Urban Empire takes the successful formula of urban planning sims and expands them significantly by a political and a technological level. We were able to take a look at the complex strategy game at Gamescom and were pleasantly surprised. This could be a strong insider tip for hobby mayors!
If you are looking for more games of almost the same kind, check out AFK Arena Tier List – Best Heroes for PvP and PvE (Updated).
Political City Building Game! – Urban Empire Gameplay
City Building Simulators Meets Political Simulators
City building simulators such as Sim City or Cities Skylines have been popular with strategy fans for a long time. Urban Empire also takes the same line, but gives the genre an interesting twist. Because in addition to building a thriving city, this multi-layered simulation is also about politics. Unlike in classic city builders, as a mayor in Urban Empire you cannot freely adjust taxes at will, or stomp new city districts out of the ground – you first have to box through these building projects or adjustments in the city council! But let’s stay with Urban Empire’s urban planning.
In contrast to a Sim City, we do not draw individual streets with the mouse or declare individual residential and industrial areas down to the smallest detail. Instead, we plan complete municipalities in one fell swoop. To do this, we simply draw a rectangular frame and then adjust it freely by adding new corner points to the boundary lines and dragging the frame in the desired direction with the mouse.
Sims – Let’s Build This City!
The game then automatically checks whether the shape of our district is permissible and fills it with residential, commercial and industrial quarters at the end (the ratio is predetermined at the beginning, but can be adjusted in the later game) and a street network. This is quick and pleasantly intuitive. Districts can also be modified at any time, which is of course often useful during the course of a game.
As a good mayor in Urban City, you naturally have to respond to the needs of the residents, of whom there are six, including security, training, health or entertainment.
Around 800 different events can occur at any time based on the epoch and the circumstances and buildings in our city. This provides more dynamism. In the industrial age, for example, we have to decide how we will deal with child labor and the consequences of our decision accordingly. According to the developers, you should be able to play around ten to 15 hours in a game of Urban Empire. Thanks to the high level of complexity, the replay world is likely to be enormous. The release is currently planned for January 2017 on the PC.