A little over a year ago, I wrote a review of one of my favorite and most anticipated games, Virtual City.  If you are not familiar with the game, I’d suggest reading that review before coming back here for this one.  I can’t tell you how much I enjoy Virtual City.  I’ve played it on the iPhone, the iPad, the PC, and now my Android.  And I was very disappointed when the Virtual City Playground was released on the iPad and I didn’t have any way of playing it.  But then G5 made my day.  They came out with Virtual City 2: Paradise Resort on the PC.  I normally don’t review PC based apps and games, but since this is related to a mobile one, and HOPEFULLY headed to the mobile platforms itself, I jumped on the opportunity to take it for a test drive. If you want to see a bit before or during the download, check out the YouTube preview.

Virtual City 2 isn’t a disappointment.  While the original had 50 types of buildings and 50 levels with 7 “production chains” to master, the sequel expands on that in every way.  There are 73 building types, 42 different goods making up 12 production chains, and 29 missions across 52 levels to master.  And while there doesn’t appear to be a true free-form “sandbox” mode as was in the original, the missions themselves take about 20 minutes a piece to work though, which gives you 15-18 hours of game play for just the included missions.  And, since every mission has the ability to continue playing, the game-play is essentially endless.

Now before I get into the game dynamics any more, let me discuss cost.  The PC version of this game is $9.99.  But, if you purchase the original Virtual City (also $9.99), you can get the sequel for 50% off.  If you don’t HAVE both, I’d highly recommend getting both.  You can’t get a movie ticket, popcorn, and coke for that price, and this is sure to entertain you a LOT longer than a 90-minute movie would.  The sequel is more of an upgrade to the original than a whole new experience, but by getting both, you have access to the sand-box modes in the original.  Besides that, the differences between the maps/locations make it a different experience to play with the same or similar goals in different towns.

The download itself is about 70 MB, and is free to play for the first 30 minutes.  While the 30 minute limitation is great for learning the basics of the original game, you don’t really get into the expanded things in this sequel title as the demo times out fairly early in the tutorial.  You get a good basis of how the game is played, but are not really exposed to the full depth of the sequel in just that first 30 minutes.  I wish that, as a sequel, there would be a way to jump right to a tutorial of one of the missions with the expanded content.  If all you see before the demo times out is just what you had seen in the original, then you may wonder what the big deal is about.  Short of that, if you could fully explore the production chains in such in the built-in help prior to actually achieving the ability to add these things, it might give a better feel of what the game is capable of.  I’d rather it let me explore these new production chains in the help and just tell me they are locked until a certain level than to lock me out of the help on them as well.

Virtual City 2: Paradise Resort is, as the name suggests, oriented around resort or vacation destinations.  While the original focused on typical city industry, this adds to that with the kinds of goods and transportation that a resort or vacation destination requires.  You will be working on everything from casinos to ski resorts to ice hotels from the beaches of Florida and the deserts of Nevada to the slopes of Utah and the snowy tundra of Alaska.  Every location has different goals and different challenges.  The production chains required for the different buildings differ.  Some might just need trash pickup, and that is all.  Others require both multiple deliveries and multiple pickups.  And each production chain requires multiple buildings.  So the relationships become critical and getting your different production chains up and running become the fun challenge to the game.  By the time you add in the requirements of public safety, maintenance on your vehicles, environmental health, and personal/town happiness, I can guarantee you that you won’t get bored with this title.

As great as this game is, there are some things I wish it would incorporate in an update or future sequel.  First, I would love to be able to sync my progress on the Virtual City games across the multiple platforms that they are available on.  Multi-player mode where you could trade with a friend’s town and trade raw materials as well as finished goods would be very cool as well.  I’d also love to see some “micro-game” kind of incorporation where you can “zoom in” to the hotel or restaurant or store and it either launch a mini-version of one of G5′s time management games, or (if you have it), a full blown version of Supermarket Mania or Stand O’ Food.  Finally, adding some aspects of the real-time strategy games would add a whole new level to games like this.  You wouldn’t want building to burn while you were asleep, but if you could “zoom in” to your farms, for example, and actually incorporate harvesting activities and seasons for crops and such, or even incorporate some traffic management options, it would be really cool.  The free Virtual City Playground for the iPad starts down this “live” path with earning credits and energy while the game is closed, but I would love to see this idea expanded in scope and incorporated into their other games and platforms.  And, while you can always pause the game by pulling up the menu, I’d really love to see some pause/play/fast forward options in the game.

All in all, this game is a bargain for the price, especially if you can get it at the 50% discount.