One word: INCREDIBLE. Not perfect, but what game is? But The Guild 2 is one amazing and fun game.

User Rating: 9.5 | The Guild 2: Pirates Of The European Seas PC
With all of the blood and guts, runnin' and insane gunnin' shootem'ups glutting the game market these days, The Guild2 stands alone in it's own genre. A RTS/RPG on both land and sea - LIFE SIMULATOR!

The 3D graphics are drop dead gorgeous, of the same caliber as Oblivion and Witcher. Gameplay is like a cross between Patrician III, The Sims 2 and 1701AD. It could best be described as a 3D version of Patrician III with much more depth and character development.

The over-micromanaging complaint makes absolutely no sense to me, because you can put any business in AI management mode and simply let it do its thing; sending carts to market to buy raw materials; sell goods; upgrade your business all automatically! You can even hire a housekeeper that will do the same for your house(s) - so the micromanagement complaint has got to come from a reviewer that is not as familiar with the game as they should have been before writing the review, but it's a typical Gamespot Bearing False-Witness Review that I, as well as many of you, have grown accustomed to (I look at player reviews only now. They are much more reliable).

As a former game review TV producer, When you review as many games as Gamespot you become naturally jaded and desensitized by the sheer number of games that need to be reviewed, so intelligently written player reviews are always much more reliable.

As I played this game I was deeply impressed by the amount of sheer depth of the ambiance of medieval times, as well as the intriguing diplomatic, political and criminal systems. The towns have fully functioning governments with town meetings that go on with or without your participation that changes the entire political/economic and criminal systems dynamic.

While most gamers want to avoid having children when playing THE SIMS 2,, because they are a real pain to deal with, in THE GUILD 2, your goal is to continue your dynasty - so children are a necessary evil :-) (just kidding), but you must have an heir to your dynasty or the game will naturally come to an end when your character dies of old age (if he's lucky) if there is no one to pass on all of your knowledge, wisdom and business to (your dynasty would end - as well as the game). Yes, the characters actually get older and eventually will go home and lay down for the big-sleep and you'll mourn their passing (more so for the loss of all those experience points - you insensitive, heartless minions :-)

Your heir can be trained at an early age and actually have a better start on life than their parents by going to school, university and through being an apprentice in one of your businesses (or someone else's). So gaining experience gets easier and easier with each new generation. If you start by playing in DYNASTY MODE, the free style game, you also can gain experience on how better to play through each generation without starting over, as each generation is like starting a new game.

While not perfect, as I have never played a "perfect" game yet, they all have some quirks that remind you that it's a computer game, walking through furniture at times, pathing sometimes gets weird (I have never played a game with perfect pathing - have you? and I own literally thousands of games) the level of sophistication in all of these working systems in The Guild is amazing.

Sure Gamespot gives it a low rating, I expected them to before I even looked, because its not an adrenaline junky game, but one of tranquil, peaceful (mild violence) business management and life management. Gamespot really needs a strategy game reviewer BADLY for these type of games and not use the same guy that just reviewed DOOM, CRISIS and UNREAL TOURNAMENT to suddenly take an adrenaline hit to have to sit down and actually have to THINK QUIETLY for a change. You're guaranteed bad reviews.

Overall, I would recommend this title to anyone who likes The Sims 2, especially those who like 1701 AD and Patrician III. It is an awesome, deep and extremely entertaining adventure.