Zenith Frontier
Zenith Frontier is an interstellar strategy simulation game. Explore and colonise hostile exoplanets and help humanity survive the struggles of 2040 and beyond.
Zenith Frontier features several novel mechanics in the context of traditional 4X and grand strategy gameplay elements. Experience visionary strategic gameplay set in an evolving procedural galaxy populated by billions ot autonomous citizens and private companies. Build a faction with a rich background and strong identity, then oversee their interstellar efforts to advance their position within the precarious New Space Age.
New Gameplay Features:
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A Shared Origin: Factions start in the same overpopulated, suffering home system and compete to expand outwards in the year 2040. This is made possible by the recent discovery of –REDACTED– which allows high-tech spacecraft to slip into subspace.
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Volatile Subspace: Exploration of this newly accessible subspace is incredibly dangerous. This chaotic region is thick with dark matter and swirling dark energy fields, but the ability to travel interstellar distances in considerably shorter timeframes may be worth the risk. Known safe routes will become critical to sustaining your remote holdings, but beware - subspace is neither static or stable and these routes may change!
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Information is Essential: Unshielded signals will be destroyed in subspace and must be carried through by comm drones. News that arrives at your capital from a distant colony will be out-of-date - the situation will have evolved and you will have to consider this when planning your response. Additionally, perhaps the illegal hijacking of another’s comm drones will glean some strategic information - and prevent it from arriving at its intended destination!
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Special Relativity: Spacecraft travelling at incredible speeds and colonies established within deep gravity wells will experience first-hand the effects of special relativity and time dilation. Time will progress more quickly for the crew of your –REDACTED– spacecraft making a long journey at high speeds than the colony they are destined for.
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Geospatial Resource Pricing: A supply and demand model for price determination within a dynamic economic system that includes taxes, import/export fees and transportation costs mean that resource prices will vary throughout the galaxy. Plan your economic developments accordingly - or invest in this interstellar network infrastructure to take a slice of your rival’s operations.
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Top Level Direction: Shape your faction from the top down by issuing orders, directives, and edicts to your military staff, governors, and private sector. These are executed autonomously, which can lead to surprising outcomes. This indirect control poses interesting strategic challenges.
Traditional Gameplay Features:
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Diplomacy and Politics
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Research and Technology
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Military Conflict
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Management and Governance
Zenith Frontier’s Design Pillars:
Zenith Frontier is being designed and developed in line with these pillars.
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Emergence - A rich, living world that generates unique emergent scenarios.
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Strategic Depth - A semantic network of interconnect systems.
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Gameplay Over Graphics - A high quality interactive system that priotises gameplay.
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Self-Directed - The player is primarily working towards self-selected goals in open gameplay.
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Top Level Decisions - The player provides direction from the top-down to autonomous agents.
Read More: Best 4X Grand Strategy Games.
Ozymandias: Bronze Age Empire Sim
If you’re interested in Ozymandias, please wishlist, follow us and download the demo! :)
At the dawn of history, Bronze Age kings built the first empires. Strategize their rise to power in a uniquely streamlined 4X.
DISTILLED DESIGN
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Focus on strategy over tactics, we’ve stripped the busywork out of 4X gameplay.
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Combat abstracted via innovative Power system so you need only move armies and fleets.
HISTORICAL MAPS
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8 handmade maps charting Bronze Ages around the world, empires in real-world locations.
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Empires are tagged from ‘Easy’ to ‘Very Hard’ to reflect their unique challenges.
COMPETITIVE AI
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Data-driven AI system, flexible enough to succeed in any environment.
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Streamlined ruleset is inherently AI-friendly so no ‘AI cheating’ required.
MULTIPLAYER
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Players take their turns simultaneously so there’s no waiting around.
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Choose to play ‘live’ (short turn timers) or ‘asynchronous’ (long game timers).
Read More: Best 4X Strategy Games.
Shadows of the Sengoku
The year is 1467. The Sengoku period has just begun. Every Daimyo will be out for blood, trying to bring glory to their clan and be unifier of Japan. More than might and riches, cunning is required.
Enter the Shadows.
Shadows of Sengoku is a Grand Strategy game that mixes Turn-Based Tactical Combat into the formula, and puts the player in control of the Shadows; a group of elite units that serve one of the Daimyos of Japan, executing missions and expanding the clan’s influence in order to achieve its ultimate destiny: The Unification of Japan.
Conquer Your Way!
Shadows of Sengoku features over 30 possible clans that the player can choose to play as. Help the Ashikaga retain the Shogunate; Aid the Hosokawa in keeping their regional superiority; spearhead the warlike Uesugi’s offensive in the Tokaido; grow the Ainu into a formidable opponent; or fight for supremacy in the Kyushu as the Shimazu.
Each clan will be ruled by a Daimyo with their own goals and aspirations for the clan. Some may seek greatness through war, others may desire for peaceful relations and diplomacy, yet others may want to isolate themselves from the rest in a road to self-reliance. But Daimyos don’t live forever; a change in the leadership of a clan may severely alter the course of a game!
Train Your Squad!
Units can be recruited and will have their starting abilities based off of the province they hail from, with each of the game’s 80 provinces bringing different bonuses. But they all start at low level, and will need to gain experience be it in the form of open combat or using the Shadows' training grounds. Being efficient in battle will not only allow your units to improve quicker; they’ll also gain combat ranks which will unlock a whole new host of gameplay options.
There are no classes in Shadows of the Sengoku; instead a system of proficiencies will categorize your unit based on its weaknesses and strengths. An innovative skill system allows you to train your units in whatever way you desire, specializing them into one or more combat roles as you see fit. But use caution; losing a very important unit in combat can have drastic consequences to morale!
High-Stakes Tactical Combat!
Going back to the roots of tactical turn-based combat, Shadows of the Sengoku gives the players complete control over their units action. Based on a time unit system, players can more accurately coordinate and develop their strategy during combat. Each time unit will count, with units being granted a better chance of defending themselves if they have time units to spare after taking their turns.
Combat is also extremely deadly; badly positioning your soldiers can lead to a quick and untimely death at the hands of the enemy! A blend of melee, ranged, and explosive attacks will be useful in turning the tide of a battle. 8 different enemy archetypes with multiple variations within will expand the possibilities in battle and make each encounter formidable. Expect the unexpected!
Build And Research!
Improve your weapons, armor and items via a dynamic research system that does away with traditional tech trees in favor of a more procedural approach; each piece will have their own tech progression, which can first be unlocked by researching an existing item. This way players can focus research on items that more favor their playstyle; become an assassin with ranged weapons, focus on impenetrable armor and so on. But beware; the enemy is smart and paying attention to what you do, and they may just focus on tactics to counter you!
Players will also be able to build up the infrastructure for their headquarters, constructing new buildings and improving old ones as they see fit in order to gain bonuses and gain combat advantages. But these expansions must be planned carefully; there is always the possibility of an enemy attack on your hq, which could be very difficult to defend if you were haphazard with your planning!
And More!
Shadows of the Sengoku also features:
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Comprehensive mission tree system to direct the actions of your clan
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Wide variety of procedurally generated missions to keep the gameplay always fresh
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Intricate diplomatic system that allows you to form alliances, start wars, and betray your friends
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Unique Daimyo personality that will shape the way each individual clan acts
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An AI learning system that learns and adjusts to your tactics on the battlefield
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Annex provinces via diplomacy or conquest
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Non-combat missions that may drastically affect the world and provide you with benefits
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The ever-present threat of retaliation by the Emperor should your clan grow too powerful, be it politically or militarily
Read More: Best 4X Grand Strategy Games.
SimPocalypse
UI has an unusal design to help increase the options for the massive number-growth generator applications that all idle-clickers are.
The demand for input from you as a player feels obstructive at a fair bit of time and the techs that allow you to automate yourself away are not clearly advertised with the tech tree being ‘shrouded’. This can add some frustration.
There is little else to add, the combat is mostly for show - my own ‘35K force’ tank brigade does not take any damage at all anymore when facing supposedly superior forces and development of my faction has pretty much gone to a standstill for the past 5 hours while I’m tabbed out letting the auto-combat handle conquering everything.
– Real player with 92.4 hrs in game
This is a ‘yes, but’ review, so. If you’re skimming, pass this one up. If you’re interested in details on why this MIGHT be for you, read on.
So. This is one of those compelling semi-idle games where you fundamentally click things on spreadsheets to make the numbers go up until you literally take over the world. And that’s pretty fun! However.
For the random store browser, there’s not much more to it than that, and I think there’s a lot of room to be disappointed with your purchase.
For people who enjoy the semi-idle thing…?
– Real player with 23.9 hrs in game
Space Empires I
I remember playing Space Empires way back ages ago, so I was pretty excited to pick the series on steam again and replay them.
Sadly, Space Empires I is NOT FUNCTIONAL on windows 10 at this time. It cannot process a single turn, crashing to desktop when ‘end turn’ is pressed. game load and save functions also do not work either.
This should have been tested more before release.
– Real player with 0.6 hrs in game
I had no idea Steam was carrying the Space Empires Series, and was incredibly shocked to see SE I and not SE II on the store list. So a little bit of history here. Aaron Hall back in 1993 was working on his personal project Space Empires and formed this game as a prototype for something bigger and in 1995. We got Space Empires II.
Space Empires II was technically the first product released to the public and I remember sending in a money order to purchase this game after playing the shareware forever back in the mid 90s. I also got the CD when buying the complete bundle with Space Empire 4 Gold back in the early 2000s. Which was the only way I knew at the time, on how you actually got the original Space Empires prototype.
– Real player with 0.2 hrs in game
Mini Gal4Xy
I’ll try to keep it short as MiniGal4Xy is. This game is a Distilled 4x Strategy Game made with its base parts. Meaning it shows you a standard eXplore, eXpand, eXploit and eXterminate experience. The difference though is that this is not a multiplayer game and it is a solitary experience because of that.
This game it built in an arcade style with score building and randomness (similar to Roguelikes). The reasons that I give this game a positive review is that it is simple to learn. Which makes it a decent learning tool for those that don’t know how to play or feel overwhelmed with most other games in this genre. Think of it as a Skull Girls or TFH’s for people who want to understand how the core parts of a 4x game operates. You use it before introducing the complicated stuff.
– Real player with 13.5 hrs in game
This is a good, fast paced, easy to learn game. If you like the 4x type of games but don’t have 10 hours to sit and play one this is a good alternative I managed to complete 6 games and the tutorial in about an hour. Initially games are limited to 20 turns and don’t take very long to play through which is something that I enjoyed about it. I unlocked the 25 turn game on my 5th game and played it on my 6th. I managed to so far unlock 3 other races, beside the starting race, and each of them play very differently. I can see this game has a lot of replayability as each time I started a new game it was vastly different having randomised planet layout and research trees. All in all I think this is a great game if you don’t have enough hours in the day for the more complex 4x games or if you just want to relax and not overthink things.
– Real player with 9.9 hrs in game
Translunar Enterprises
Translunar Enterprises gives gamers the tools they need to compete in randomly generated sandbox universes. In these universes are multiple worlds to either colonize or exploit for their resources. Players can either fight for more resources through war or complex trade agreements. With a unique design system that enables players to design new reactions from elements and components, They can share or keep the research they discover throughout the game.
As a player, you will have to manage the economics, production chains, colonies, wars, and research of your corporation. Dive into the translunar universe where you will play as a corporation, either alone or with friends. Each session will never be the same as each universe is generated randomly, which will force you and your opponents to think differently on each playthrough. You can take up arms if you can’t find a peaceful resolution, or fuel the fire between other players and sell your high-tech weaponry to the highest bidder.
Features
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Community driven development
During early access, the community will be involved in what will be coming in the next patch. We value your feedback immensely, and we want you to be a part of this game’s development! We, the developer, will select a few features that we can manage for the upcoming milestones, and then you get to vote on what is most important to you! Be a part of the community!
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City Building on Planets, 4x In Space
Command your locations and your resources located in space and on different planets! You won’t have to manage menus to upgrade and build your megacity or industrial complexes, because they are created on the very planet surface! Space travel and combat will never be a menu or numbers game. Use your battle strategies and tactics to your advantage and prepare to defend yourself against enemy players and space pirates. Build Missile frigates for reinforcement and then counter incoming attacks with close-ranged defense systems that will eliminate most missiles. Or you can blast your enemies into nothingness with the power of your railguns. You control everything with the flick of a finger.
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Player Driven Design
The players are in full control of designing the items that exist in their universe. You can trade, sell, and produce each of your items, control the market with your designs, and specify who can produce your items and the cost of the royalty fees they must pay. With over 20 different items to design and more on the way, each player is challenged to find the best combination while keeping their resources stocked by trade or mining. Successful execution of these skills will reveal the pros and the rookies.
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Sandbox
Whether you choose to build entire cities, harvest and collect every resource in the known universe or become a warlord that make the strongest of players scream in fear, the decision is up to you to do exactly what you want. Play your way and fulfill your destiny!
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Realtime Combat
When war strikes the universe, each player controls a battlefleet that fights in real time. Proper management, skilled tactics, and careful planning can turn any battle into a victory. You can also control individual ships or fleets at the same time to maximize the tactical ability in each combat situation to make sure you win. A corporation without protection rarely gets its mineral safe to harbor.
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Multiplayer
Multiplayer gaming is at the foremost of this game. Together with integrations from Steam, your gameplay experience will be as smooth as possible. Play alongside your friends, or fight and destroy enemy players who have just as much to lose as you do!
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Production Management
Transport minerals across the universe to manage production and raise it to its highest possible level. Optimize your production and transports for maximum output. You, the player, have full control over the market and what to sell and buy. Players can also choose where to sell or buy. Cause these prices to skyrocket by hoarding valuable minerals, or by making sure no other mineral transport reaches its destination.
World of Asgabas
In World of Asgabas, you take control of a faction with its unique gameplay and fight your way to conquer of the world. Explore the world, expand your territory, exploit your lands and exterminate your opponents.
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All the factions are unique Join the Knights, the Vikings, the Cowboys or the Pirates and play a different experience each time. The factions are designed to offer a different gameplay, unique progresses, buildings and units.
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Take advantage of the terrain Build your fortresses to be impregnable or conquer rich soils to take over your opponents. Each faction has bonuses related to the terrain that you’ll have to consider.
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Manage your armies Battles between armies take place in a small battlefield and are entirely automated. Organize your armies to take the best out of your units.
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And more to come… There are only too many possibilities to add content to this game. New factions, new concepts, new objectives. The game is released in Early Access and new free content will be frequently added.
Age of Wonders: Planetfall
This game is easily one of the best newer strategy games (i.e. 4X style game) currently available for single player in my opinion, period. I’ve had a lot of time to try several of these sorts of games that are considered the top games in the category lately. Civ, Total War games, Stellaris, Endless Legend, the list goes on, but I always come back to this one.
NOTE: Many of the reviews for this game were from when the game was released, since then they did a massive update that re-balanced the game and overhauled several mechanics. A lot of the comments in negative reviews were from a year+ ago using the old mechanics. This game is being actively improved / patched as of Oct 2020 from what I’ve seen and they’re still releasing an expansion.
– Real player with 1901.7 hrs in game
As the game is now, I do not recommend it.
I played the entire series extensively, over 4.000 hours over all titles of the series, for me personally, they changed things that were good about the game, and kept things that were bad about it.
City Siege
The first thing that is really noticeable and changes the dynamic of sieges entirely, they removed gates from city walls, those were replaced by militias and defensive towers, however these militias don’t have mods, and you can’t aim the towers, so any other troop that attacks the city will be stronger.
– Real player with 1383.1 hrs in game
Alliance of the Sacred Suns
A thousand years in the future, humanity’s last empire stands on the brink of collapse. Noble Great Houses compete for control over the decaying feudal state, while the lives of ordinary people have already begun the descent into an interstellar dark age.
You are the young emperor or empress, preparing to ascend the throne. You carry the last glimmer of hope for a brighter future among the stars.
Alliance of the Sacred Suns immerses you fully in the role of ruler. You will create your character, selecting from a variety of backgrounds and abilities. You will engage in conversations and develop relationships with your officials. You will make hard choices in illustrated narrative events, some threatening the stability of your fragile reign, others shining the faintest hope of a new dawn for your dying empire.
Your empire’s long decline means that you begin as ruler in name only. The nobility has coalesced into a handful of Great Houses, and their power has been growing for generations at the expense of imperial control. Members of the Great Houses dominate the imperial bureaucracy and complicate your rule. Yet, the strength of the Great Houses also provides critical support to your empire. A council of nobles serves as a check on your authority, but also a chance to build consensus for your policies.
You cannot micromanage the daily affairs of each planet in your empire, and you do not have omnipotent control of the economy or military. Instead you can only wield your authority as a real emperor or empress would, by managing relationships and politics to rule through appointed officials. Some serve as your governors, ruling planets and star systems in your name.
There are no build queues to micromanage. Instead, exercising wisdom in whom to entrust with official appointments will be critical to the development of planets within your empire. But you must tread carefully, and you cannot make appointments on merit alone. The scion of a powerful House may prove an incompetent governor, but stripping them of position may have consequences far worse than a badly run colony.
You too are a member of a Great House. Your House and those of the other noble families will each employ a unique playstyle. For example, Houses with a technocratic tradition will research advanced technologies to grow their power, while those with a mercantile culture strengthen their rule through economic growth and trade.
These factors will play out differently depending on which of several available scenarios you choose. Each scenario includes unique political situations and victory conditions.
Mods
Alliance of the Sacred Suns is built to support modding. Players can access much of the game mechanics and content through text and XML editing. We are excited to see what worlds modders will create using our politics-in-space framework.