Review: Moviehouse
The 1980’s, movies and video games: 3 of my passions for many years now, so when we were offered a video game for review that begins in the 80’s where you assume the role of the head of your own movie studio, I was of course immediately intrigued.
The premise of it all is a simple one; you begin in the 1980’s with a small movie studio (which you can name…say hello to 60MW Movies) and an even smaller crew, with the first task being to hire a scriptwriter.
You guide the scriptwriter by giving them the title of the movie you want written and the genre, of which more genres are unlocked as you progress through the timeline. You can also select how fast you want the finished script available by, with a shorter time leading to cheaper costs and a shakier script, with the opposite being true if you allow them to take more time with it.
Other options given to you are the locations (more of which can be unlocked by sending some of your crew location scouting) and the actors involved, of which once again the choices are limited to begin but open up more as the timeline passes by, allowing you to build even more props and sets…if your budget can handle it of course.
Once the script is finished you can then produce it, but seeing as you are a small company to begin it’ll have to be made as an indie film and hit the film festivals. So then a director needs to be hired and more choices are given to you.
When your movie hits the open market it is ranked and you start to accumulate fans of your studio, all helping to make you more popular and eventually expand.
You can rest your staff by sending them on vacation (essential to do as their energy depletes, but they are then unavailable to you), as well as sending them off for training or managing them to focus on specific categories all aligned with their particular role in the movie industry.
Eventually you will have outgrown your humble beginnings and start to expand more, being given more options, more studio space and moving through the decades. More options open up throughout, but essentially the gameplay loop is the same.
Despite the set of options given to you to begin, Moviehouse boils down to a casual experience where your options are limited (though expand as your studio gets bigger and the movies more popular) and repetition can become a problem in the early game, and never really leaving throughout the entire game.
Some of the options are not clearly explained and you’re left guessing what to do, while the ones that are explained often don’t appear to have any logic behind them.
I’ve had fun with my time so far with Moviehouse, but feel as though it needs more work doing to it to make it the game I really hoped it would be. Thankfully indie developer Odyssey Studios have already released 2 patches for it since its release on April 5th, so that bodes well for support and development going forwards.
If you’re a cinephile then this scratches the itch that “The Movies” from Lionhead Studios used to do many years ago, and hopefully continued development on it will keep it scratching for many more years to come.
Moviehouse is now available for PC/Mac on Steam and GOG.
Review by Dave from a Steam Code.
