Developer Hellfire Games has just launched Home Tycoon, a free-to-play exclusive for Playstation Home. If you’ve ever wondered what exactly Playstation Home is for, you are not alone. I don’t get any part of it, but then again, I never really got The Sims. Sure, I played The Sims, but it made me feel empty and sad. I was at the top of my Sim career, with all of the Simoleons my little Sim heart could desire, and yet it wasn’t enough. Nothing makes you question the meaning of life more than playing a game about life and suffering through an existential crisis alongside your character.
Home Tycoon features city-building, street racing, and hours of missions and activities. It also has 50 avatar awards to unlock. Players will take on the role of a Mayor who can personalize their city with buildings like luxury homes, parks, power plants, hospitals, police stations and more.
That sounds so boring. Luckily, they say “the only limit is your imagination,” which is great, because I’m imagining my Mayor as more of a crime boss. Not a completely bad one; she’ll be a mobster with a heart of gold, but she will take out whoever stands in her way. I’m talking about breaking kneecaps, making people sleep with the fishes, leaving the gun and taking the cannoli, the whole enchilada. I suppose it would be more apt to call it the “whole meatball” to keep with the Italian crime thing I’ve got going on here. The developers say that you can balance your economy to maximize happiness and growth, but I have a criminal enterprise to run. I’ll tell my population that if they don’t want anything to happen to their nice little luxury condo, then they need to hand over a stack of simoleons, and smile while they do it. Money and happiness, ba-da-bing. I win.
