KN Tower - Build your skyscraper empire

I played it for 14 minutes and did not feel the need to spend another moment. It's incredible how Yoot Tower from 1998 seemed far richer in its features with a lot more information available to the player. Visually, it's barely better than its predecessors. You start the game with a lobby, office, condo, and snack bar. Oh, and stairs. That's it. Couldn't even access escalators and elevators. No hints or tutorial messages. You lose money and there's absolutely no indication of what you're doing wrong. Your restaurant floor is a ghost town, and you have no idea why. There's barely any useful info when you click on individual building units. The nail in the coffin for my ADHD brain was the pacing. It's extremely slow and the clock only has x1 and x2 settings. It's not so much a "second screen compliant" game that you keep running in the background while revenue trickles in, as much as a plant you water every other day.

If you've played SimTower, you can play this game, the goal is the same, achieve 5 Stars, put the Chapel at the top. I don't know if you have to hold a wedding, but that's the stated goals in the new tutorial. This game loads quickly and runs smoothly. Love the game, it's like playing an updated version of SimTower. Definitely recommend. No complaints from me since the tutorial was added recently and covers the keymapping for the controls in the game.

Love it! So far it´s like the old SimTower, which was my favourit. The developer said, only for so far. updates will bring a lot of new punch. I´m looking forward to it :)

For those old enough to remember Sim Tower, this will feel very familiar. Cynically one might say it trades on Millennial nostalgia, to which I say: shut up and take my money. I personally feel this is a faithful homage to it's spiritual ancestor. Improved in ways that make decisions about balance matter, budgetary choices, placement; there is a deeper game for those who look. For more casual play, it's pacing is a joyful comfort, though I can certainly understand wanting a 3x speed option for those would would prefer it faster (not I). The addition of the Tutorial, promptly on it's universal request on launch, is an absolute must read to understand the progression. I got a little elevator happy on my first tower attempt and failed to place the garbage collector. RTFM folks, don't be like me or you'll struggle for twice as long as necessary. The English is a little interesting - understandable but not distracting or bad, just entertaining. Some improvement to the colloquial reading in the future might be advisable. There is a good game here, with the potential to be great with some more refinement. And given that the dev has been very active in responding to reviews and feedback since launch, for that alone they are deserving of the small financial reward that this game asks for in it's price. It's a lightweight game, Megabytes in size, it's not meant to be the most complex or intricate game in the world, but it satisfies that niche that it finds itself in. Keep up the good work.

When I stumbled upon this game I was excited because I LOVED playing Sim Tower as a kid in the 1990s. I have tried other building simulation games since but they never seemed to scratch the itch. This one was intriguing to me because the visuals and functionality looked like a pretty direct throwback to Sim Tower and as someone who adored the original, who doesn't love a little bit of nostalgia. Already I've logged a few hours playing the game. It definitely scratches the nostalgia itch and has a lot of potential, but at the moment it plays more like a Beta than a ready to be released game. On the plus side I have noticed the developer does seem to be responsive to reviews and have already made a few updates since I first downloaded the game so that is a good sign. However, right now some things that seem to be glitches and other things that seem like design choices are hampering the fun of the game. There are a few things about the design of the game I don't love: *In the original Sim Tower I'm pretty sure you could overlap elevators with tenant properties, in this version you cannot. It means you have to plan ahead for where elevators will go and also makes it harder to adjust their placement as the game goes on to optimize tenant happiness. *If you delete something you don't recoop any of the costs of placing it. This surprised me as it is very common in all the building simulation games I play to recoop all or most of your $ if you delete something immediately after placing it as well as to recoop an amount of money that allows for depreciation if you delete later. Given how easy it is to accidentally place something and the fact that between milestones there is some enjoyment that can come from optimization, this makes the game more frustrating to me and less fun. *There is very little personalization and little variety among the type of properties that are placed (i.e. in the beginning there is one base condo size, but having studios, 1 bed, 2 bed, etc would be more realistic and provide more choices about efficiency earning money vs. working with how much funds one might have at a given time). This was a part of the original Sim Tower, but I have noticed there seems to be even less variety than in that game. I think the developer will have to figure out the balance between trying to evoke the original and acknowledging that game play has gotten more personalized and sophisticated since the original was released. I have no doubt that if I went back and played the original it would feel a bit boring now compared to how it did then. I think more personalization and variety is needed because at points in game play I find myself feeling a bit bored before the next milestone kicks in and unlocks more functionality. While sometimes a game with simpler functionality can be nice to relax with, this feels too simple. I am usually the kind of person who can get a bit addicted to simulation games, but right now it doesn't feel like there is enough to the game play to keep me hooked. *The colors of the individual sims seem kind of random. In the original they were a way to understand the satisfaction or dissatisfaction of your tenants in real time, particularly as it related to elevator speed. I wish the developer would emulate this aspect of the original and find other ways of telegraphing elements of building health without having to go to all the sidebars. *Game speed could use more options. Right now 2x still feels quite slow, especially if you're in a period of the game where you're low on funds and just need your money to click back up. I'd love a 4x option as well as a pause for when I'm adjusting my stairs and things but don't want satisfaction to tank in the meantime. Now the glitches on mac... *When you click on individual tenants the hearts appear solid black (vs. my husband's version where they seem to be populated based on tenant satisfaction) and thus don't give any information. *Elevator functionality seems wonky. Mine don't seem to go up and down in predictable paths, letting people off and on. It seems like some sims ride around for awhile before they get off, clogging up the elevator and ruining the perceptions of realism. It doesn't seem to follow a predictable flow of who it picks up and when which leads me to believe it is probably dragging down my satisfaction. *I don't know what's going on with the hotel housekeeping. Even though I have two separate facilities for laundry one of my housekeepers only seems to show up every other day. And even when they are both there they seem to clean (or not clean) rooms in the most chaotic way, i.e. passing by rooms without cleaning them, waiting to take the elevator to another floor even though there are dirty rooms on their floor, two housekeepers walking side by side so they are inefficient doing their work, insisting on waiting for the elevator even though there are many convenient staircases that are faster, etc. Truly this is the most frustrating part of game play for me right now because I can do everything right to maximize my hotel efficiency and then it is a total gamble whether any of my rooms are ready for guests. Seeing how badly this works also raises questions for me about how logical the underlying patterns are that control the NPCs and make me question how much control I really have over how my building does. It's also an area where the more archaic nature of the original Sims Tower shows since modern simulation games allow much more user control over how employees behave, allowing for a more sophisticated sense of managing a building. *Tenant and employee sims often seem to not want to use escalators or stairs even when it would make more sense (i.e. just going a couple of floors). Sometimes they do, sometimes they don't, but it is very frustrating to watch a sim wait for an elevator (especially on higher floors) when there is an escalator or staircase RIGHT NEXT TO THE ELEVATOR. Again it eats into the feeling one has control over managing a building because even if you try to make optimizations to make your tenants happier it seems hit or miss if it actually takes. *What is going on with the leaderboard? I cannot tell if it is real or a placeholder but it's frustrating when my score is supposedly higher than the people on the leaderboard yet I'm not there. Overall I think this game has a lot of potential. I like the ways in which it harkens back to Sim Tower and the nostalgic feel. However right now it has some glitches that make game play frustrating and it also seems like it needs to update the game play to reflect the fact that simulation games have come a long way since the original is made. That doesn't mean the game has to become incredibly complex, but it does need to have more variety, surprises along the way, and some ability to add one's personal touch.

Mein erster Eindruck: Nicht nur das Gameplay ist sehr nah am Original "SimTower". Der Sound erinnert an alte Zeiten - Sogar die Eule heult nachts. :-) Die Grafik wurde etwas verbessert, erinnert aber ebenfalls stark an das Original. Allerdings gibt es noch ein paar kleinere Unschönheiten. So müssen zB Aufzüge ZWISCHEN zwei Rezeptionen platziert werden, anstatt DAVOR. Das führt zu aufwendigem Umbau nach Erreichen des ersten Sterns und der Freischaltung des Aufzugs. Und wenn man in einem Schacht zwei Aufzüge betreibt, dann wird einer ausgeblendet, wenn diese sich kreuzen. Aber insgesamt macht es ähnlich viel Spaß, wie das Original. Bin gespannt was da noch kommt...

So I played a good bit yesterday and have some thoughts. First off, it would be nice to have access to the guide, as it were, from the pause menu and not have to go back to the main menu. That helped me understand wtf was going on a lot better. Basically, you build a lobby. Then you can choose to build offices, condos, or snack bars, and you connect them with stairs. That's it for the first 100 population (office workers or condo residents). Once you get to 100, you get elevators and waste management, which adds some complexity. And then you need to get to 300 residents, then 1,000 for the next level up. That's as far as I have gotten. When you build offices, those pay rent. When you have enough office workers, they will go and spend money at the snack bar. Condos are one-time payments that add 4 residents instead of 2 workers for a small office. Eventually, you can make money off residents by adding a cinema, restaurant, etc, but that's not for a while. The snack bar makes good money if office workers can get to it. You have to balance getting people to their higher floors with elevators as well. You also get to add hotel rooms that require hotel laundry at 2 stars. This all makes some sense if you look at the manual that's on the main menu. That tells you what buildings there are, how much they cost, what their expenses are, and the rent you can expect. Once you get into the flow of the game, it actually has a nice rhythm. I do wish time could move a bit faster (maybe add a 4x option), but in all the bones here are pretty good. I would definitely be disappointed in the dev did not continue to support this game, but assuming that's the case then I think this is pretty fun and good.

No fun at all. No tutorial, no story, it just makes an obnoxious sound every time you try to figure things out. I've had more fun at the dentist.