Youda Marina
Platform: Mac, Windows
Some of the happiest memories of my childhood involve touring through Gippsland in a small yacht. We're not rich; years of reading Cruising Helmsman magazine ate into Dad's brain and he decided to stop being a 'gunna' (as in "one day I'm gunna buy a yacht"). So we hired a little boat and took it around some scenic destinations, played with the 'roos and the koalas, and stopped at some romantic little pubs for barramundi and chips. I haven't been on a yacht since, so Youda Marina was a pleasant blast of nostalgia for me, although its facilities are more reminiscent of the Gold Coast.
As you might expect, the objective in Youda Marina is to run a successful marina. You do this by building facilities, attracting visitors, earning money to gain fame. Get started by building a radio station to attract boats, and a ramp with some docks so they can stay at your marina. This is the most basic marina, but of course you'll want to do more. And you will have to, because you must play through the tutorial and gain at least a few levels of the first and easiest map before the relaxed mode is unlocked. A helpful old sea-dog will give you instructions, enabling you to understand how things work and build up an income.
Initially, boats will only want the kind of dock most suited to their size — a very small, not too profitable dock. But as you develop your marina with bigger docks, clicking on a boat will bring up a number of docking options with different likelihood of being accepted. You can go for the guaranteed income, or offer the sailor a bigger and more expensive dock and hope that they're willing to pay. It's possible to boost your income by adjusting the price of the docks, but be careful — if you set the price too high, boats won't dock with you.
The major challenge of Youda Marina is to balance the competing needs for money, reputation, fun activities and geographic space. There's two kinds of currency in this game: money and reputation. Gaining reputation is what will ultimately win the game for you by allowing you to gain levels and to build facilities. Adequate lighting, emergency services and shore facilities all help to build a daily increase in your reputation, thus paving your way to success. Having adequate police, fire and medical facilities also builds your reputation by marking you as a trustworthy operator that the big cruise companies can feel comfortable trusting with their passengers. Fun things like bars, restaurants and amusement parks will attract visitors, make them happy and let you run events to raise funds... but it's only worth running events if you have people staying at your marina!
As you become more successful you'll need to juggle demand for different dock sizes — thankfully you can destroy ramps and docks when you discover that no-one wants little size 12 and 14 docks any more since it's all about the international cruises now. I hope you remember high school geometry, because you're going to need it to work out where you'll be able to place the giant cruiser that just loomed into the bay with 200 passengers.
You win the game when you've gathered enough reputation to rise through all the ranks. Note that winning the game is just the beginning, so think twice before moving on to the next map once you've won — I returned to a map after winning to take some screenshots, and was pleasantly surprised to find that I was still attracting new and different boats. You can also continue to meet milestones if you like.
There are a couple of odd things about Youda Marina: you can't speed up the game, which for an impatient person like me can be agonizing, and you can't zoom in to view the facilities you've built. That said, there is a lot to like in the interface — just click on the boat icon and it will take you straight to the next boat that wants a dock, without you having to hunt around. You're free to build anything anywhere you like, unlike the Build-A-Lot games formula. Even the deadlines given for each task are fairly generous, so the game doesn't feel rushed at all. And the boats are so pretty, and the steel-drum reggae so relaxing, that it underscores the essense and nature of casual gameplay. Make yourself a Pina Colada (or a Shirley Temple) and settle in to live the dream!
Play Youda Marina (Flash version)
Windows:
Download the demo
Get the full version
Mac OS X:
Download the demo
Get the full version
Here's a request: could you denote availability (Windows/Mac(ha)/Linux(haha)) in the beginnings of articles instead of at the end? No use reading about and getting interested in something only to find out you cannot play it.
Sander, there's a Flash version linked at the bottom of the page... you can't "win" the Flash version the way you can the download, but you can submit high scores once you've played the limit of the demo. All the buildings are available in the Flash version, there's no "Buy full version to unlock Grand Hotel" or any of that nonsense.
Sander: The "availability" (a.k.a. platform) for download games is always listed immediately below the title in the header of every review.
In the case of Youda Marina, it shows: Platform: Download (Windows)
Okay, so here's one for the developers (if they're listening):
Why do your buildings always seem to catch fire AEONS before you could possibly ever raise the absurd amount of cash required for a fire station (never mind the constant whining of the visitors to have more and more of everything BUT a fire station...)
What's the point of Relaxed mode if everything always burns down WEEKS before you could possibly afford a fire station? Not very relaxed if you ask me.
Ahem.
Does Youda Marina load maps slowly?
Because my Youda Marina loads map very slow.
Help!
How do you remove docks?
To Smacker789:
I haven't had a problem with maps loading slowly.
To Aaron:
To remove a dock, click on the dock you want to remove, then click on the "destroy" button that pops up.
Errr.. ramps I mean then.. not docks.
To Aaron:
Ah, ok. On the infrastructure tab, there is a wrecking ball. Try using that to destroy the ramp.
Played it over and over when you start to get better you will see that no building will burn to the ground and you will have raised enough money to buy a firestation before a building catches fire.
Good game i love it!
There is probably going to be a mac version Youda games releases them i have seen macversion of their games in some charts.
How do you get the submarine to dock in your marina?
To Ara:
I believe the submarines are coming from the deep sea events, which means they'll never be able to dock the way the boats do because the people in them already came from your marina. You'll also start to see other event boats, too, and they won't dock either.
This awesome game IS available for Mac.
macgames.com has it.
I spent my $19.95 to buy the full version on Friday, and I've spent all weekend playing.
I love the game...too bad I can't load anything. The game really needs some bugs worked out, it seems I am not alone with this problem.
To Amanda:
I don't have a problem loading the game at all. What do you mean that you can't load anything?
how do u dock the submarines?
I've just started playing this game, and now I'm stuck.
It wants me to build a parking lot, and I have no idea where to find it. I've looked under all the tabs and nothing says parking lot, but I need it in order to build a small hotel.
Am I just not seeing it, or...?
Or could anyone tell me under what tab it's located in.
To Anne:
Please see my post a few spots above yours for info about the submarines.
To Kimi:
The parking lot is on the Utilities tab, right next to the small lighthouse.
where do you put the helipad it was all in red?
To nmoore:
The helipad goes on the shore.
I just started playing this game and I liked it but then all of the boats got stuck in a boat jam. And so no one was docking. There was one or two bigger boats just stuck there not moving and a bunch of other boats behind them, Some of them were trying to move back and forth but they couldn't go around. Once in a while one will get past but it doesn't want to dock. I would think that there should be something giving me a tip as to what's happening since I'm still just beginning, but it just goes on like this. I'm stuck. Can anyone tell me what's going on and how to fix it. I tried building another lighthouse, another gas station..and then I ran out of money and i can't get any more because the boats won't move or dock.:(
When i try to start the game in the tutorial, when i have to make a radio station, no ships come!!! Please help!!!
Babu, build another radio station near the bottom of the screen and those boats will unclog in a jiffy, all wanting to dock. :)
My question is how do the terminals work, I do not have enough dock space to warrant the 10% increase in dock fees, it seems these are a big waste of space. I could not build docks attached to them but perhaps I can extend docks from area adjoining them. Please comment on terminals if you have some strategy.
i am thinking wether to but this game does anybody recomend it
Hiya
theres a milestone that i have to build a game fishing service but i seriously have looked EVERYWHERE and i cant find it!! and i cant go forward until i do!! please help soon!!!
Love
Niamh
I am on day 50 and I'm getting no more milestones.. why?
I just started playing this game and can't figure out where the option to build a parking lot is.
To JIGuest:
The Game Fishing Service is on the Events tab.
To Veroniquets:
What is your rank. Once you've achieved Winner, the milestones stop coming. You can either continue to play or move onto the next location and start over with new milestones and a new marina.
To JIGuest:
The parking lot option is on the Utilities tab, right next to the small lighthouse.
ok so i have a large marina now, on winner status, but i have a problem getting emergency vehicles to respond to emergencies using the roads i built...and i have built a lot. am i doing something wrong?
To Alaskanpenguin:
I have found that the emergency vehicles will use the heliports much more often than the roads. I also found that I was building roads in the wrong places. When an emergency vehicles leaves its point of origin, watch its tracks and then put roads in the same place. But even so, the helicopters will usually be the first responders.
Dock light?
I have tried to add the dock lights and I guess I'm just dumb. I get a red X anywhere I have tried. Same thing with the buoys. Duh....Pease help with this.
Prememorie -
To add the dock lights click on the ship light button then click on the actual boat berth (it can be empty or have a boat in it, it doesn't matter). Lights will appear. It works the same way with buoys.
I can't get any of my games to reload! I have gotten to Tycoon on 2 different shorelines but when I go back to play it won't get past the Youda Marina screen even though I can hear the game playing in the background!!! Help!
How do you build a parking lot to make a hotel?
Anyone have the loading saved game problem? Mine hangs up and never does actually load a saved map.
Yes! My saved games will not load. This is a big problem with this game.
My game freezes after I put the Radar station down.
There are serious problems with the game loading....I love the game but it is frustrating waiting for it to load...It has on occasion refused to load a game any suggestions?
Everytime I try to play Youda Marina I get a runtime error saying the application asked the runtime to terminate it in an unusual way. Anyone else getting this problem? I have tried to uninstall and reinstall the game many times.
[Edit: You should probably contact customer support of the site where you purchased the game. -Pam]
Yep, same thing here...My games will load (continue) on the milestone game, but get hung up on the relaxed mode. Too bad, I had a nice map built on the island, can't get back to it! Arggg!
Same here. I can't load my saved game in the Relaxed Mode. (the first one, I forgot on what it's called) D:
I'm already in the Tycoon Level. And have also built a lot of buildings, etc.
I can't even get the game to load. It starts out ok, but when I click on the map to load, it says loading map and the loading bar fills up like a tiny bit and nothing else. The music still plays and the graphics are moving like the wave reflection on the life ring. I left it running when I went to work and when I came home, it was still at the same spot. Should I try reinstalling the game?
To Nikki:
You can try reinstalling it. And also please see my comment directly above yours.
I love this game, but I'm having a problem and wonder if anyone else is experiencing the same thing.
Sometimes, when I build an event facility, it won't let me organize an event there. It will be fully constructed and then just sit there with no option to organize the events. It doesn't seem to matter what type of event it is, either. It's happened on pretty much every one at some point and there's no rhyme or reason to it, that I can see.
Any suggestions?
@Troy - Try to exit the game and open it. Purple $ should be able to pop out on the left part of the screen. :)
I also have an answer to those who have difficulties in loading the game. Try to play the game until you reach the Winner title - that is, without exiting it. Sad part is though, you won't be able to load that game again.
Am I correct in thinking you do not have to plan your docks to allow for ships to get in and out? As long as the dock is there with the ramp next to it a ship can/will dock in it, it doesnt matter if it is impossible (in real life) to acutally navigate a ship into such a dock?
[Edit: You are correct. -Pam]
I just bought YoudaMarina and started playing but I'm getting stuck during the learning phase.
I'm at the point where it tells me that the daily income and capacity are at their maximum. It wants me to click on the bar I just built to show me a "useful technique". When I click on the bar, I get "clone", "destroy" and "repair" options but when I click on any of them, nothing happens. I can only exit the game. Very frustrating. I tried switching to different screen resolotions so I can see the options better, but still nothing.
Any advise would be highly apprecitated. Tx,
I was hooked and bought the full version, Unfortunately as the game just started to get interesting(lots of boats and everything unlocked) the game started to freeze/pause intermittently to a point the game wasn't fun anymore, I contacted tech support and they instructed me to install/reinstall shockwave and flashplayer which didn't work. I received a full refund thru Pay-Pal but really would have liked the game to run smoother it was pretty fun just too slow...
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