Go-Go Town: Early Access Preview
On the 18th of June 2024, Go-Go Town released into Early access on Steam becoming Prideful Sloth’s third game. The Queensland based developer paired up with Cult Games, a relatively new publisher located in London. So new, in fact, that it is only their second published game, don’t let this inexperience fool you, as Go-Go Town is a silly cartoon-style town-building Early Access game with loads of content and Steam deck compatibility.
The game opens with the player being dumped unceremoniously in the town, stuffed in a duffle bag. Some shady men in suits and a mysterious voice on the phone declare that you are now the new mayor of Go-Go Town and you decide what happens next. After a crash course on building shops and decorations and automation, the suspicious organisation (named Town Co.) disappears as quickly as it arrives. While players are supposed to be driven by the main goal of climbing the tourist town rankings, that’s not the be all and end all. There is an underpinning story that holds the whole experience together. After each milestone, one of Town Co’s drones with top-secret information will unceremoniously “land” somewhere in town, giving players insight into the workings of the organisation.
The core gameplay loop of Go-Go Town sees players trying to increase the town’s rankings by placing decorations and shops, maintaining the shops, resource gathering and unlocking the next level of upgrades for the town. This is a very generalised version of the core loop as players can be as involved or as uninvolved in the process as they like. The first unlocks are two shops, a few houses and a forestry and mining area, from here things expand and grow. Houses are needed for visitors to become Townies. Once a person is a Townie, they can run a shop. However, shops and houses don’t build themselves and that’s where the industrial areas come into play. The forestry area and the mining area are special locations where players can collect resources. Special equipment can be placed only in this area to allow the player, (later in the game this can be automated by Townies) to forage for larger amounts of wood and stone, as well as process it. With the right machinery, stone can be turned into brick and branches into wood planks. As the town progresses, the farming and fishing area, as well as more shops, houses and decorations unlock.
So how does the town progress? With each milestone, the Town Co. gives the player access to more recipes to unlock in their phone’s EGO app. Of course, they’re not just going to give them away, there’s no profit in that. Instead, players use a special currency generated by their tourists called EGO. This allows them to purchase new areas, shops and decorations, with a set limit per milestone. For example, tier one gives access to the mining and forestry zone. Tier two allows players to buy access to the farming and fishing zones as well as tools to use them. As the Town reaches the next rank, players will be given a challenge by Town Co. At first, the challenges are simply about earning enough money, but later, they require certain buildings or decorations to be built within the town.
As the town increases in size, there will be a lot going on with two industry zones, two produce zones, rubbish disposal and shops to man, it’ll become impossible for the player to do alone. Townies can be hired to take care of the shops, zones and rubbish so that the player doesn’t have to. Alternatively, players can invite their friends to four-player couch co-op if they want help. The nice thing about Go-Go Town is that different people will enjoy different aspects of it. I personally enjoy designing my town and trying to fit it all in the space in a way that makes sense and looks aesthetically pleasing but there’s plenty to do. I adore the art style of the game as well as its silly sense of humour. All this is backed up by an amazing soundtrack where artists have given Prideful Sloth permission to use their songs in the game. They also have a streamer mode where songs that may get flagged will be removed which is a nice addition.
Now I’m done singing its praises, what are the downsides to Go-Go Town? There are a few and it is subject to change due to it being an early-access game, but the main complaint I have is that the Townies are complete morons. I had a storage crate full of honeycomb and the dumb dumbs kept harvesting honey. Seriously guys, I don’t need that much! They also seem to forget the machinery to manufacture additional building materials exists unless the town requires a specific item. This is something that doesn’t have an easy fix as the developer team will need to keep tweaking the AI as more changes occur in game. It’s annoying, but not game-breaking. Another thing that irritates me is that it’s very easy to miss the set recipe function on the machines that manufacture goods and building materials. Often each machine will have at least two recipes that it can swap between. As the town is upgraded, more recipes can unlock for existing machines. It’s hard to bring the player’s attention to this if they aren’t already aware. These are problems that the Prideful Sloth developers are aware of and actively working on. They are frequent and transparent with their updates as well, taking on player feedback as they go.
With the prospect of future updates improving what is already a solid game, Go-Go Town is looking to grow into bigger and better things. Despite its few issues, it’s hard to believe that it’s an early access game as it really doesn’t lack content at all. It’s worth the $35 that they’re asking for on Steam for a solid experience that will only improve as time goes on. There is a real chance that Go-Go Town might even end up as one of the examples of Great Australian games rising to the top of its genre. Things are looking that good.
