Cartel Tycoon
Top Critic Average
Critics Recommend
Critic Reviews for Cartel Tycoon
Not brilliant, but pretty entertaining tycoon with a bunch of decent mechanics and gameplay aspects.
Review in Russian | Read full review
Cartel Tycoon goes all in on the drug cartel leader fantasy and mines the setting for as many concepts as possible. The management game is good, with a mix of mechanics and with clear challenges for players to work through. I like the look of the game and most of the writing fits well with the ‘80s Latin American world it is evoking.
Cartel Tycoon gets the basics right, and its low price may entice some fans of management games. However, more could have been done with the setting and some of the mechanics. There are better options in the genre.
Overall, Cartel Tycoon can be a good replacement for other RTS type games. Everything can go wrong pretty easily, as you’d likely be familiar with if you’ve played these types of games before. Sometimes you’ll have games where you steamroll everyone else and feel pretty good about yourself as well. Much like a box of chocolates, you never really know what you’re gonna get sometimes.
As much as I’ve enjoyed Cartel Tycoon, I still can’t shake the feeling it isn’t quite ready to come out of early access. It’s almost there and there’s a lot of potential for future content, but for now I think this is one that needs a few more features and some additional polishing before being ready to hit the streets.
Cartel Tycoon is mostly for people who want a fun and gritty theme to their city management, even if it is at the cost of overall gameplay. As it stands, the game needs more onboarding and a better user interface instead of just throwing players to the wolves. Moon Moose has already announced further updates, and perhaps those could help relieve some of the existing issues.
While a little overburdened with systems and a glaring glossing over of the rampant sex trafficking and drug deaths that are a direct result of the real cartels, Cartel Tycoon is a polished management sim with intuitive UI and great visuals. If you want to feel like you're the star of Netflix's Narcos, you've come to the right place.
Cartel Tycoon is for me a nice and original diversification in the Tycoon genre. The developers sensed an appropriate opportunity and took advantage of the so far clear waters in setting the Tycoon genre in a controversial drug environment. The actual placement in the world of the Latin American drug cartels has really worked out well and there is nothing more to do than wait for the final version of the game.
Review in Czech | Read full review
