This is the same problem with the more recent Offworld Trading Company game. You can take a half an hour building a great colony, harvesting all the resources, building all of the goods, and so on, but none of it really matters. The end game takes about 60-120 seconds and it's all trading on the in-game stock market, resulting in a sudden "you lost" screen popping up even if you did everything else right in the first 29 minutes. Kind of a let down.
Yea, it's entirely possible that I'm simply expecting a different game and just don't find the current one's endgame fun or satisfying. I played it a few times, chugged along building a nice colony, and then suddenly the big full-screen "Haha you lose, your opponent bought you out on the stock market (which you can't prevent)".
I'm trying to think of any games that try to include an in-game stock market, where the gameplay doesn't eventually utterly hinge on playing the in-game stock market instead of whatever else the game was about. Looks like we've discovered a rule: "Take any game about anything, in any genre, and if you add a stock market, the game eventually becomes a stock market simulator instead."
That was one of my initial fears with Shadow Empire, but it somehow doesn't manage to devolve to only that... I guess because there's a variety of brakes applied on trading like trading houses' limited stocks (including in credits), the way how price discovery is gradual between trading regions and not instant cross-planet, and the way they rip off the major factions by taking large trading margins ?
I would argue that OTC without a stock market is barely a game - it would just a race for resources.
IMHO the problem with OTC is that there is not enough opportunity for financial shenanigans. If someone successfully corners the market on the right commodity, there's a runaway leader problem with not much you can do. The game wrapping up early is a grace in those situations.
> even if you did everything else right in the first 29 minutes.
But you didn't do everything right. What makes OWTC different from most economics sims is that the goal is to quickly establish monopolies on the various planets. So unless you starved the competition of resources, pivoted to producing high-value products from cheap commodities, or speed run to offworld shipments, with an eye towards buying out everyone else, you're not playing to win.
The matches are sprints, not marathons. And faction abilities are critical to victory. You really have to chose matches that favor your faction if you want the upper hand.