A greed that is good- and yet suffers from a conflict of interest
Greed can certainly make pretty little packages for the eyes of its beholders, especially when everything comes together as intended. Or when it falls apart as tends to be the case in Greed Corp, a turn-based strategy game released for the PC, Mac, Playstation Network, and Xbox Live. No matter how 'pretty' the package, presentation is key for consistent audience enjoyment. Flawed or inconsistent presentation can sabotage a product's promise. Such is the case with Greed Corp, the overall competence of which is hampered by a few self-defeating design choices.
As the first game made to present WGames' Mistbound universe, Greed Corp introduces a world where four different factions wage war over the resources of the world. The extreme pursuit of wealth is the focus of Greed Corp's design, as the factions completely destroy the land as they try to come out on top. The colorful visual design of Greed Corp certainly makes for some nice looking islands to destroy and goes a long way in differentiating the various visual styles of the game’s factions.
Greed Corp does not bother to go much farther than this colorful surface with any potential story for the Mistbound universe though. The campaign of the game does little more than introduce the base themes of each faction. The Empire is the most militarized, the Cartel, a collection of corporations, is the greediest, the Pirates live up to their name, while the Freemen are the only group that gives a damn about the environment- while still participating in Greed Corp's method of warfare.
This method involves maps consisting of hexagonal tiles, each with 1 to 6 layers representing how close it is to complete destruction. The objective the game presents is simple, since all one needs to do is eliminate the other factions; but the path to this objective is a bit of a balancing act. Each player needs harvesters in order to properly fund their war effort; but the harvesters inevitably destroy the tiles around them over time. As a result, the maps quickly become more and more cramped as players harvest and subsequently destroy the various tiles in a race to get the upper hand in funding and positioning.
The simplicity of the tools in Greed Corp provides places the focus on outmaneuvering your opponents. It is intense and satisfying to use the game's balancing act to your advantage; or to go crazy with it and cause mass destruction. This setup would have been appealing to players of any skill level, but for a few questionable design choices surrounding the otherwise competent central gameplay.
Greed Corp is primarily designed as a multiplayer game, but this does not excuse how it handles time limits. Players have a mere 60 seconds to perform their moves in both online and offline modes, and the timer cannot be adjusted or turned off. For online play this setup is understandable, but including the timer in offline play is an absurd design fault that will annoy newcomers and veterans alike.
Greed Corp is also unfortunately one of those games that forces players to go through the single player campaign to unlock much of the multiplayer content. This campaign also has the potential to annoy players of any skill level. More experienced players may be turned off by the campaign consisting of little more than a long collection of skirmishes against the AI, while newcomers may have to give each skirmish multiple tries due to the quality of the AI.
Even at the lowest difficulty setting, Greed Corp's AI generally knows what it is doing. The easy AI will make mistakes ranging from redundant to suicidal with harvester placement on occasion, but it otherwise performs competently. At all difficulty levels, the AI has knowledge of several of the more aggressive tactics in the game (including aggressive harvester placement) and is fully capable of punishing players for their mistakes. The AI's tactics don't blatantly change with each higher difficulty level, but it does become progressively more aggressive and efficient.
The quality of the AI encourages newcomers to quickly learn the capabilities and versatility of the game's tool set, but the time limit provides unnecessary pressure that can hamper this learning process. The quality of the AI may also annoy those who just want to unlock all of the multiplayer maps.
Were it not for this conflict of interest, Greed Corp would be an outstanding downloadable title. As it is though, Greed Corp ends up reducing itself to only a passing recommendation. The core gameplay seems lined up to be ready to please players of any skill level, but the design choices that surround the core gameplay openly collide with each other in such a way that greatly devalues the overall product. It is not a complete disaster though, as those who are willing to live with or ignore these design shortfalls will find satisfaction with Greed Corp's core gameplay design.
