Rescue Team: Evil Genius

Review

Jack Ross is a genius inventor, but at this year’s Annual Conference of Inventors, the board has decided to cut the funding of his latest project. “My latest invention will save the world,” he proclaimed as he was escorted out of the conference. Soon after, nature seemed to have declared war against us. Earthquakes, tornados, floods, fire and other disasters struck, one after the next. This can’t be right, and it needs to be investigated! The best agent and his colleagues are on the job in Rescue Team: Evil Genius!

Rescue Team: Evil Genius is a casual indie game developed by Platinum Games and published by Alawar Premium on the 12^th of September 2019 on the Steam platform.

The game consists of 50 levels and an additional bonus of 20 levels when you finish the game the main story.

At the start of each level, you’ll be given a small description of what is going on as part of the story. In the top right corner, you’ll have tasks to complete as fast as you can in order to finish the stage and earn yourself three golden stars. There are four tasks to complete per level, with some variation between each one.  You might need to restore a communication tower, rescue animals and residents, put out fires, repair airports or train stations and something else entirely.

The countdown will start as soon as you order one of your workers to do something. They will be located in a big blue tent somewhere within the stage. You’ll usually start with 3 to 4 workers at your disposal, but you could end up with up to 7 seven in some levels. You see, some workers might also need to be rescued before joining the team, as an obstacle might be between them and your tent (headquarters) and as soon you clear the obstruction (trees, rocks, holes etc.) they will join your team. However, each time you give an order to one of your workers or vehicle operators (helicopter and boat) it will cost you a certain number of resources. It might be 30 foods and 30 planks to clear a hole on the road, for example, and if you use a helicopter or boat, you’ll need to have enough oil. Depending on the map, you may have hamburgers, planks, money, barrels of oil and bones on the side of roads to pick up and add to your resources, as long as you clear any of the obstacles between the objects and your workers. You’ll also have construction sites where you can build a hamburger joint, sawmill, gas station, apartment, kennel or pet store, but it will also cost you a certain quantity of wood to construct. You’ll see buildings to repair, such as hospitals, police stations and fire stations. If the level includes arresting marauders, you must restore the police station, for example. On some occasions, as soon as you repair the station a police officer will instantly be there, but in other circumstances you might need to clear obstacles from the road that links the station with the officer to be able to use him. It’s the same for the fire stations and hospitals. You can purchase important and unique items at the department store, but before you can buy any of items, it will need to be repaired.

There are strange machines to de-activate as well, and you will need the help of the agent Aidan Clarke in this instance. You can’t miss him; he is always hiding under a blue cover. What a hero (lol)!  In any case, you’ll have to get to him, take the cover off, and yes, it will cost you resources and you’ll have to clear the paths between his hiding spot and the machines.

Blueprints will also be laid out on the side of the road and can be picked up to boost a few things for a while. It might be to increase the production of planks, foods, money and even make your workers run as fast as Speedy Gonzales -  Arriba… Arriba - which is always good!

Try to complete a level before the time limit reaches the golden stars. That way, you’ll receive 3 stars, and you’ll be able to purchase all 12 upgrades quicker.

If you are like me and own a few (or all) games in this series, you’ll definitely like this one!

The graphics are nice, and the soundtrack suits the game perfectly. This version does have in-game achievements, but no Steam achievements or trading cards.