Cliffski is back with a sleek, sexy update to Positech's life sim game Kudos. For those of you who don't already own Kudos, it is a turn-based sim which, although beautifully illustrated, is basically text, unlike The Sims where your avatar moves around and interacts with objects and other players.
The basic premise is still the same — you start as a bouncy, enthusiastic 20 year old waiting tables in a cruddy restaurant for minimum wage and tips. You have four friends with varying characteristics, and the choice of one activity a day (two at weekends). You can try to get a promotion at the restaurant, study medicine, law, performing arts, or just beef up your meditation chops. You also need to maintain yourself — keep fit, bathe, go to the dentist and so on, all whilst maintaining your social life... which can get expensive.
The play screen allows you to select the way you get to work, and one activity to do in the evening. The activity buttons allow you to pick something to do — sign up for classes, look for work, socialise with friends or chill out on your own. You can shop for things that will 'enhance' your personality and skills — for instance, books on confidence boosting or a set of barbells for good health. You need to keep a close eye on how your activities are affecting your characteristics — for instance, if you apply for a job with low confidence, the employers will think you're not really up to it and reject the application.
This is quite a challenging game, and I'm not entirely sure if it's strictly "casual" given how long you'd have to play to get through the ten years of the character's life. Its replay value is immense — OK, you've "won" the game as a TV chef, now give it a go as a computer programmer with an interest in ballet. Although it is tempting to play the game as a clickfest, you will be rewarded for paying attention to the text. Firstly, keeping a close watch on friend's personalities and who they get along with will help you create successful events, which will increase your positive characteristics and make your character more popular. Secondly, it's funny — although Cliffski has mentioned that he's deliberately made the game more upbeat, the acerbic sense of humour still shines through.
Analysis: So... what's so special about Kudos 2 if you do already own Kudos? The most noticeable thing is the artwork, a clean, sharp comic style very different from the 3D style of Kudos and Kudos: Rock Legend. If you like it as much as I do, it's by a couple of artists named Chris Hildenbrand and Jamie McKelvie, whose work can be viewed on his blog. Mostly, Kudos 2 is — as Cliffski freely admits — an enhanced and more sophisticated version of Kudos, rather than a completely new game. The character AI is more sophisticated, and characters will drop hints about activities that should be taken in or avoided. There are also new mini-games and more depth to previous activities.
I have a few quibbles about the activities. I know the prices of things can't be realistic in an independent game like this, but, for instance, why does it cost $2 to take a bath? Even allowing for utility bills, it doesn't cost that much to sit in a tub of hot water! It also makes me somewhat upset that there are so few cheap or free activities — one is soccer in the park, another is to go jogging alone — even though in the real world people do low-cost stuff together all the time (let's hang out in the park and drink goon!). Then your friends get snarky and leave you because you can't spend all your time socialising! Similarly, "Go to church" to increase your honesty and relaxation levels didn't impress me much, being a godless heathen. However, the beauty of the Kudos series is how easy it is to mod, so if I want to switch church with a vigorous session of ashtanga yoga, I can just change a line of code.
Windows:
Download the demo
Get the full version
Mac OS X:
Not available.
Try Boot Camp or Parallels or CrossOver Games.
Kudos without the weird, stiff old 3D models? I'm curious! I'm not religious either, but I understand the "go to church" thing.
That whole sim problem with "everyone hates you because you're not socialising 24/7" is indeed frustrating.
Here's a question, and I couldn't find the answer anywhere:
If I purchase this game, do I get to register its use for multiple computers?
Typically, I've found, most games like these let you register them on three or so computers. I have a laptop and a desktop, and I would like to be able to play this on both of them without paying twice.
I just wanted to know before I bought this game. It's wonderful, but I don't want to spend $40.
There is absolutely no copy protection on Kudos 2. No registration, no DRM, no nothing.
Cliffski recently had an open conversation with the software pirate population, and he has concluded that copy protection does more harm than good. So in the spirit of trust and optimism, he has released Kudos 2 with no protection at all.
When you purchase the game, you get a link to download it, and then you can install it freely.
How do you play with your pet? I'm confused because the game keeps on telling me that my cat hates me and I don't know what to do.
@James: Just keep enough food in the house and spend some time at home. The relationship should improve with time (at least it did for me). I don't think you can play with your cat. Did you get an red pad that said that your cat destroyed your flat, when you got home? That tells you the cat is unhappy, which makes the relationship turn bad.
I have a question myself:
Is there an end to the game or can you just play your character forever? I remember that at the start it told me that it's going to be ten years, but they have passed long ago.
any cheats, or anything? Can you date? I was playing and got a guitar, hoping to become a fit rockstar. Then one day someone waltzed in and stole my guitar and all I have is my weights!! But it's still good
Yes, you can date. If one of your friends has a really high relationship with you, they will ask you if you want to date them. Having a boy/girlfriend can be nice, but it has drawbacks too.
Why does my ability to play guitar go down when I don't play it?
my computer is not opening up the game.
Any ideas?
[Edit: Check the minimum system requirements for the game. Does your computer meet them? -Jay]
I too am wondering if this game ever ends. It seems to be going forever. It's 2025 in the game now, well beyond the 10 years mentioned at the beginning, and it just seems to keep going endlessly. I'm getting pretty bored with it by now, where is the ending?
Hey guys, how are we all? I'll get straight to the point. I just spent 6 hours playing Kudos 2 (full version) and I've come to a part where I'm stuck. Basically, I chose to study law and I'm up to the high end of the career but unfortunately the job I'm in at the moment minuses 41 relaxation a day (which is almost all of the bar) so therefore when I study expert or any other form of law to further my career, I don't have any relaxation therefore my concentration level is very low therefore where I study I gain not even one bar because my stress levels are too high. If you can be bothered my fellow Kudos fans and are willing to help, please reply on this forum I'll be keeping my eye on it.
Basically I'm literally stuck. Why is it so difficult? Even when I meditate like every day after work (so I can't do anything else and lose all my friends), the next day I lose all my relaxation points because of my job. And when I want to find another job my IQ is too low. Yeah, second question, what's the best way to up IQ? At a certain point it just stops going up...even if you're only at like say 58 per cent.
I can't see any text! Any ideas on how to fix it?
I think I've discovered a bug. I'm trying to build a career in journalism and when I try to apply for higher salary jobs, it says I don't have enough IQ points. It say in the job application screen I only have 25 IQ, but on the play screen I actually have 45. So I can't advance because the game doesn't read my expanding IQ. Anyone else having the problem? Any suggestions on how to fix it?
Peggy - I believe that owning fish and cats(?) will raise your level of relaxation. I'm not sure if there are any other items that do that just automatically, but I think it will help if you don't have pets already.
Marci - I had that problem too. It took me a while to figure out, but it isn't a bug. If you click on the bar that holds IQ you will see there are four different sub-categories. The one you want is IQ(Knowledge). This can be raised by watching the News on TV.
Also, I am having a problem with Journalism as well. When your experience gets high enough you have the option to research a story. On the screen that comes up when you research the story it shows Contacts that you need to have in order to successfully research (otherwise when your progress bar reaches 100% your lead will disappear). How do I get the contacts to perform this?
Can you date???
Niki - yes, you can date someone. If you build up a very strong relationship with a character of the opposite gender (or same gender if you have your game set to do this) then they will call you and ask if you want to date them. Keep in mind that if you say yes and end the relationship later on you will also lose them as a friend.
Hey,
Just a few things that I have learned. The cat is a pain, I got rid of mine never happy. As for IQ you need to go shopping and buy books. There are books for all sorts of learning. As for cheats, I found one for money just go to where the game is installed, open up the data folder,in that folder you will see a txt document called config. Just open that and find where it says GV-Starting money and just change the amount to whatever you want it to be and save and play!! Hope that helps. Good luck!
hello I was wondering if anyone had the same problem as I did the adult school doesn't offer driving class.
Hi, JIGuest,
Click on the solitary activity button, and the option to learn how to drive will show up when you scroll through the choices.
can you marry?
For the transportation system, I used to go on the bus, but then bought a car...the only problem is, whenever I try to change my transportstion method to driving the car, that option is like, blocked...like, usually, if I want to ride a taxi or something, there's a button at the bottom that says "Chage your transportation" or something, but for the car, it says it too, but wouldn't let me click it...why?
I know it should be obvious, but how do I save my game? Also, no matter what name I choose at the beginning of the game, my character is assigned a random name.
Thanks for the help!
@Kalene:
I had the same problem. You have to take driving lessons, first. Once you buy a car, the Driving Lession option should show up under your solitary activities menu. Classes are $25 each and you need a LOT of classes before you can drive, so I ended up selling my car. It would be nice if that were mentioned before you purchase a car.
Where is the solitary activities menu? I have looked pretty much every where and I own 2 cars and still cant' see the option to learn to drive
Driving lessons can be unlocked similarly to the "Go to church" and "walk in the park" options. You unlock activities by being very social. I usually just held a dinner party with 6 people and it unlocked events for me.
Can they marry or have kids?
Cheating is easy although i dont reccomend you fiddle with a lot of things on the one game as i done this the first time i downloaded it and totally screwed it up. So... Here's how :
Start, My computer, Local Disk c, Program files, Kudos 2, Data, Config...
I suggest you only change GV_STARTINGCASH as if you start fiddling with other things your game will just get confused and crash.
Kudos x
Addicted to this game, but I just bought a paintball gun for the first time and it won't let me use it - anyone know what I have to do to go paintballing?
I don't understand why it isn't letting me socialize. Even if I have the money for the activity and an interested friend the button is still greyed out and I can't go.
Fun game. One issue for me: I seem to be the one to initiate social interactions most of the time. I'd say I issue 8-10 invites for every invite I recieve. This seems off to me. Does this mean the other characters don't like me, or is that just the way the game works?
why does it seem like I can not do any other career and be happy about it
Update