Turmoil caught my attention when I first fired it up on my Xbox. What I got instead felt more like unearthing hidden treasure. It’s got that vintage charm and quiet confidence that says, “Trust me, this will be good.” Spoiler alert: it’s great.
You’re an oil prospector in the early 20th century, hoping to strike it rich. The idea is simple: you bid on land, hunt for oil reserves, and build pipelines to get that sweet, sweet crude. That sounds cool, right? But every decision costs you both time and money, and your lease clock is always ticking. You feel like you’re in a strategy board game where everyone is watching your next move in silence. No pressure here.
When the dowsers whistle, you send them to search for hidden wells. You then have to make rigs and lay pipes, trying to keep them cost-effective and efficient. Supply and demand make up the game’s economy. There are times when you hold your oil for a price surge and other times when you panic-sell because your tanks overflow. Like a satisfying balancing act between mini-resource-management puzzles and big-picture strategies, it’s challenging but never punishing.
It is inevitable that things will escalate as your cash piles up. Your horses become faster, your drilling rigs get deeper, and your dowsers become oil-finding bloodhounds. At one point, I even whispered “yes” to myself after hitting a massive deposit. That’s how Turmoil works. It makes you celebrate like a championship gamer, complete with inner memes. In the end, I felt like shouting “git gud” to my noob self when my wagons and pipeline output synced.
It’s simple and cute visually. With its cartoonish style, it’s not too childish, and every element is easy to comprehend immediately. It has a low-key soundtrack, like a saloon band playing softly in the next room, with a relaxed feeling. You’ll feel like you’re sitting on a frontier porch with a cup of coffee watching tumbleweeds roll by.
With the included DLC, you can spice things up with features such as natural gas and magma. It adds layers of complexity — more chances to strike it rich, but also more chances to screw it up.
If you’re looking for a simulation game that blends strategy with easy, pick-up-and-play mechanics, Turmoil is a gem.