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Car Tycoon Fails to Satisfy

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 20 / 21
Date: January 16, 2002
Author: Amazon User

This new release, developed by VectorCom Development and distributed through Fishtank Interactive, puts the user in the driver's seat of an automobile company. The goal, of course, is to beat your competitors at the game of building and selling cars. While many auto buffs would find such a simulation exciting, the buggy Car Tycoon is not yet ready for prime time. I've found a downloadable patch for the German language version, but none yet for the English version.

First, this game takes eons to start and load. I tested the game on a 1 Ghz machine with 256 MB of RAM, and this game took several minutes to load from the start. Once under way, performance was acceptable.

The game provides a tutorial mode to allow first-time users an interactive way to learn the game's operation. While that feature is helpful, I found it difficult to turn off the tutorial mode, even after successfully completing the tutorial's steps. During the game, a few program errors occurred and revealed the game's German heritage with Deutch-flavored error messages that were unreadable, at least to this English-speaking car fanatic.

After a few hours of play, the game's more serious flaws began to show. For example, the car models that I stopped producing would occasionally still show as being sold at a few dealerships, even if the dealer's stock was zero. Since a dealership can only sell from 2 to 4 vehicle models, this reduced the dealership's ability to stock new models. That annoyance alone makes the game frustrating to play, and makes one wonder how much testing occurred before declaring this product ready for market. In other cases, saved games couldn't be reloaded, creating more frustration.

The game's brief documentation is filled with misspellings and grammatically errors, which I assume were introduced when translating the text from German. While this doesn't create a big problem, it casts an unprofessional shadow on the product. Also, Fishtank's web site is nearly useless, providing no support information for the product.

If you're looking for a simulation of the auto industry, this doesn't come close. In the U.S., the manufacturers don't own the dealerships. This game has you bidding for new dealerships via an auction, and those dealerships can only stock a few different models. There are no decent reports available that compare you to your competitors, such as sales reports, percentage of market share, comparative financial statements, etc. The only feedback that comes close is a window that tells you the quantities of vehicles registered in a single city.

Oddly, the game's designers chose a SimCity-style town layout for the simulation, which is the game's biggest weakness. You sell vehicles in a city or two, and that's it. Not much fun, and certainly not realistic. A country map or globe would have been more realistic.

Once you master the game, which doesn't take long, the fun wears thin. Since the demise of the old simulation "Detroit", I was hoping for a high-quality automotive industry simulation to hit the market. My wait continues.

Better than everyone says it is

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 10 / 10
Date: May 01, 2002
Author: Amazon User

I went and bought even though I had heard about how bad it was and how unstable it is. I was shocked when I finally got to playing the game. It's the funnest strategy games I've ever played. It's simple and fun to do. You can look at your dealerships, factories, and see what kind of people are buying your cars. The game hasn't frozen on me once! I've heard over and over again how people are mad that you can't make them certain colors. Think about it. Does the company really decide what colors are made? Not really. The consumer does. This is a great game! I am not disappointed!

Amazon does take software returns, right?

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 5 / 6
Date: January 23, 2002
Author: Amazon User

You would think in this world of simulation games that kick butt ( Rollercoaster Tycoon, Airline Tycoon,Sims, etc.) that someone, somewhere, especially in the vehicle capital here in the USA, could come up with a good car industry sim. For those who are total car nuts like me, well, Car Tycoon is NOT it.

The translation of the program from German to English is bad, with text and the numerous error messages coming up in German sometimes. The game freezes for no reason and the graphics are stolen from the original simcity, not a compliment in 2002.

The interface is not easy to figure out and making money is not an option. Your factory can only build one car at a time, you must bid against the computer for more factories, dealerships,etc. The large dealerships can only sell 4 models of cars. You must spend a lot of money to research and develop cars, only to find out no one wants them. There is really no way to see how you shape up with competitors and no way to compare you cars to theirs, other than price. I can go on and on. Fishtank Interactives website offers no help at all.

I pre-ordered this for before Xmas and I love business sim games and cars, so I was anxious to get Car Tycoon. I should have kept "Detroit" by Impressions software, but I doubt that old program would run well on a 1.0ghz machine and Win ME.

Save your money, wait for someone else to do a better job with this kind of sim. Car Tycoon is not worth your time or money.

What a disappointment!

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 5 / 6
Date: February 14, 2002
Author: Amazon User

I had come up with this concept myself and was amazed when I found the game on the shelf of a computer store. FINALLY, I thought, THE GAME I WAS HOPING FOR! But what I found was a game that while good in concept is simply software filled with bugs. I couldn't get my computer with Win 98 to run it at all. I got it to work on a friend's computer with Win ME only to find that I had to go through the intro movie each time (no option to skip), the rules are unnecessarily complicated, it seems nearly impossible to win the game no matter what level you start at, and much of the game is very amateurish. Also, the game maker's web site is no help at all and parts were not even up when the game was released.

The real disappointment is that while I was waiting for a auto tycoon type sim game for a long time, when it finally came out it was just a big mess. I'm hoping a more reputable company will come out with a similar game in the near future. Save your money, avoid the aggravation, and do not buy this game.

Don't buy this game

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 7 / 11
Date: June 17, 2003
Author: Amazon User

I bought this game because I loved cars. When I loaded it I found messages kept coming up in German. I returned the game for a new one. This seemed to work fine. I then noticed that the woman in the bottom right hand corner of the screen sometimes speaks German. I then discovered that sometimes when trying to sell off models, they get stuck and you can't remove them. The biggest problem I found though was that I put in 7 hours of work into a supposed "open ended game" to find that once saved, and I was the leading manufacturer, when reloading the game it comes up with a message saying "Time has expired" and then a message saying "competitor has attained goal". I would never but this game again, or anything from this supplier. I would never recommend them and if there were a similar game around by another supplier I would buy it because I don't think it could be any worse than Car Tycoon.

Not the best, by far.

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 4 / 6
Date: August 07, 2005
Author: Amazon User

To make a long review short: You would be much better off playing Old Timer (Motor City), or even Detroit. This game is like a shoddy remake with flashier graphics.

A gamer in Gaithersburg, MD

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 4 / 7
Date: July 18, 2002
Author: Amazon User

If I could give this game a half star, I would. I love simulation games and was hoping that this one would be a newer version of Detroit (by Impressions many moons ago), but was very disappointed. It is hard to keep track of what is going on. Could use better reports. It locks up. Once while trying to exit, it hung and I finally had to shut it down through Task Manager. When you pop the CD into the drive, it tries to start installing again. Obviously not programmed smart enough to know that the game is already installed. And the movies at start up, where do I begin? Sitting through them once was more than enough. There is no way to skip through them, either, as I hit most every key on the keyboard as well as doing mouse clicks. Very bad game. Do not waste your money.

ways ton waste $...

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 4 / 7
Date: November 27, 2002
Author: Amazon User

The concept for this game had me intrigued, however once I installed it all I can say is ....simple. There are so many possibilities in this concept that just don't pan out or simply wern't explored. For instance I can't change the color or name the car types. Also for some reason dealerships won't change the types of cars they sell. What can I say but the game lasted less then a week and now its a fairly good frisbee!

a definite thumbs up game

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 3 / 5
Date: January 21, 2002
Author: Amazon User

This is definitly one of my favorite games, it's fun, realistic, it has good music. my only complaint is that even though a had a good 3dfx Voodoo 3/ 3000 video card, I still had to buy a new video card because everything except for the cars and buildings would be pitch black. Now that i have a new xtasy video card the graphics are great. I recommend anyone to get this game if you have a very good graphics card.

Great Game; Awesome

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 3 / 5
Date: May 28, 2002
Author: Amazon User

The cool parts about it is that you can have a lot of different cars and if you are a car fan you should get this game. you are a Car dealership thats wants to sell your cars, you control the prices of the cars, and the parts of the car.

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