The shape of a run
You take one of London’s 32 boroughs and run it for eight years. Each year has the same rhythm: build one capital project (or bank the money), host up to two events, make two decisions that land on your desk, then read the annual report and live with what it says. Your score is the sum of four stats — Culture, Attractions, Economy and Pull — and the league ranks all 32 boroughs by that sum. Finish Year 8 as high as you can. Simple to say; the rest of this guide is about why it’s not simple to do.
The four stats — and the one that pays rent
The stats are equals on the scoreboard: a point of Culture is worth exactly a point of Economy. But they are not equals in what they do along the way.
- Economy is the only stat that pays you. Your annual settlement is £4m plus £1m for every 12 points of Economy. A borough sitting at 72 Economy collects £10m a year; one at 36 collects £7m. Over eight years that gap builds several extra attractions.
- Culture, Attractions and Pull are how most builds and events actually score — and they’re where the league is usually won, because everyone remembers to chase money and forgets to spend it evenly.
- The hidden fifth number, soul, doesn’t appear in your score at all. It’s covered at the end — but know from Year 1 that the game is keeping that ledger too.
Why your best stat stops growing
Gains taper as a stat rises. Below 35, improvements land half again as hard; from 60 they’re dulled; from 80 a triumphant build might nudge the needle by a point or two. Above 84, stats actively decay — minus one a year, minus two above 90. The summit has weather.
This is the single most important system in the game, and it cuts both ways. Your weak stats are cheap to fix — so fix them; that’s where the value is. And a rival parked at 92 Attractions isn’t running away with anything — they’re paying maintenance on a mountain. The taper is why balanced boroughs win leagues and specialists write memoirs.
Money: what things cost and when
- Contractor prices rise about 15% from Year 6. Anything big is cheaper in Years 1–5. Plan the expensive dream early.
- Major projects — the multi-year investments — are only offered in Years 1–7 and never overrun Year 8. They front-load cost and drip out benefits yearly, so the earlier you commit, the more of the payoff you actually collect.
- Unique builds (the ones only your borough can construct) appear rarely — roughly one offer in five or six years each. They’re usually strong and always characterful. If you can afford one, the answer is nearly always yes.
- Banking is a real move. Building nothing to afford something better next year is often right — especially just before a major project window, or in a year when the offers are dross.
Events, dilemmas, and the quiet word in the car park
Events are smaller, cheaper nudges — up to two a year, some with an earn-back, each with a listed chance of going wrong. Weather the odd embarrassment; the maths still favours hosting. Some builds unlock better events, and several borough perks (tourist cash back, events feeding Culture) turn hosting into an engine.
Dilemmas are the two decisions on your desk each year. Their effects are hidden until the year-end report — and some plant consequences that surface years later. There’s no solving them by spreadsheet; read them as character questions. Choices that back locals tend to feed soul; choices that chase cash tend to feed stats. The game notices which manager you are.
Occasionally someone offers you a deal — a handshake in a car park, nothing written down. These are genuine coin flips. Take one when you’re behind and need variance, or when the downside reads survivable. Decline when you’re leading; leaders don’t need coin flips.
Falling behind is a strategy
The game quietly helps strugglers: boroughs in the bottom quartile draw regeneration funding (money plus a surprise stat boost), and some have perks that only fire in the bottom half. Weak boroughs also start with low stats — which the taper makes cheap to raise. This is why a Barking or an Enfield run can outpace a Westminster one: the champion boroughs start high, gain slowly, decay at the top, and everyone is aiming at them. Strong boroughs defend a crown; weak ones climb with the wind at their back. Pick the fight you enjoy.
The soul ledger
All game, a second meter has been moving: the borough’s soul. Every choice that traded character for cash nudged it down; every choice that backed the locals nudged it up. It never touches the league table — but it decides the tone of your ending, and the mood lines in every annual report were tracking it all along. A 1st-place borough with a hollowed-out soul gets a very different final page than one that kept its parrot shop. There is no correct answer here; there is only the manager you decided to be.
Five mistakes everyone makes once
- Pumping one stat past 80 and wondering why progress stopped. (The taper. Always the taper.)
- Ignoring Economy until Year 4, then discovering compound interest works backwards too.
- Saving the big build for “the right moment” — which arrives in Year 6, costing 15% more.
- Taking a car-park deal while top of the league. You had everything; you flipped a coin with it.
- Reading dilemmas as maths problems instead of character tests, then acting surprised at the year-end report.
When you finish a run, the game records an anonymous score for your borough and tells you how you rank against everyone else who managed the same place — here’s how that works. First place in Camden is currently held by somebody. It may as well be you.