Ports of Call (Third Review)


Title           Ports of Call (Third Review)
Game Type       Action Strategy
Publisher	Aegis
Players         1-4
HD Installable  Yes
Compatibility   All
Submission      Jerome Legrux

Review
Here's one of the best Economic type games I've ever played on the Amiga!
I've spent many, many hours with friends in games that were never finished.

You are a Shipowner, setting up business in one of the many ports you can
choose, and with funds of 5 Million dollars at your disposal you have to
make your bid for fortune, like Onassis... You must first buy a cargo
ship, choosing from old ones up to the most recent models, but at the
beginning of the game you won't have many choices...

You can mortgage your ships, ask for loans from your bank, or trade ships;
waiting for the best prices, as the market is a roller-coaster. Once you've
got a ship, you'll get the market prices for many different products. It
goes from food to weapons, chemicals to electronics... an so on! The
more ships you have... the richer you can become. But don't forget the
charges, the refuelling (running out of fuel costs 1 million dollars) the
repairs... etc. Also choose the best ports to trade from and to... This is
where the economic part comes in.

Now, time to show off your capabilities to pilot a ship through the
mysterious and hazardous oceans of the world. You'll have to contend with
pirates, wars (in some critical countries), rats (it can happen if your
boat's in bad condition), police (you can trade on the black market),
hurricanes, etc. Also you'll have to manoeuver your vessel around
icebergs, and when tug's are on strike you'll have to steer your ship into
or out of the port. In these cases you'll see your vessel from the top,
and carefully navigate through the harbour. No need to tell you that if
you hit any iceberg or any other kind of object it will results in
damages for your ship, and repairing it will cost you a lot of your
profits. And if you decide not to repair the ship, if it's in bad
condition it can of course... sink! In this case you'll lose some
solvability status, it means less credits, less business...

Finally, the graphics are very nice, for this is the same graphic designer
as Defender of the Crown. The game will keep you for many, many hours in
front of your screen. Unfortunately the action is quite repetitive, and
when you're very rich you don't even need to sail, just speculate on the
shipping market, buying and reselling. Once you've understood how to
behave, the game loses all its interest. Games with other players are very
intensive, and you can fix a time-limit to play, but believe me once
you've started you just can't stop...

In my view me this game deserved to be continued and developed, this
could have produced a really great game, but there were only 2 programmers
in the team!





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