What are the criteria for a computer game to be considered a classic, one that will be remembered over the years, one that will be included in lists that are made from time to time to select the 100 greatest games in general or in a particular field.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Is it just the number of units sold? Probably not. Maybe it’s exceptional computer graphics? maybe. Maybe the story behind the game and who wrote it? In this case, too, yes, but not only, and of course, it depends on the type of game. Maybe it’s the length of time it spent at the top of the list of sales? Or the length of time it was even sold? Is money even a topic of discussion? And what does the bus driving simulator OMSI 2 have to do with a discussion about classic games?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And what, exactly, does a bus driving simulator like OMSI 2 have to do with classic games?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Interestingly enough, most of the usual criteria don\u2019t really apply to OMSI 2. The game was released in 2013, received its last major update in 2014, and has largely remained untouched ever since. It is now more than twelve years old, and graphically, it often looks like something developed in the late 1990s. And yet, it caught my attention many years after its release – and a quick visit to Steam shows that, despite its age, it is far from cheap.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
First, a brief history lesson. OMSI was developed by a small German studio called MR-Software GbR, which – if I remember correctly – consisted of just two friends. Their goal was to create a realistic bus driving simulator, not only in terms of driving physics, but especially in the level of detail found in the buses themselves. They succeeded.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The original game focuses on the Spandau district of Berlin, located on the western side of the Wall. It features several real-life bus lines running along authentic streets, but it goes even further than that: the game allows players to move along a historical timeline, showing how the city, the routes, and even the line numbers change before and after the fall of the Berlin Wall.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The stars of the show were buses manufactured by MAN, a company that dominated the German market at the time and remains one of the largest bus manufacturers in the world today. Most of the included vehicles were double-deckers – an iconic sight on Berlin\u2019s streets during that era.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Since then, the game has received dozens of commercial expansions – many of them released after Aerosoft <\/a>acquired ownership of OMSI 2.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This is one of the main reasons why I consider OMSI 2 a classic. The base game may be old, but new official expansions continue to arrive, bringing new maps, new cities, and new buses\u2014both old and modern\u2014at a pace of several releases per year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n