Recommend me a trading/business/sim game?

fadingathedges

Mostly looking for PC or maybe DS... would listen to PS3/2 if you have something amazing in mind.


This is what I have and what I think of them to give some idea:

Patrician4 is okay but it's really repetitive and the satisfaction wanes.
Freelancer-esque games feel too much like the trade aspect was tacked on rather than being the main focus/income.
The Guild II:Pirates of the European Seas is near perfect in what it does well, a little wonky on some things, but just plain too reliable to crash and corrupt your save to be playable.
Recettear had some great shop aspects but the dungeons got tiresome for me.
Chocolatier (on Steam) is fun for a bit, but too casual.
Tropico is fun but off target.

I'm considering a Harvest Moon - I have the PSN one and it scratched a similar itch.


Can anyone suss out what I'm looking for and point me in the right direction?

Thanks in advance PA

Fiatil

Hmmm, well you've shot down a lot of good ones but there should still be hope. I've heard mixed things about Patrician 4, 3 is really awesome though. If you're into Harvest Moon, Back to Nature on PS1 is still a solid choice. The only ones I would really say are upgrades on that are Magical Melody for GCN, Animal Parade for Wii, and the new 3DS version. Something a little bit outside of the box would be X3. It's a space sim but it leans really heavily on the "being able to build an awesome capitalist space empire" aspects of the game. If you can get past the learning curve it's one of the best business/trade sims because you get to use all of your money on big ass space lasers and missiles.

Rami

How about something like Transport/Railroad Tycoon/Locomotion?

mere_immortal

The X games are hideously complicated but have trading and economies.

fadingathedges

I have Back to Nature on my PS3. Is Grand Bazaar or any of the Rune Factory an improvement? I want to run a shop for my corn and milks!

eobet

Grand Bazaar is a great game (as most Harvest Moon titles are), but I would not recommend it as a trading or business game, as you can't set your prices, you can't see the demand and there really isn't any dynamic competition.

I don't know of any modern game which meets requirements either, but let me give you two off target recommendations: Pharaoh and Settlers 2 (though the last one is really a traffic management sim if you take a step back and look at it).

Otherwise... I don't know... there was something called... Monopoly Tycoon? A very weird real-time version of Monopoly... of sorts... anyone remember it?

Zenitram

Eve Online has a totally player-run economy, complete with manufacturing, trading, scams, etc. And internet dickwads running the show.

Klyka

Port Royale?
I know that 2 is really good, not sure about 3!

Drake

Cities in Motion has a lot of business sim in its design as well as being a nifty civil transportation engineering game. You can manage every aspect of your transport empire, from employee pay, ticket prices, advertising campaigns, bank loans and more. The better you manage the business side the happier your employees are. This makes it easier to engineer efficient transport systems which makes citizens happy.

I like making people happy.

bamjo

Port Royale is basically Patrician in the caribbean. The Patrician games didn't really grab me either, but I loved those same mechanics set among 18th century pirates. I got a lot of mileage out of Port Royale 3. Also if you have a smartphone, any of the Kairosoft games are great. (Game dev story is the most popular).

Since you mentioned the Guild, you might like the Anno series. The one just prior to anno 2070 (1604 or something) would be my recommendation. It should be fairly cheap these days.

Another I just thought of is that Omerta game that's coming out later this month. It's an organised crime business sim by the people who did Tropico 3 and 4.

Axen

Well, might I suggest Capitalism 2 from Gog.com. It is a bit older, but if you do not mind then I'd say it is a great business sim game.

I could also suggest X3: Terran Conflict (you can get it on Steam). Which at first glance may seem more of a space combat type of thing, but I assure you the trader/business manager side of things is where the real fun is. Setting up a complex inter-stellar trading empire has never been so rewarding as it is in X3. Though, admittedly, the game is fairly complex and will probably take awhile to get used to. Plus there are a plethora of mods to make everything all the more awesome (in fact some mods take things a step further and allow the player to set up their own Space Empire).