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> Results: Space Colony
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Space Colony is promoted as a sort of ﾓSims in Spaceﾔ sort of game. The game does contain the fun aspects of watching little virtual personalities meet and interact on the computer screen. However, the fact that you are also trying to accomplish some specific goals for survival and advancement tends to make the charactersﾒ little idiosyncrasies far more annoying than cute. You begin the game in control of one fairly balanced individual, Venus. She has a wide variety of skills and will probably be your go-to character when you need something done. Unfortunately, she canﾒt be everywhere at once, so all the other charming personalities are called on to use their specific talents. Each crew member has a similar variety of needs, such as food, social interaction, rest, money, etcﾅ Keep those levels high and they will be happy and work longer shifts. Some crew members have favorite needs, like Stig the Norwegian space biker who favors being well fed. Failing to meet that particular need will penalize that characters happiness more severely. As you manage your colony, you are given tools to build and expand. Things such as mining stations and food processors can, if supplied with manpower, create income for the colony. Other stations, such as a sauna for our friend Stig or a disco dance floor, help to meet the needs of the colonists. If this is not enough, at times the station area is attacked by alien aggressors, and must be defended with an assortment of stationary and mobile defenses, all while keeping an eye on the bottom line. Since almost every production-oriented station that can be added to the colony requires a crewmember to run it, the game often requires a delicate balance of forcing your crew to walk a fine line of time management between multiple work stations. This can be quite tricky, and makes the included pause button a necessity in the early stages of colony development. Once the initial series of missions are finished, you are given the choice to go down a more aggressive, combat-oriented story branch, or try your hand at the more economy-focused branch of the game. In addition to the story mode, the game can also be played in a sandbox style mode where youﾒre free to try to build the most efficient and productive base you can manage. The menus and controls for the game seem to be reasonable and donﾒt get in the way. At times, it would have been nice to give colony members more than two tasks to queue up, but it is not a game-critical problem. The graphics and sound are quite excellent, with eye catching animation and scenery. At times, the 2D graphics can become a problem if some items or planetary features are occluding a necessary item or person. The game advertises a huge amount of voice acting, and it delivers. Every colonist has a full range of responses to actions and interactions and the mission briefings and announcements often have responses by the colony personnel as well.  Despite its well rendered graphics, unique game design, and shoeboxes full of voice acting, Space Colony falls short of being a must-have game. One of the joys of The Sims comes from seeing the success and foibles of your little person as they go through every-day life. This fun factor is there in Space Colony, perhaps even more so since each colony worker has such a distinct background and personality. However, while their successes are appreciated, the continuous pressing need to accomplish colony goals tends to create far more frustration from their foibles. This can be a problem for gamers who like to completely optimize their gameplay. With so many variables and independent personalities involved, the game is often more of a balancing act to make the best use of very limited resources. Anyone who manages people for a living might soon find themselves feeling like theyﾒre back at work trying to get everyone to play nice, rather than relaxing in front of a keyboard. The game really is quite fun at first, but with time it can turn into a human resources bad dream, just not my cup of tea. Kid Factor: At first glance, this title seems fairly kid-friendly, but several real concerns pop up as the game progresses to show the title deserves its ﾓTeenﾔ rating. Due to the complexity of managing all the personalities while simultaneously trying to accomplish mission goals, I would expect a minimum age requirement to fall around the middle school level. Some minor flavor animations could be disturbing to some, such as the screams of ﾓpainﾔ when some of the characters use the auto-doctor to get healed. Finally, if the relationship part of the game is taken to its conclusion, two characters can form a romance. At this point, when they encounter each other, they have a tendency to kiss, and then go jump into bed together and undulate underneath the covers. While possibly a highly amusing feature to a middle school student, I would expect not all parents would approve. A final caution, there is no sexual orientation bias to the romantic relationships, so that may be an additional drawback for some. Reviewerﾒs Recommended Ages: 13+ ESRB: T-Teen (13+) Publisher: The Gathering Developer: Firefly Studios Score: 3.5 
At first glance, this title seems fairly kid-friendly, but several real concerns pop up as the game progresses to show the title deserves its ﾓTeenﾔ rating. Due to the complexity of managing all the personalities while simultaneously trying to accomplish mission goals, I would expect a minimum age requirement to fall around the middle school level. Some minor flavor animations could be disturbing to some, such as the screams of ﾓpainﾔ when some of the characters use the auto-doctor to get healed. Finally, if the relationship part of the game is taken to its conclusion, two characters can form a romance. At this point, when they encounter each other, they have a tendency to kiss, and then go jump into bed together and undulate underneath the covers. While possibly a highly amusing feature to a middle school student, I would expect not all parents would approve. A final caution, there is no sexual orientation bias to the romantic relationships, so that may be an additional drawback for some.
Kid Factor by Dr. Matt J. Carlson
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