Game Reviews

Greed Corp for Xbox 360 is a rather unique turn based strategy game. Yes it’s your traditional hexagonal affair but let’s be honest, the majority of other strategy games can get rather boring and long winded. Greed Corp is different. Unlike the others that can take a long time to play and are full to the brim with complex features, Greed Corp keeps it’s simple from story right through to gameplay. Before we get into the details let’s cover that story a little first.

The planet you’re on has been ravaged of resources for thousands of years; the constant digging, mining and drilling has taken its toll and the once beautiful land is nearly at the end of its life. Just a small portion of the land is left and four ‘Greedy’ corporations are battling to the death to take control of what does remain. With every battle yet more of the planet is going to be destroyed; the outlook is certainly bleak to say the least. With no compromise in the offing, will any of the Greed Corp’s actually survive long enough before the whole planet is destroyed? So as one of the four factions at a time (Freemen, Empire, Pirates, or Cartel) you must enter this raging battle and defeat your foes until the land is all yours.

That’s the idea but so what’s so different about Greed Corp that makes it unique? Well to start with each round will only last between 10 and 20 minutes; something that quite puts me off with strategy games is when you are forced to play for an entire day or more (Yes I do mean you Empire Total War). Greed Corp condenses everything neatly into this small arcade package yet is just as rewarding as those longer games.

So how does an RTS actually become a compressed experience? Firstly every turn is just one minute long so you’ll need to be quick yet concise with you battle plan. You cannot spend hours planning that offensive attack; in fact spending little more than 20 seconds on just one aspect of your move could see you running out of time to cover all your bases (as it were). Ok so you only get a minute to move but that doesn’t make the game fast paced on its own, Greed Corp’s main mechanic is the limited lifespan of the land you’re on. As soon as you start mining the land for much needed materials; the ground starts to disappear from underneath your feet. Because the planet is so unstable, every time one of your harvester digs into the ground one layer of the crust disappears until it’s all gone.