“All God does is watch us and kill us when we get boring. We must never, ever be boring.”
God games, I'm sure at some point in every gamer's life they have played or at least watched someone else play this genre. The two biggies Civilization and The Sims still have a rabid fans to this day. Most games in this genre go the tried and tested route set by the two giant's above but Reus dares to be different and sometimes a change is as good as a rest.
Reus immediately turns the God Game genre on its head by not giving you control of people or countries but control of the planet itself. Yes you play as a planet and at first it seems a little too out there but once everything starts to click into place it makes you question why nobody has thought of this before.
The fact that you're a planet really screws with your communication skills. In fact you can't communicate at all. To solve this problem you given four Giants and each one is the living embodiment of the planet environments. These Giants give you the power to control nature and the world around you. Each of these Giants are given a specific role/environment which they must micro manage. The Ocean Gian, The Forest Giant, The Swamp Giant and The Earth Giant. While ever Giant may have similar roles to perform their powers vary from one Giant to the next.
The Ocean Giant creates the planet's oceans without which there is no life. Make an ocean and anything on the perimeter of that ocean soon becomes a manageable forest or swamp when you have decided what to do with the wasteland that appears on either side. Now that land must be terraformed so any plants you gory can thrive there which will encourage any animals you place around your lands to thrive also. Soon humans arrive and start to build villages but this development brings it's own set of problems.
Once your planet is up and running and providing a steady flow of resources the strategy side really shines through. Your human inhabitants start off very simple and are basically neanderthals. They live a simple life by eating whatever plants are edible and by killing animals for their meat. Then after a certain amount of time has passed they will want to start various projects. Each one of these projects is governed by a time limit and it will require a set amount of resources to be used. These resources are under your control and if you don't have enough of them it's your job to make more. But it's not as simple as planting more trees and shrubs and watching or helping them evolve. Symbiosis is the key to better and healthier vegetation so what and where you plant your trees and shrubs is vitally important. Each project succeeds or fails by these decisions but eventually another project will need your time and energy.
Your villages are a complicated bunch. As your Giant's grow more powerful the less impressed by you the villagers become. They are a fickle bunch and they become more and more demanding. Treat them with kid gloves and they will soon become spoilt and bloody greedy. There are ways to combat this rather unpleasantness by messing with your plants and animals but you might choose not to do this and that's when the trouble really begins. Your villagers will seek out and attack other villages. You can let these attacks play out or step in and wipe out the attackers village. But that means it's back to the drawing board.
To get to this point you have to unlock various lengths of play. Once you have completed the tutorial you will unlock the thirty minute era. Then
surprisingly each additional era is locked behind achievements. Playing the thirty minute era over and over soon became a bit of a chore and I was forced to grind just so I could unlock the next time era. The game ends with the planet and it's Giants going back to sleep after the time limit has expired. There is a freeplay mode that allows you to play for as long as you want but you can only use the abilities you have unlocked during the main game. One of the hardest things to achieve with God Games on consoles is adapting the Joypads limitations compared to a trusty old mouse and keyboard. Things aren't perfect here but I'll admit that I was pleasantly surprised with the setup.
Reus strikes a great balance between risk and reward and although the time era levels are locked behind achievements this gives you the time you need to really hone your knowledge of symbioses. There are a tonne of abilities to unlock and developments to conquer. Newbies to the genre can easily get stuck in but veterans will find a surprising amount of depth here and I'm sure they will all enjoy the time they spend playing Reus.
Developer: SOEDESCO Publishing
Publisher: SOEDESCO Publishing
Website: Reus
Twitter: @SOEDESCO @AbbeyGamesNL
Reus is available now for £19.99
Review code supplied by SODESCO