Steam Awards – “Labor of Love” Nomination
Nominate Turmoil for “Labor of Love” 💛 Turmoil has been in players’ hands for many years now, and it has continued to grow thanks to all of you — your feedback, your suggestions, and your passion for digging a little deeper. This year, we’d love your help nominating Turmoil for
Nominate Turmoil for “Labor of Love” 💛
Turmoil has been in players’ hands for many years now, and it has continued to grow thanks to all of you — your feedback, your suggestions, and your passion for digging a little deeper.
This year, we’d love your help nominating Turmoil for the Steam Awards “Labor of Love” category.
This award celebrates games that keep evolving long after launch — shaped by a dedicated community and a team that keeps improving the experience.
Your support helps more players discover our quirky oil-drilling world.
Thanks for sticking with us all these years and for being such an important part of Turmoil’s journey 💛
Besides the new and shiny Multiplayer mode, we of course also still love the single player campaign. Here are the things we improved with regards to the classic game and DLC:
Accessibility features:
Henry busting out of prison very politely with hat in hand is my favorite portrait so far.
You might notice the character customization menu is located in a completely new multiplayer menu. I hope you like it, because you’ll be seeing a lot more of it!
At the moment there are 12 characters and 11 portrait borders to choose from. The characters include all the classic, expert and Heat Is On playable characters and 3 completely new characters. We’ll certainly aim to add more in the future!
All the portraits are available from the start without any additional unlock conditions (or payment, no loot boxes to be seen here). We initially played with the idea of unlocking certain portrait borders by completing multiplayer matches or getting other achievements. In the end we decided against this.
We might reconsider unlock conditions for portraits added in the future. There is a certain prestige to using a cosmetic that no one else has access to, but we don’t want to turn picking your portrait into a negative experience either. Let us know how you feel about this in the comments.
Starting a new match is as easy as pressing the “Play now!” button. You will join a match instantly.
In the current system you can join a random online match, or play with a selected group. After pressing the “Play now!” button, you don’t have to wait in queue or anything like that. You join a match, get land from the mayor, and play your first level and auctions. Even if all the player slots aren’t filled yet.
Of course you can’t progress further than one level until all the player slots are filled and other people have played their first level as well. Just close the game and you will get a Steam notification when it’s your turn again. This might take a few minutes, or a day. So don’t plan your day around playing online Turmoil unless you’re playing with friends.
The lobby is the first screen of the multiplayer menu and shows you an overview of all the matches that you participate in, in order of importance.
When playing multiple matches, don’t forget to check which upgrades you purchased and what your opponents are up to. You can always refresh your memory by taking a look at 
Creating a custom game. You can invite players by name or use your in-game friends list.
You can only start a custom game when you have a full group of 4 players. We’re still considering how to handle less than 4 players.
First off, the Profits history gives a nice overview of how much money has been earned by everyone each round. Not doing too great on stocks so far? There’s no shame in gloating about that one round where you beat everyone out on profits either way. If you’re the strategical type, you can glean information about your opponents off this page by cross-referencing it with the other pages.
Next up is the Stocks history page. The line chart represents the number of stocks owned by each player, and the money stacks the offer made to win the auction.
This screenshot taken from one of our internal test matches showcases a dangerous and bothersome phenomenon. Inflation! Since human players earn more money than the rivals in the average single player campaign, the stock prices skyrocket rather quickly. Beware of this, and don’t be afraid to shell out some extra cash to win an early auction. It might save you later on! Be wary though, in doing so you will yourself become an accessory to inflation.
The Land Auction history. It shows you how juicy the oil plots that everyone digged have been. And of course what they were willing to pay for it. Don’t make the mistake of directly correlating the oil supply values and auction bids though! The players didn’t know the exact oil values when making their bid. The bids are quite useful for determining how high players are willing to go though.
As you can see, in our test match no-one was willing to bid that high for land. But being picky can make a big difference in the amount of oil you get! The potential profit difference between a plot of land with 45,000 or 55,000 barrels of oil is much more than $2,000. So don’t be afraid to follow the inflation when bidding on land. Getting the best plot counts double. More oil for you, less for them. 
Finally, the upgrades history allows you to see what upgrades have been bought in each year by a player. It’s not necessarily useful to the match at hand, but you can at least use it to copy someone else’s starting upgrades for your next match if you're not happy with how your initial level plays out. As usual, you can still view the total upgrades purchased by clicking the scroll in the town.
With the dust settled, your match stats get added to your profile. Don’t mope if you didn’t win. After all, what counts is that you had a good time.
Thanks for reading! Remember that there are 5 blog posts planned in total. The last one will be a Q&A where we answer as many questions as possible, so make sure to ask away in the comments. The multiplayer Steam playtest is still planned to be held in Q1 of 2022. Until the next one!
Dear oil entrepreneurs,
It’s finally here! Leiting Games and Gamious proudly present Turmoil for Android and iOS. Turmoil for mobile contains the full experience you know and love, adjusted for touch screens with zoom, tap, and swipe inputs specifically designed for phone screens. Additional features include: