Mar 7, 2011
Have you ever wanted to make your own video game? Well, without a lot of programming knowledge that’s probably not going to happen. With the help of Game Dev Story, you can still soak up some of the video game development process in a fun way. This game development sim challenges players with the task of choosing where to spend their money while developing their studio’s games. If you run out of money, your studio goes out of business, and the game ends. If you can keep your studio afloat for 20 years, you’ll win the game.
The actual gameplay consists of making a series of decisions. You choose who to hire, and whether to use your in house talent or outsource talent for various tasks. You also choose what genre your game will be. For example, you can make a fantasy action RPG, or a war themed shooter. Picking the right combination of theme, and genre will lead to a more successful game. Once the game is in development, you can use various items to boost your game’s various stats in order to build a better product.
You also have to pick and choose which consoles to develop for. Some consoles have higher install bases than others, 
making them worth the license fee. Once you’ve made all the decisions for game development, and the game is done, you can choose to either wait for all the bugs to be fixed, or release the game sooner with a few bugs still present.
Game Dev Story goes beyond game development, and touches on marketing and advertising. You can set up a booth at the yearly video game conference, and choose different advertising methods. This game touches on just about every aspect of developing a game in a fun and interesting way.
The only real complaint that can be levied against this game is that once you find a formula that works, gameplay can become very repetitive. I suppose that could be viewed as commentary on the stagnation of mainstream gaming, but for the purposes of this review, it’s really just a sign of a formulaic gameplay mechanic.
Despite repetitive gameplay, Game Dev Story will eat up a lot of your free time. There are enough different things to do, and enough different types of game to produce to keep you occupied for hours on end. As an added bonus, there are a lot of “in” jokes buried in this game that anyone who’s ever had any ties to the gaming industry will love. If you’re a fan of sim games, you can’t go wrong with Game Dev Story.
