By Adam Smith on February 4th, 2013 at 10:00 am.
Omerta: City of Gangsters is out now and I’ve spent many an hour conquering Atlantic City, building an empire of bullets and booze. I’m not quite ready to tell you wot I think so I thought I’d use the posting of the launch trailer as an excuse to spill some secrets in your ear. I expressed my disappointment with the demo shortly after playing it, but I’m much less apathetic now. Omerta is an old-fashioned management game, with a simple but effective campaign structure and few frills, but its pin-striped heart beats steady. It doesn’t have the charm of Tropico, or that game’s simulated civilians, but it wears its theme well and performs turn-based combat in a clunky but effective fashion. Full thoughts later this week.
I’m fairly sure that every trailer uses the same footage in a different order.
04/02/2013 at 10:26 KikiJiki says:
Do you know if they have fixed the issue that was present in the press version from Nov/Dec where you could break the game by selling all your criminal enterprises, cleaning all your money and going straight?
Looks like an interesting game for sure, especially since I haven’t played any Kalypso games before, but I’m not really looking to throw money at the game if basic design errors like that are still present.
04/02/2013 at 10:32 Adam Smith says:
There are some gaps in the design – not sure if it’s the same one that you’re referring to but there are campaign missions that are easier to pass by having a fire sale rather than actually using the game’s systems. I’ve found that they’re odd and irritating rather than game-breaking, since it’s possible to work around them. That shouldn’t be necessary and it’s a shame.
Haven’t quite finished the campaign yet though so don’t want to say too much.
04/02/2013 at 10:35 KikiJiki says:
Thanks Adam, I might wait a week or so post release before picking it up just to see if these things are going to get patched post-release then.
04/02/2013 at 11:19 ReV_VAdAUL says:
They’ve fixed that now, a man in a bow tie and impeccable suit and another fellow with a shotgun come and kill your character if you try and do this.
04/02/2013 at 11:53 Mario Figueiredo says:
Oh gosh! Not a bow tie! Couldn’t you send someone with a better sense of fashion and that didn’t try to dress like a clown? I mean, send me even a street gangster. There’s a method to the way he dresses. But a bow tie? A bow tie!?
those would be my dying words.
04/02/2013 at 13:04 StevoIRL says:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q5VxvF7DaCw Such a badass character
05/02/2013 at 17:26 Bassem says:
Man, I know who you were referring to before I clicked that link. Mouzone kicked ass. Seeing him and Omar interact was one of the highlights of the show. Wish there was more of that.
04/02/2013 at 13:12 FullMetalMonkey says:
They send Dr Who?
04/02/2013 at 15:02 sinister agent says:
Y’know, I’ve not played the game at all, and the ability to do that sounds like an amusing addition rather than a bug. Bonus points if your friends keep trying to drag you back in by asking for just one small favour.
04/02/2013 at 15:14 KikiJiki says:
My friends said it just broke the game. They couldn’t progress or do anything further when they did that at the press event they attended. When checked on by the staff there they were apparently the first people who ever though to go straight. I thought that it was odd that the game design allowed you to do that and it hadn’t been taken into consideration, but Adam’s comment seems to show that a fair few things like that slipped through the net.
04/02/2013 at 10:37 frightlever says:
Hmm. EG savaged it., but this preview review looks a bit more optimistic.
So, how mod-friendly is it?…
Edit: I had a look. Not THAT mod-friendly. Yet.
04/02/2013 at 10:39 yurusei says:
If you’re bootlegging this, you’ll find a horse head in your bed…
04/02/2013 at 10:56 Carbonated Dan says:
so you’re a wiseguy eh?
04/02/2013 at 11:42 maninahat says:
Leave the gun, take the piss.
04/02/2013 at 12:22 MrEclectic says:
This game has a pair of cement shoes dragging it down, so fuggedaboutit
04/02/2013 at 21:48 RegisteredUser says:
It was a marriage gift to my daughter, I swear.
04/02/2013 at 10:40 lordcooper says:
Please be good.
04/02/2013 at 10:44 Bracknellexile says:
It’s odd. Normally a game demo will go one of two ways: either I’ll play it for five minutes, realise I don’t like it and delete it, or I’ll play it to the end then go buy the game. Omerta has the dubious honour of being that rarest of things, a game where I played the whole demo but still don’t want to fork out for the game. Not entirely sure I can put my finger on why, either.
Another one for the Steam sale list….
04/02/2013 at 11:01 Anthile says:
Eurogamer gave it a devastating 3/10. I wouldn’t get my hopes up.
04/02/2013 at 11:50 Yargh says:
While I’ve yet to play past the 4th campaign mission I can already say that the Eurogamer review was overly harsh in my opinion.
The game is competently produced and seems to be fully functional at least so far. It doesn’t look like there is a massive depth to the full strategic game but I won’t be able to say that for sure until I have played quite a bit more.
Combat worked fine for me, but I have a large number of more advanced weapons to unlock so there remains scope for things to break there too. Character customization is selecting a perk per level and choosing which weapon to bear (only one at a time, I think).
04/02/2013 at 12:46 frightlever says:
PC Gamer gave it 78 out of 100.
04/02/2013 at 11:15 Maxheadroom says:
An earlier trailer (at least i didnt spot it in this one) had someone firing a gun and the bullets coming out at a full 45 degree angle
Dont get me wrong, I’m not some CoD playing kiddie and am a big fan of strategy games like the original XCOM, but this looks pretty awful.
04/02/2013 at 12:01 georgetownhoya says:
Those were clearly the shell casings. You can’t see the bullets (in the game or real life)
The game has flaws, but its graphics are very, very good.
04/02/2013 at 12:51 maninahat says:
No, they were bullets. Shell casings don’t produce muzzle flash, or fly from the barrel of the gun, into a guy standing thirty yards away.
04/02/2013 at 13:11 georgetownhoya says:
Have you played teh game? Bullets are not visible as a stream like that. It’s the game’s depiction of shell casings. In the trailer, the target that the shooter is facing is highlighted with a red circle. You are right that the behavior of shell casings is not very accurate in the game, but whatever.
Also: The turn based gameplay in Omerta is probably better than XCOM’s, if only because targets in line of shit can be inadvertently hit by your fire. Also, it has action points and you don’t “trip up and activate” clusters of enemies, so it feels much more natural than XCOM.
P.S. – XCOM had shooting glitches too, namely shots through walls. I haven’t played enough Omerta to know how its strategy layer compares to XCOMs, but since XCOM’s strategy layer basically requires you play in one set way (satellites and engineers ad infinitum), I doubt Omerta’s is much worse.
04/02/2013 at 13:22 Sparkasaurusmex says:
Omerta, no, but XCom does have that feature of bullets shooting even 90 degrees relative to the gun
04/02/2013 at 11:33 maninahat says:
I played the demo and did have some fun, but I don’t know if there is just enough there to keep it interesting beyond a few hours. Management seemed to be quite limited – do I get to hire generic goons to guard buildings? Do I get to pick what guns my lieutenants use? Do I get more aesthetic character customization beyond picking a portrait? Do I get to raze buildings to the ground with bomb attacks? Can I buy any building? None of this became apparent throughout the demo, so I’m still stuck. Looks like I’ll get it in a sale.
04/02/2013 at 11:46 Klingsor says:
Not really convinced from it. The game got a lot of mediocre or even miserable ratings from most of the german gaming sites. I was hoping for a new Gangsters-like game but apparently it’s much to streamlined without offering long-term motivation.
That’s kind of typical for the late Kalypso games. Even Tropico 3&4 were much to easy compared to the original one.
04/02/2013 at 12:57 maninahat says:
Gangsters really needed streamlining though, and I don’t mean Gangsters 2 streamlining. A game with Gangsters’ variety and strategy, combined with Haemimont’s simple interface and charm could have worked really well. And a freedom force style strategy sounded cool.
Oh, also Haemimont: a drunk Irishman and a cheapskate Jew? Really? It certainly ain’t Freedom Force’s idea of silly stereotypes.
04/02/2013 at 12:09 brulleks says:
ITS pin-striped heart.
Its its its its its.
Please edit before I have some kind of stroke.
04/02/2013 at 12:11 Adam Smith says:
Oh no! It may be too late for brulleks. Quickly – to Surgeon Simulator 2013!
04/02/2013 at 15:03 sinister agent says:
Everybody stand back! I’m dressed like a doctor.
05/02/2013 at 21:32 Bassem says:
Thanks for the laugh!
04/02/2013 at 14:35 brulleks says:
*Wheeze* It’s *hrrr* ok (cough). I might *nnnngh* pull through now.
beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep.
04/02/2013 at 15:37 Sparkasaurusmex says:
This game is a lot of fun but it could have been so much better if it just gave the player some more stats and feedback.
04/02/2013 at 15:37 Sparkasaurusmex says:
I don’t mean that it needs more stats, it just needs to give you more info on the stats in more areas.
05/02/2013 at 02:31 akbarovich says:
When I saw “OMERTA” I was all excited that this would be a Jagged Alliance 2 remake. This game would be better if it was set in the Arulco-an town of OMERTA where you control a band of mercenaries to overthrow an evil dictator-ess and restore the rightful dictator.