14 DAY TRIAL // The Political Machine is one of the elements of the American electoral cycle and this year’s installment of the turn-based political strategy from Stardock is equal parts educations and fun, a bite-sized game experience that can be played over and over to discover how a particular candidate could end up President of the United States.
Of course, the core gameplay concepts are much simplified when compared to real life and might hurt the sensibilities of those who know a little bit about politics or about elections, but the interplay between the various mechanics is superb and can lead to very interesting tactical decisions.
One of the biggest changes is the ability to create a custom candidate that can embrace almost any position and can have a number of attributes, from impressive charisma to limited intelligence, that make the general election either a cakewalk or an almost insurmountable challenge.
The only major failing is that I cannot choose a party other than the Democrats or the Republicans when creating a custom candidate (I would have loved to run on the Green ticket).
The Political Machine 2012 means creating campaign headquarters, giving speeches, hiring consultants and seeking endorsements while trying to get access to more money than your opponent and making good use of the various media opportunities.
The game also has a solid understanding of the social and political structure of the US and the various hot-button issues that a candidate needs to touch upon in order to win the Presidency.
The Political Machine 2012 offers impressive replay value because of the custom candidate mechanics and because it allows gamers to randomize elements of the game and create an entire new United States of America in order to create a more tactical game with more unknowns.
Worth a full Softpedia review? Yes.