14 DAY TRIAL // We’re two days away from printing and we don’t yet have our main story. This is a problem considering our fledgling news organization is trying to put out a story with a specific featured topic to satisfy a Mafia request. So, I skip a few investigative possibilities about sports and culture and keep a reporter ready to go.
That crucial piece of news is found and then processed in the nick of time, and we go to press on Sunday with it on the front page. We sell more than 10,000 copies and we get an outpost in another neighborhood, even though some of our stories aren’t entirely timely and at least one of them is badly written.
I want to invest some of the money we made into creating a better office environment, which should boost the quality of our articles. And this week we’re not printing any special interest stories and the editors will focus on putting out the best newspaper possible.
News Tower is developed by Sparrow Night and published by Twin Sails Interactive. The game is in Early Access on Steam on the PC. It’s set firmly in the management genre, with a focus on creating a best-selling newspaper.
The action takes place in New York at the start of the 1930s when newspaper publishing was big business and there was no social media to kill off print. The game quickly runs players through a tutorial and then gives them free rein. News Tower captures the feel of the era, with plenty of news stories based directly on real-world events.
The paper gets printed every Sunday. Until then players get notifications about incoming stories and need to assign their reporters and editors. Stories take time to report and then be prepped. Staff do level up over time, but they also do their jobs faster if they have access to food and they work in decent offices.
Doing all that requires money, which is why I quickly went into debt during the first few weeks of playing News Tower. At first, I wanted to run a principled operation with a focus on important news. Soon, I was running whatever the public wanted to sell as many copies as possible. The game uses a clever story-matching mini-game to challenge players to create the best possible layout, which I looked forward to every Sunday.
News Tower also has a strategic map. Here players will satisfy specific criteria to expand their newspaper’s influence to new areas while also handling requests from the Mafia and other special interests. Some landmarks also act as stores, where favors get turned into new items that can boost productivity.
Creating rooms, placing items, and ordering food are pretty classic ideas for a management title. I hope that in Early Access, developers will focus on adding more choices to the news reporting system itself while enhancing the layout in-game.
News Tower doesn’t aim for realism. Its presentation stylizes how modern audiences think of 1930 New York and is focused on giving players information. Icons and labels show areas that can be improved and it’s easy to always check on the status of a new story. The sound effects are suitably old-timey, and the soundtrack is decent.
Conclusion
I would like for the full experience to give players more choices to shape the news and influence the public. News Tower doesn’t revolutionize the management genre, but it delivers on its theme and has plenty of space to develop its gameplay.
Preview key provided by the publisher.
