14 DAY TRIAL // Positech Games, which is basically made up of Cliff Harris, the man who had the idea of the game and wrote all the codes, has released Kudos 2, the second game in its “turn based casual life sim” series. Artwork for Kudos 2 was made by Chris Hildenbrand and Jamie McKelvie while Jesse Hopkins wrote the music. The game is at the moment only available on the PC, although a Mac version is in the works, and you can get it from the developers’ website for just 19.95 dollars. It is DRM free and, following a discussion regarding the origins of piracy, a demo has also been made available by the developers, with extensive play time.
In the game, you get to control ten years of the life of your character, the ones from 20 to 30, and guide his life every way you see fit. It may sound a lot like The Sims, but with a smaller time frame, although the game is fundamentally different. On the one hand, this life sim is turn based, with just a few actions you can perform during a week. Your choices will be pretty hard at times, as you weigh if you need that extra education or want to go out with that co worker. Also, all the actions in the game directly affect the character and the way he approaches all subsequent actions and opportunities.
Comic artist Jamie McKelvie has created a very interesting game world, with a very personal and attractive style. All the characters are highly customizable so that you can make a virtual person that manages to convey your real image.
The game also supports modders, as most elements are controlled via text files and spreadsheets. Full details on modding are available on the developers’ website.