From Zero to Hero: Cityman 12+

Super unplayable

To start off, the game idea is a freakin banger. Such a good idea and concept it’s crazy how it’s not a bigger game, right? Wrong. As you play your expenses for a car, house, clothes ect. Becomes higher than your actual income with the job you have, then you need to pay more money per month by upgrading your car and housing to get a job that still under cuts your expenses ALOT. So essentially, you just need to either pay your OWN money, or get very lucky in the casino or stock market. The game is a pay to win game after a certain point. If the developers weren’t so money hungry, this could be makin a lot more money than they get off a couple of suckers who wanted to win. I played a solid 5 times and I couldn’t get past age 29. EVERY SINGLE TIME. Honestly if you want to know what I’m saying, get the game, try it, because it’s fun a first. But you’ll realize how it is close to impossible to progress in the game after a certain point. Funny thing is I said to myself I wouldn’t stop until I was the president. But that’s pretty much impossible. Big middle fingers to the greedy ah developers. Smh.

Developer Response ,

Hey there, thanks for your review! Some of the points you mentioned are valid, but the game is supposed to be hard (just like real life), so that player's skill and careful planning could make the difference. The ads and in-app purchases are not necessary to win if you learn how to manage risks and income!

Starts out good, becomes unplayable. Giant scam.

I very rarely write reviews for games, but this game is an exception. It starts off pretty good and you are able to advance your career pretty quickly; and then you notice that not only are you earning less then you are spending BUT you actually HAVE TO PAY EVEN MORE to advance your career which- news flash still puts you in a deficit. Don’t be fooled by the other scam which is actually spending your money. Unless you’re prepared to spend over $60, spending money just bides you time, it dosent give you enough to actually make it until the end. What’s most disappointing about this game though is that it actually can be good, if the developers weren’t so hungry for money. I see the developers saying it takes strategy but I consider myself pretty good with these types of games, so like I said before, unless your prepared to spend over $60 on the game IT IS IMPOSSIBLE without incredible luck at the casino or waiting years (real life) to accumulate the money. To the developers: this can be a great game and people would pay for things if they thought it was worth it; you just can’t make it impossible for the people that won’t pay and it’s incredibly frustrating that people have been complaining about this forever and you don't do anything. Anyone able to complete this without spending money or waiting for ages is smarter then Einstein.

Developer Response ,

Hello! Paying helps, but it's more of a difficulty lowering option for the players that need it. What you truly need to win is, really, the right strategy. For starters, we recommend always having a side job as that income can make a LOT of difference (note that the money are given to you by the end of a job, so if you're deep in red and are close to a bankrupcy, a 2 months job with slightly less pay will be better than a 6 months job with slightly more), using the jobs that pay more than you spend to accumulate wealth (not for too long though, or you'll be fighting an uphill battle against the old age), and learning how to play stock market in order to create a financial safety cushion (unlike the completely random casino, it's based on a combination of randomness and real life stock market graphs, meaning you can master it and use it as your third job)! So no, it doesn't take an Einstein to complete the game without smending money, it just takes utilizing the tools available to the player to make the best micro- and macro-decisions towards your goal. Best wishes, the devs.

Good game. Stock market is the key

Basically if you don't figure out the stock market and how to profit off it well, you cannot play this game without spending real money. Even if you do I doubt you can get away with spending zero real money. But you can for reasonably cheap if you get it down. Recommend a throw-away play through or 3 to figure out how to work the stock market. One thing I haven’t figured out and is very frustrating, the market will randomly close my position at times even when im in the green for a total loss of the whole investment. I’ve had it go the other way where I get automatically closed out and its for a profit as well but much more frequently its for a total loss. Secondly when you have not much miney left and your trying to recover with good trades the constant “your out of money” pop ups make it impossible to make good trades when it really matters. Probably by design. But it’s slightly infuriating when you had a good trade that would have taken you out of the whole but the 3 pop ups make you unable to close your position and you loose everything. This is basically stock market simulator with some other cool stuff too.