Smugglers 5 is structured much like Sid Meier's Pirates - there are various ports of call, and as you travel from one to another, you can acquire goods to sell, chat with the governor or listen to rumors in the bar. The goal is to acquire wealth and status through some combination of trading, piracy, and legitimate military work. When you get too old to continue, you can retire and receive a score that evaluates the overall success of your virtual life.
I liked it when I first played it back in the 90s and I like it now. The economic system is either too simple to be interesting or too complex to be a satisfying game, but I seem to have the hang of it in a general sort of way. As far as I can tell, you buy materials in a system at peace and you sell it in a system at war, focusing on trading exclusively the most expensive resources and never shipping with less than a full hold. That's gotten me up to 10 million+ credits and the maximum ship size in less than 3 hours, and now I'm just trying to run up my score by experimenting with things like factory ownership and war bonds. The knowledge that my trading empire will be limited by the length of my life-span is kind of harshing my style, but I guess that just means that in a couple of hours I'll have the chance to do it all again.
I don't think the trader archetype is sustainable long-term, though. The game acknowledges it. It gives you options. But it doesn't really embrace it. All of the missions require me to join a faction. Most of the character skills are combat-related. And frankly, my trading has become a bit rote. I'm not looking forward to branching out - the short time I spent with combat in the tutorial was mostly a chore - but it looks to be my inevitable next move, just as soon as I retire my current character.
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