The UI is an amazing rework of the old style, but also lacks the modern features we would like such as shortcuts between different rooms. Indeed reworking them to make front and rear suspension choices different, cylinder numbers different between engine layouts, they aren't really possible in the current engine but would really elevate the game. A few components can dominate the market whilst others (hydropnumatic) are priced to ridiculous levels. They don't seem realistic, nor do they seem balanced. Components need a lot of work rebalancing them. The biggest downsides seem to be those which are easily fixed. Modding support is also very, very open but there aren't many to pick from yet. This is where it really shines compared to older games, they attempt a lot of features too but GearCity does them all properly. It would take forever to list the features, and every single one is done properly. Even the smaller features are done properly - the game has a detailed stock market of car companies allowing a great amount of money to be made. Economies change over time including inflation and populations. Wars are simulated along with reduced sales, damage to your factories.

You're building components then cars (manually or in a few seconds assisted), but a large part of the game is picking where to build factories, dealerships, what sort of prices, what your company is doing, bigger picture stuff.

The game seems to revolve mostly around being the CEO and picking strategy, funding, investments. But unlike those games it really has the calculation and depth to back up the features it has added. It feels exactly like a game from the 90s, both in terms of UI and mentality. Whilst it could do with a little bit of work, the game has an amazing foundation. If you like tycoon games, or 'spreadsheet games', GearCity is a definite must-have. Having somehow never come across this game in its nearly 8 years on Steam Early Access, I found GearCity to be an absolute gem, and a great start to 2022 in gaming. The user interface might leave a few things to be desired for some people, but I don't think it detracts too much from what is generally a very compelling game experience. My knowledge of cars and the things that make them up expands about as far as having watched a couple of Top Gear specials and heard the term 'V-8 engine', and I'm still not quite sure if 300 horsepower is a lot or a little for a pickup truck, but perhaps a level of ignorance at the helm simply adds another dimension of realism to this excellent business simulator. The choice of whether to utilize prebuilt models or not is characteristic of GearCity's approach to gameplay: despite the apparent (and initially, perhaps somewhat overwhelming) level of detail involved in the car design pipeline, it is made completely accessible to someone more interested in the tycoon genre than cars. It features a neat little car designer applet in which you start with a basic body and attach a range of props to make a car body that is truly yours, but for those of us not too inclined to tinker there are a range of prebuilt models to choose from. GearCity takes the concept of 'car manufacturing' and wraps it in a neat package of player agency, attention to detail, spreadsheets and retro tycoon charm.Īt the mercy of a powerful world economy simulation - in the default game mode, spanning history from the beginning of the 20th century onwards - you will design, manufacture, market and hopefully sell cars of whatever description you desire. A map with some indicator of wars and conflicts would be gravy too.Īll in all probably one of the better spreadsheet sims out there with fun car sliders. Adding opponents seems to slow down the game in multiple ways and many feel simply not more challenging but more tedious. Why were my contracts denied? Who did they go with? Can I compare my product? Why do I care new competition has started selling trucks in Juno Alaska? I suppose some features are designed around not being a super mega international corp, but who honestly plays 100 years as a sports car only manufacturer? Maybe I need to tic up the difficulty for some of these features but honestly outside of the major wars very little bankrupts your business. However, rarely will you pick up a notification or article with anything insightful. Most of the text can be fun to read and look at. At times it is definitely tedious and frequently the game overproduces information for the player. Definitely needs a second iteration eventually with perhaps a little more time spent on UI innovation.

Gearcity pre made cars