Evil Genius tips and help

[Daehawk]

So Ive just started this up again. Ive never gotten past the beginning so Im hoping to do better this time. I have my barracks and storeroom going and am building my control room now.

The first thing Im wondering is do I need a locker for each bunkbed?

[Sepiche]

The first thing Im wondering is do I need a locker for each bunkbed?

Nope. Lockers let you have more total minions, while you only need enough beds for minions to rest in when they're tired. Basically build a few beds and then add more if you see they're all filled up.

One of the most important things to note in EG is which objects create "Heat" and which ones don't. Enemy agents are looking for evidence of your wrong doing and if they find anything with a heat value and escape that will lead to big spikes in your overall heat rating and assault teams coming to the island.

My basic base strategy is to have a small barracks up front for my social minions to stay in so they can swiftly get rid of enemy agents as they enter. This forward base needs to have no heat causing items in it for enemies to find. Then, farther back from the entrance start a secondary base that houses anything that causes heat: generators, body bags, arms, training rooms, etc.

[Daehawk]

Already out of money. Dont even have a freezer or a holding area lolz. Id build a hotel for cash but Im broke And my minions I sent to south america are getting nothing. No plots no stealing nada.

[Sepiche]

Already out of money. Dont even have a freezer or a holding area lolz. Id build a hotel for cash but Im broke And my minions I sent to south america are getting nothing. No plots no stealing nada.

Hotels are more for distracting agents and inspectors rather than making money, and they really aren't all that good at it, but they are fun. For money I send out teams of soldiers backed with social minions to rob banks. A few good social minions, or a good lieutenant can lower the heat generated by your soldiers stealing, and therefore increase the time they can remain out there.

For what it's worth GameFaqs as a few good guides for Evil Genius:
http://www.gamefaqs.com/pc/915014-evil-genius/faqs" target="_blank

[Daehawk]

Thank you for all this help. This is one of those building type games that i enjoy early on but then when it starts getting tons of stuff to keep track of I lose interest.

[Sepiche]

Thank you for all this help. This is one of those building type games that i enjoy early on but then when it starts getting tons of stuff to keep track of I lose interest.

No problem! Evil Genius is just one of those games with lots going on that's not really apparent until you've played it for a while.

[Daehawk]

Too bad they haven't updated it to today's stuff. I built my storage room too big and i now need a power room. im low on cash. the way the game is I either have to build a new room or destroy my storage room and then rebuild it and the power room.

If it was updated I could simply destroy half of the storage room and make that half into a power room.

[Sepiche]

Yeah I think I started over more than a few times when I first got it before getting a feel for what to build first, how big rooms need to be, etc. I think the main rooms you want to setup to be able to expand extensively are your power room and your freezer. Most other rooms don't need to expand past a given size very much.

[Daehawk]

Im doing well except for the no money thing. I guess Im doing awful. I need to build some rooms like a place to relax and eat or a gym..a new vault..lots of stuff. no money and none coming in. My henchmen dropped really low for some reason but they are coming back now. On the world map I really cant get any cash.

Do more agents in a world zone = more cash? Or is 1 per country fine? It's always saying "2 more consoles and you can break their hold"...well I built 2 more and it was fine. Then later i check and it says 2 or 3 more are needed. I dont have that many henchmen...then again no money means I cant buy the consoles I need to make money.

Catch 22 game. I may need to restart. But thats one thing that makes me end up quitting.

[Daehawk]

Well I guess Im going to be forced to start over. I am 11k in the hole and it keeps growing. I cant do anything. I think i expanded too fast. Not sure how to handle it.

BTW - corridors.....should they be 2 tiles wide?

Im going to have to force myself not to build stuff as soon as it is available.

[Daehawk]

I guess I just suck at this too much. At $41,000 I quit spending money...stopped building stuff. I tried to keep an eye on my world map stuff so I'd get cash. I went to the kitchen for a bit and when I came back I had $800 and dead minions. The island was full of enemy agents. This is on EASY. Im about ready to remove it This is why I never bought any of the Tropico games hahaha. I see 4 is on sale but im afraid of it.

[Paingod]

I have a terrible "cheat" for money issues.

Spoiler:

During the tutorial phase, when you're first allowed to send out agents to collect money in the world - do so. Build a largish vault. Get as many minions as you can hold (buying lockers) and send them all out except for a few to man the consoles at home and collect briefcases from the Depot. You'll need to collect money, buy lockers, collect money, buy lockers, etc... Pile minions up in the best money-making regions (US, England, I can't remember the others). Now wait. Wait all night - just let the game run (make sure you turn off notifications and pop-ups so they don't pause the game). When you wake up, you'll have 3-4 million in cash sitting in your store room.

This works because counter-agents aren't deployed in the world yet and you can't be attacked by deployments of soldiers until after the tutorial. Let your Heat cool down and then continue the game.

I find it more enjoyable when money isn't an issue at all and all I need to worry about is base building and messing with enemy agents.

Below is my 'standard' layout that I keep seeming to default to.

Spoiler:

The "Barracks 2" area is strictly for lockers and I end up removing it to make room for other things once I research the double lockers and have enough infamy to get to my max minion count.

Another helpful thing to do is (if you're so inclined) increase your total minion count. 100 minions gets spread pretty thin by the time you have the top-tier classes for them, and I find that a cap of 200 is nice (though it makes for a very crowded base). All it takes is altering some text/ini files. I can probably dig up more info if you can't find a how-to.

This is how I use my vault:

Spoiler:

I find that minions get stuck too easily in vaults, or might interrupt a money square if they get blocked in. So I give them a way out and set up briefcase racks aimed into a hallway tile. Once the room is empty, I lock the inside door and no one ever goes in there, but piles of gold still magically fill the room. Once I'm done collecting money, I'll re-open the interior door as my minions do seem to like to oogle piles of gold and it's a good place for looted treasures to be stored initially.

[Daehawk]

Doesn't your barracks 2 block your starting entrance?

[Paingod]

Doesn't your barracks 2 block your starting entrance?

The starting entrance is at the top of the map you see, next to those winding corridors. It's the dark grey squares.

Some additional tips on how I get around the game successfully...

Spoiler:

I tried experimenting with multiple entrances to make getting to the Depots easier, but found it wasn't worth the hassle of having a secondary way for agents to get into my base. The two hallways you see there are for dual purposes.

• Agents and minions seem to want to go the shortest route into the base, which is the first way down. I'll put a locked (4) door at the bottom hallway entrance and a locked (4) door at the top. I fill this hallway with blower traps and other nasty things to deal with them. When an agent comes snooping around, I quickly unlock the door to let them in and then relock it behind them to keep my minions out. When there are no agents around, I might disable the traps and then unlock a door so minions can clear bodies out.
• The second, longer hallway, is locked (2) and I force my minions to use this for coming in and out of the base. Agents don't seem to want to use it because it's "technically" a longer pathway.

Around traps, too: I'll build a whole hallway's worth of sensors and tie them to a single trap. Then I use this trap to trigger all the other traps in turn. When I want to disable all the traps in a hallway, I simple disconnect that first point and none of the others work. Reconnect it and they do. It makes shutting down a hallway very easy.

[Daehawk]

Ok now I see. I forget that I rotate the map on start. Saw the little red mark on your map and assumed it was the door I start with lol.

[Blackhawk]

This thread is making me consider firing this up. It's been sitting there, installed, for months.

[Paingod]

Ok now I see. I forget that I rotate the map on start. Saw the little red mark on your map and assumed it was the door I start with lol.

Just a lava flow.

I've played this game too many times. I even made graph paper schematics at one point of the mountain and used that to design my room layouts instead of trying to spend money making them and demolishing them.

[Blackhawk]

I'm having fun, but they really needed to up the quality of feedback. "Security door breached!" Where? I have like 50. They need a 'go to last event' button.

Worse yet is when I notice that, somehow, a couple of enemies have gotten into the middle of my base. They've shot up half of my generators and most of my training room while guards stroll right past them because I didn't notice them and manually designate them to be killed. I've got security cameras. At the very least a 'your base is under attack' warning would make sense.

[Daehawk]

Lol ya Ill walk away and come back and 4 or 5 enemy are in the base walking around even with traps set and such. I hit red alert and it all gets taken care of but still. I put doors everywhere that supposedly only me and my guys can use...they dont help.

As a side not I have 1.3 million now to use

[Daehawk]

Ok Im doing really good right now. I have plenty of cash and even as Im building Im still making more than Im using. I have one large room that is simply lockers. i can support 62 workers. 30 of those are on the world map in China getting me money I have a small barracks of about 7 beds in another area.

Back at base I have built everything up to the power room. I have not built an armory which is the last room I have access to right now. I am letting the maid wander around...capturing her will ruin my money making and safety. As is if I leave her alone then the good guys wont bother me yet. But Im also to the point of being out of anything to do other than make money.

So a few questions.

Ive made a 2nd entrance nearer to airport so my guys can work faster. Is that a bad idea? I have doors on everything...which seem to do nothing...not even keep a maid out.

Should I build multiple entrances in my rooms themselves? Like if a room sits on a corner of a corridor....do I make 2 doors to it? I haven't before but have started to do it thinking Im helping make life easier on the little fellas

Should I make the huts outside into anything or build new huts? I moved my strongroom inside and demolished the one I started with outside. Would a barracks be good out there or something?

EDIT: At present I have about 1.3 million to work with and that is growing all the time the game runs. If I could figure a way to let it run while Im asleep without a popup happening I could really be rich hahah...err I mean MWaahahahaha (evil laugh).

Oh..does Boss have any difference to the game. As max I kept losing fast. As the tall Ming like guy Im doing well...So far

Also I cant fit any more lockers in my 2nd barracks. I am supporting 60 some odd workers. Do I need to build a 3rd barracks and have more lockers? Maybe enough for 100 workers? Most are out in the world stealing..i think I have 45 out right now. my base is staffed with just enough to run it while some sleep.

I would take pics of my base but I seem to have lost my paid copy of Fraps. I got it with an old video card purchase and now cant find it. Just prnt-scrn and copy paste to Paint gives me a black pic.

[Paingod]

Worse yet is when I notice that, somehow, a couple of enemies have gotten into the middle of my base. They've shot up half of my generators and most of my training room while guards stroll right past them because I didn't notice them and manually designate them to be killed. I've got security cameras. At the very least a 'your base is under attack' warning would make sense.

One big problem is that if you make an area that has no possible way to get in, say a 1x1 square section wedged behind a generator, an enemy agent is allowed to burrow directly into that space in order to investigate and completely bypass your security. I lost a generator room or two before I actually saw them coming in. Never make an area that your regular minions cannot walk to.

Ive made a 2nd entrance nearer to airport so my guys can work faster. Is that a bad idea? I have doors on everything...which seem to do nothing...not even keep a maid out.

I found having two entrances taxing. It meant twice the number of ways for enemies to get in. The only pitfall to having one entrance is that it gets crowded - lots of traffic... but it's easier to control that traffic.

Should I build multiple entrances in my rooms themselves? Like if a room sits on a corner of a corridor....do I make 2 doors to it? I haven't before but have started to do it thinking Im helping make life easier on the little fellas

I'd say yes. Only so many minions can enter and leave a square at once and if you've got a certain room that they all get stuck in, you might want to consider making a second door. Also, I tend to join rooms with doors or even remove walls completely between some rooms. I might have my Library connect to a corridor but also connect to the Recreation room, and the Rec room connects to a corridor and the Library and the Mess hall.

Should I make the huts outside into anything or build new huts? I moved my strongroom inside and demolished the one I started with outside. Would a barracks be good out there or something?

Huts are of questionable use. It's hard to find useful things to put in them... but ... if you build a few scattered around your island and put locked doors on them, enemy agents will waste their time trying to pry their way into an empty locked room instead of coming for your base. Alternately, you could put non-lethal traps in them that drain statistics like Attention or Loyalty. Enemy agent works for 20 seconds to pop open a door and finally does, only to get stunned and confused by a trap. I say non-lethal because you don't want to generate gobs of Heat away from the interior of your base by dropping bodies everywhere.

Oh..does Boss have any difference to the game. As max I kept losing fast. As the tall Ming like guy Im doing well...So far

Max makes research easier and has a medium area of influence.
Shen Yu reduces the amount of Heat you generate with evil activities but has a small area of influence.
Alexis helps keep minions loyal and has a large area of influence.

My primary use for my Evil Genius is to act as a mobile loyalty/attention generator. I'll put him somewhere where minions congregate to help keep their stats up or store him in the middle of my Control room in order to regenerate the stats that working in that room drains.

Also I cant fit any more lockers in my 2nd barracks. I am supporting 60 some odd workers. Do I need to build a 3rd barracks and have more lockers? Maybe enough for 100 workers? Most are out in the world stealing..i think I have 45 out right now. my base is staffed with just enough to run it while some sleep.

As you do evil in the world you will increase the number of minions you can maintain naturally without lockers. Lockers act to let you exceed this number quickly. It's possible that you could be so evil that you don't need any lockers in order to have the maximum number of minions, but I've always beaten the game before I got there.

As you research, you'll also unlock "Double Lockers" which take up 2 squares but provide (I think) for 4 minions.

[Daehawk]

I guess Ill have to do the story then to get infamy. Right now Im drawing no aggro as I raise money. Getting about 12k per minute now but Im getting bored since I cant move forward. Im just afraid once i do then it will all fall apart

Nothing ventured nothing gained so they say. I will now grab the maid and torture her and that will get me moving. I should then be able to buy new stuff for my rooms and build new types of rooms too. I think next up will be training new advanced minions so Ill need a training room....not sure what else will come. Im never sure how many advanced guys to train or what next to do on the world map. my base will be crawling with enemy agents once i start down this road. Hope Ive saved enough cash. I have a little over 2 million now.

And reading your post it seems Alexis is the one I should have picked. I like leaving them in the control room. I was wondering why the new boss had so little a area around him. Thought it might have depended on the amount of conssoles I had since I didn't fill the room like I was doing.

This game is making me want to subject myself to Theme Hospital again. I liked it back when it came out but I sucked as much at it as i did Evil Genius. It got complicated fast. I wonder if it's freeware yet or a place to buy it and have it run. I'll check GoG. Heck I own Roller Coaster Tycoon and it's addon. I could try those again too. I failed so badly at that game but now I think I have a better understanding of them. I think I could do a lot better than i used to. you cant just slap stuff down any old way. I have learned one of the most important things in these games...patience.

[Paingod]

I guess Ill have to do the story then to get infamy. Right now Im drawing no aggro as I raise money. Getting about 12k per minute now but Im getting bored since I cant move forward. Im just afraid once i do then it will all fall apart

Yeah, once you get out of the Tutorial Mode, you'll suddenly find that trying to raid for money means dealing with soldiers on your island and watching your world deployments to make sure they don't get killed by inspectors.

I do generally let the game run for a single night with pop-ups off (I'm certain there's a menu option, you may need to scroll to find it) and that nets me 3-4 million to work with, which lasts the entire game and makes things a lot less stressful.

I have a little over 2 million now.

If you don't go bananas and splurge constantly, that could last you the entire game. You'll probably want to collect more later on, though, just so you don't feel like you need to pinch pennies.

And reading your post it seems Alexis is the one I should have picked. I like leaving them in the control room. I was wondering why the new boss had so little a area around him. Thought it might have depended on the amount of conssoles I had since I didn't fill the room like I was doing.

Just go with whoever you like, really. In the end it's all the same. You'll get relics, treasures, and equipment that also regen stats, and can place those in your control room.

[Daehawk]

Im to the mission where I capture the other evil leaders and bring them to my sanctum. I caught the 3 it wanted but the mission is not updating. Do I need to fill the other 4 seats at the table from random places or something?

[Paingod]

There are a few pre-requisites and the game drops some minor hints on you.

There are a total of 7 bosses to get (contains spoilers), and each has a different thing going on. Three have missions you need to complete in the overworld to get them, and four come to you by various means.

Keep collecting infamy and searching for them and you should be all set if you follow the mission clues to getting them.

[Blackhawk]

Im to the mission where I capture the other evil leaders and bring them to my sanctum. I caught the 3 it wanted but the mission is not updating. Do I need to fill the other 4 seats at the table from random places or something?

Did you click the 'down' arrow on the bottom of the objectives list? I stalled at three for a while before I I noticed the next one required scrolling down.

[Daehawk]

I got a 4th one that came to my island. Ill have to check on the scrolling down.

[Blackhawk]

I guess Ill have to do the story then to get infamy. Right now Im drawing no aggro as I raise money. Getting about 12k per minute now but Im getting bored since I cant move forward. Im just afraid once i do then it will all fall apart

You're getting very close to the point that stealing draws heat. If you want to run it all night and get rich, don't capture any more crime lords until after you have. Dump loads of your minions in the midwest and the middle east, go into options and turn off 'video tips' to disable the pop-ups, and let it run.

Huts are of questionable use. It's hard to find useful things to put in them... but ... if you build a few scattered around your island and put locked doors on them, enemy agents will waste their time trying to pry their way into an empty locked room instead of coming for your base. Alternately, you could put non-lethal traps in them that drain statistics like Attention or Loyalty. Enemy agent works for 20 seconds to pop open a door and finally does, only to get stunned and confused by a trap. I say non-lethal because you don't want to generate gobs of Heat away from the interior of your base by dropping bodies everywhere.

That's about what I did - I put four huts around with locked doors, pressure plates, and pop-up traps. I find I get two or three agents at each, which is a dozen agents not in my base.

I also have a bunch of huts full of lockers. Of course, I let it run overnight myself and am sitting on $19,000,000. (Pinky in mouth, evil laugh.)

[Blackhawk]

Well, I'm on the second island now. My base is built, and I'm starting in on the next set of objectives.

[Paingod]

Good to see it clicked. The game has a style that makes it a lot of fun and easy to enjoy.

[Daehawk]

Ive been trying to play Vegas Make it Big because it's a builder / money sim in the same way this sorta is. But man the controls are killing me. I cant get into it with the old controls it comes with. Very clicky click click click all over and the view is bad.

[Blackhawk]

Muahahaha. Ha ha ha.

Take that, World.

(I won - thanks for the inspiring thread, Daehawk, and the tips, Paingod.

[Daehawk]

Congrats!

[KDH]

...

This 4.5 minute video with Rebellion CEO, Jason Kingsley, talks about their upcoming games:

Strange Brigade
Rogue Trooper Redux

and mentioning, in passing, @3:36 .. Evil Genius 2

We know you’ve been waiting a long time for this announcement, so we won’t tantalize you any further. As revealed in our new video interview with Rebellion CEO Jason Kingsley (we suggest giving it a watch) we’re thrilled to announce we are now officially working on Evil Genius 2.

Ever since Evil Genius came under the Rebellion roof, we’ve always believed that Elixir’s beloved real-time, lair-management and world-domination simulation deserved a follow-up. We’d like to make this super-duper clear – this isn’t a remaster. Evil Genius 2 will be a fully-fledged sequel and it won’t be free-to-play. Our focus currently is on a PC release, but as ever we’ll look at other platforms and see what fits and what doesn’t.

THE STATE OF PLAY
Now, before you get too excited and start furiously drawing up your blueprints for a Gravity Disruptor 2.0, development only began this Spring and is still at a very, very early stage. We’re currently fleshing out the tech that will make Evil Genius 2 a reality. This will be the first real-time strategy game built in our in-house engine Asura, after all, so we need to do a little bit of extra work under the hood before we expand the team, nail down gameplay design and go into full production.

WHY NOW?
That said, you may well be asking why it’s taken us a while to get to this point. As some of you may remember, we were very close to announcing this project several years ago. Back then, our plan was to crowd-fund a new Evil Genius PC game and we made a series of steps to launching a campaign.

So why didn’t we go ahead with it? Firstly, we were in the middle of a big transition into becoming our own publisher and we needed to put resources into the projects that became Zombie Army Trilogy, Battlezone on PSVR and Sniper Elite 3 & 4.

Secondly, we decided crowd-funding wasn’t the way we wanted to go. After the growing success of the Sniper Elite series and other Rebellion games IP, we started to feel it wasn’t fair to ask fans to fund a new game if we didn’t need them to! With some big projects now out the door and being enjoyed by gamers worldwide, we feel like now is the time to return to the world of Evil Genius.

So yes, it’s taken us some time to get to this point. But today we are in a position where we can happily say Evil Genius 2 is an actual thing we’re actually coding, designing and er… arting, right now!

.. so, there you have it, they're just arting around

[tgb]

Evil Genius 2 is in a very early stage, so I'm guessing it will be a 2019 or even 2020 release. I hope I'm still around to play it.