Gangsters: Organized Crime

Gangsters: Organised Crime has a fairly simple premise - you're a gangster, go organise some god damn crimes. Set in New Temperance, a pretty blatant stand-in for Chicago, you set out to either get elected as the city's mayor, accumulate a cool million bucks or eliminate your rival crime families.

The first step on your way to victory is the game's planning phase. At the start of each in-game week you command your lieutenants to go out and commit a wide variety of period-appropriate crimes. The combination of available lieutentants, the quality of the thugs they command and the types of businesses that surround the player's base determine the strategies needed to succeed. If you've got an abundance of bean-counters but none of them can shoot straight, you're better off milking the counterfeit press, brothel or speakeasy for all you can get.It' Alternatively, a gang full of gunslingers, arsonists and bomb-making experts will funnel you down a more aggressive route.

Once you give your commands, the game switches from a series of menus to an isometric cityscape - as was the style at the time. Though it resembles an RTS in appearance and interface, this section of the game is really just an excuse to watch your plans get put into action with the option to tweak a few things here and there. Maybe that office block you sent your men to bomb has a police car outside of it and you don't need the heat breathing down your neck. At that point, you can recall your troops back to base and call it a wash. These kinds of on-the-fly adjustments are a sensible inclusion but at no point should Gangsters: Organised crime be confused with a true RTS such as Starcraft or C&C.

If I had to draw a more appropriate comparison, I'd compare Gansters: Organised crime to something like Tropico or Dungeon Keeper. It's an economic management game that eschews the bland neutrality of SimCity and instead focuses on the seedier side of money-making. It's replete with appropriate and amusing touches, one of my favourites being the need to match your illegal businesses with a believable cover. Though it's possible to set up a brothel or speakeasy in a generic tenement block, they'll be much less likely to feel the long arm of the law if you hide them behind a massage parlour or cafe'. There's a guilty pleasure in watching your prostitution profits come in from one source, only to be donated to a local church to ensure it's priest's support in the upcoming election. If you want to go down a more combative route, these income streams and their protection are still important for acquiring top-quality weapons, fast getaway cars and pricey but effective subordinates. Watching your 5-star bomb expert blow up city hall and speed away in his souped-up coupe' may not be realistic but it is pretty satisfying.

I'm not going to spit hyperbole and say that Gangsters: Organised crime is a must-have classic. It's a niche title for a certain kind of gamer that can't resist ploughing forward for one more turn. If you get the chance to play it and you fondly remember 90's city-building games then I'd certainly urge you to try out Gangsters: Organised Crime. To me, it was addictive and endlessly replayable as any of its contemporaries. I didn't always have to be a tracksuited pawn in virtual gangland - I used to be the kingpin himself.