing from a selection of cards, which you can only activate after accruing sufficient faith points from your human charges. ![]() Simmiland is an interesting take on the god game genre that could do with a few refinements. (Obligatory shout-out to the philosophical chelonian for intro-ing this game)
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