Empire of Sin Reviews
A seamless blend of genres and high replayability make Empire of Sin and excellent choice for strategy gaming fans.
A refreshingly deep and customizable turn-based tactics game lets you reign supreme in a 1920s criminal empire.
There’s a lot going on in Empire of Sin. Romero Games and Paradox Interactive build quite a hybrid of business management, character growth, and turn-based combat, and the 1920s Prohibition-era backdrop makes for an interesting story. The gang leaders are varied in so many ways between their business, combat specialties, and personal stories. Meanwhile, the overall flow of business expansion, hostile takeovers, and diplomacy or confrontation with other gangs also makes for a mostly engaging gameplay loop.
Fantastic mafia management game with a good combat system. Employee relationships make up for bad artificial intelligence and some illogical situations.
Review in Spanish | Read full review
Empire of Sin has its bugs and some rough cinematic moments. But Romero Games pulled this project off with a team of just 30 people. For a game of its ambition, that seems like a small team. It’s pretty much an indie project, or perhaps “double-A,” compared to other games that are more polished but have hundreds of developers — or even more — working on them.
But the current implementation, especially that of the battles, is frustrating. Romero Games needs to make management more important and to bring the characters to the front more. Patches also should include auto-resolve and a big balance update. Empire of Sin needs all of this to begin to realize its clear potential.
While Empire of Sin is not the first to tackle the era or the setting, but it is the best realized version out of any of them. There’s a few bugs to be rid out by Romero Games, but what exists is not detrimental to its enjoyment. Becoming something from nothing is no easy task on the streets of Chicago, and there’s plenty of views and systems to understand where money and resources are going, and how to improve your rackets if they’re not performing well. There’s exciting possibilities for DLC and expansions, but the existing roster will keep you busy well into next year. Empire of Sin blends several genres together for a mafia game that’s infinitely replayable.
Empire of Sin offers a long and varied game that mixes management, strategy and tactical role with great success. With the 1920s and prohibition as a scenario, Romero games allows us to create our criminal empire in a fairly simple and addictive game, but at the same time deep in its gameplay and mechanics.
Review in Spanish | Read full review
While the flaws in Empire of Sin are significant, they are not enough to take the shine away from this Romero Games title. The bold proposal to mix different genres and moments in a game only ends up making the experience varied and interesting, especially for fans of the theme and genres contemplated here. When you spend time with the game, you get the impression that it would benefit from a little more development time. Still, creating and maintaining an empire of respect is as fun as it sounds. Honestly, I hope that the developers and the publisher continue to support the franchise - there is undeniable potential here.
Review in Portuguese | Read full review
Empire of Sin is a great example of how you can use the prohibition era in games. A pleasant, rather simple strategy that does not lack combat and interesting gang management.
Review in Polish | Read full review
The complexity of the interlocking systems in Empire of Sin feel like more than the game can handle. For every time a story emerges about love and loss as I described above, there are times when your speakeasy suddenly starts losing money and the game doesn’t communicate why. I’m sure through hours of play a pattern will emerge, but for now too much is too opaque and difficult.
An RPG, a grand strategy, a tycoon game and with a final touch of turn-based tactics, this is Empire of Sin, a game that skilfully manages to keep its various souls together.
Review in Italian | Read full review
Despite a couple of negative aspects, if you are fans of the mafia genre, strategy and management, Empire of Sin will make you an offer that you will not be able to reject.
Review in Spanish | Read full review
Empire of Sin is a competent hybrid that borrows mechanics from tycoon games, turn-based tactics and RPGs. Unfortunately, the game is plagued by numerous bugs and glitches that risk compromising the experience.
Review in Italian | Read full review
A few details here and there would have made the Empire of Sin experience much better, but the truth is that I can't say that the title is bad either, rather the opposite, it's just a pity that an idea that sounds great on paper misses a little in mechanics and in neglect of certain trifles. However, I think that this new work by Romero Games can lay the foundations for a future part two with many of the improvable elements that we name already modified and the same essence, because Empire of Sin is really a good game, only that it has potential for be so much more than just good.
Review in Spanish | Read full review
Empire of Sin isn't a bad game, just a simple game, not deep enough to catch the attention of the genre's veterans. The organized crime theme is, as always, interesting, but it could have been developed better: as it is, Empire of Sin looks more like XCOM-lite with gangsters than a true mafia simulator.
Review in Italian | Read full review
Empire of Sin brings X-COM-style combat and in-depth strategy to 1920s Chicago in a package with tons of great ideas, but a lack of real focus.
It's hard to ignore the need for a little extra TLC to smooth out the edges, but the fundamentals of an arresting tactics-and-strategy game about building a criminal empire are in place.
The way Empire of Sin combines diplomacy, turn-based combat, and narrative gameplay mechanics is incredibly ambitious. While there’s plenty to keep you engaged, the format doesn’t always work, and sometimes it’s easy to be overwhelmed by the sheer volume of stats and missions. Even though the game has its shortcomings, its atmosphere, characters, and environment are fantastic. And if you decide to persevere, there’s plenty to love in Empire of Sin.
The game has solid tactical combat and RPG elements but is let down by a weak strategic layer.