Recent reviews by Winfield S. Hancock

I have played quite a few political games and this is without a doubt the best one of them all. It goes into a great depth. Not only can you run for any office from a school board to the presidency, but you can actually run the city, state or whole country during your term. Even as a house representative you can influence things. I managed to sabotage the governor's attempt to replace flat tax with progressive income tax for 4 years before becoming governor myself.

The game still needs a lot more work and many things need to be worked on, but the good news is that it is being worked on and it is already playable and enjoyable. I highly recommend this game.

Edit 27th November 2021: I would recommend this game now even more than I did a year ago. The developer is adding an option to get married and have children, who can carry on your political legacy after you retire, which adds a whole new dimension to the game. Even though I would say there is still a lot to be done on the game, no other political game, I have played, gets even close in its scope.

I have played every TPM since 2008 and this one is by far the worst. I do not recommend anyone to buy it. The game has been stripped to the bone.

Cons:
- different campaign length is gone, 21 weeks is the only option
- no scenario or campaign game mode with historical presidents like in the past versions
- very few candidates; in the year where Democrats have record number of candidates you don't even get half of them, people like Harris, Booker, Castro and others missing; Republicans completely barren, just Trump and Pence, people who haven't really mattered in politics for years and a literal rock
- one type of ad
- only one type of HQ, because all other in-game currency beside money is gone
- you have to buy operatives with money now, so you won't even use them, because the amount of money you get is pretty much the same as it has always been, so the operatives are practically gone as well, even though they are still in the game
- other minor things, but everything above is enough for me

Pros:
- the new ideology system seems interesting, but it seems that the rest of the game was laid on its altar
- AI vs AI game mode, good for simulations, but in the end not really worth much

I haven't tested the multiplayer, but beware that the previous versions had an issue where the host would see the real state of the game, while the other person would see completely different polling numbers and therefore couldn't act properly and strategically and always lost. And I have doubts they fixed it, because they didn't fix it before, even though it was reported by multiple people including me.

This game and its developers made me angry so many times, but still I have to recommend it, because it was worth every penny.

I dont really have anything negative to say about this game. If you love space and space exploration, you will love this game. If you dont, you will still have a lot of fun. I have had KSP for a long time, so I can say that every update is good. Unlike in many other games updates in this game dont rebalance everything constantly and destroy the gameplay you were used to. Also the modding community is great, which opens even more possibilities if the basic game is not enough for you. 10/10 would explode on the launch pad again