King of the Universe
In the 24th century BC, the Sumerians have turned the land of Mesopotamia from a simple Cradle of Civilization to the home of empires. It is your mission to take control of the kingdom of Kish and conquer your enemies, in order to become Lugal Kiški, King of the Universe.
The Sumerians, or “the black-headed people” (Sag̃-g̃i-ga in their native tongue), were the first people to invent both civilization and writing. Their well-organised and state-run societies make the perfect setting for a strategic video game. In King of the Universe, you will not only try to conquer your enemies, you will also have to take care of your own people.
Through military means you gather land and slaves, and through economic means you build new structures for your people. If your citizens do not produce enough supplies to quench your war machine, you will fail. If you do not protect your citizens from foreign invaders, you will fail. This game is about balance, and only by finding it will you become King of the Universe.
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Tiles
Claim tiles and build or destroy structures. Watch your people go about their day-to-day lives.
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Wealth
Garner Silver and resources, such as Food, Metal and Tools.
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Troops
Build an army, and order your soldiers around. Follow your individual troops with the camera.
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Slaves
Collect slaves when conquering foreign land, and use these to build new structures in your kingdom.
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Citizens
Keep an eye on the hunger and health of your people. Make sure every class in your kingdom has enough money to survive.
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Pricing
Decide the prices of wares in your kingdom, to control the economy to ensure profits for your state.
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Trade
Buy and sell with the other empires, to build relations and gain an extra income for your war machine.
Read More: Best Historical PvE Games.
Call to Arms - Gates of Hell: Ostfront
Lots to like about this game - single player (multiple modes), multiplayer (coop and pvp), AI is challenging in SP mode. The dynamic campaigns have great replayability. Graphics and sound are excellent. Realism is pretty good - still plenty of compromises for gameplay reasons, but it is immersive and intense nonetheless.
As far as downsides, the learning curve is pretty steep and some actions aren’t explained very well. Controls can be challenging [do I left-click or right-click to do that? Hey, I said to MOVE there, not drop a mortar barrage on your covering infantry!]. Some additions to the unit information page would be nice to have.
– Real player with 594.4 hrs in game
Read More: Best Historical Level Editor Games.
Fantastic game with so much attention to detail. Physics are amazing and still getting constant maintenance and content updates. After Assault squad Cold war I was worries that this would not live up to Assault Squad 1 & 2 but it does. Its great
– Real player with 257.1 hrs in game
Grand Tactician: The Civil War (1861-1865)
I like this game quite a lot. Honestly the Civil War games are exceptionally hard to create due to the complexity required for the multiple aspects involved. Prior to this there’s been some solid battle based games but they follow a simplified path to victory or failure, there’s no campaign.
Here there’s both a battlefield and campaign strategy, you couldn’t implement your tactical goals even on the very best games prior to which probably was Civil War Generals 2 back in the 90’s.
The battlefield gets modified by simple modifiers like entrenchments and fortifications as well as fatigue and range of weapons, as prior to games. The kicker is they now can do days and nights of movements not seen in Sid Meiers and its newest remake.
– Real player with 424.6 hrs in game
Read More: Best Historical War Games.
Immersive with a decent naval model, unlike Forge of Freedom which falls flat in terms of Naval modelling. The game could use more detail in naval combat, especially riverine Naval/Land combat in restricted navigation areas like rivers and coastal areas. River Combat, coastal combat and ocean combat are all very different and require different mechanics. Naval actions need more detail, period, to match the detail in land action. For example, the presence of a fleet seems to have no effect on the ability of an opposing force to use nearby bridges and fords. Another would be using a circular zone of blockade (fine for ocean) for a riverine fleet. The zone in this cast should obviously be linear to match the shape of the river. A coastal blockade would be a rectangle matching the shape of the coast. All in all, much promise here.
– Real player with 282.2 hrs in game
Syrian Warfare
«What kind of Arab would I be if I didn’t have a RPG buried in my yard…?»
- Random guy in first mission after being asked to help defending the village
Wheew, what a ride. Definitely my personal surprise RTS of 2017 so far!
Syrian Warfare is a classic Real Time Strategy game brought to you by tiny Russian developer Cats Who Play. Since some members of the team also worked at GFI before, you could say the game is an unofficial sequel or spin-off to the 2008 RTS Warfare. Judging from videos or screenshots (and even the title font) the similarity is evident.
– Real player with 128.4 hrs in game
Syrian Warfare is a modern-day real-time tactics game with some excellent core gameplay, a surprisingly well-made campaign and complex, detailed mechanics that will be familiar to those who have played Men of War, another Russian-developed strategy game series, albiet with a significantly more user-friendly interface.
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I had heard of the game last year but didn’t purchase it until now. I had recently been playing the Modern Combat mod for Company of Heroes which got me going back to playing some older modern day RTS/RTT games. I replayed a bit of World in Conflict (which was still as good as I remembered it.) but couldn’t quite maintain my interest in Act of Aggression. Given my experience with the latter I felt that I wouldn’t have much luck going back to the Wargame series since I had never been able to maintain interest in any of the series.
– Real player with 98.2 hrs in game
Castles II: Siege & Conquest
Fun game that brings back a lot of great memories! However, right now the game is broken. Whenever I try to “design” a castle, the screen goes black and it locks up. I can’t find anything about how to fix this, so I guess I’m out of luck :-(
The only reason I don’t recommend this game is for this reason.
EDIT: Discovered how to get around the crash. Save a castle or make your own and then load them all out from the saves. Haven’t had a crash since! Changing my recommendation.
– Real player with 347.4 hrs in game
This is the first video game I can remember playing as a young kid, it was great to take a trip down nostalgia lane. Castles 2 is a game where you must balance resource accumulation, military advancement, build castles to prevent peasant revolts, please the pope with indulgences, and increase your stake for the title of King of France. I enjoy this game because I grew up with it, Castles 2 is older and does not have a tutorial to take your hand and explain the game, however after a few play throughs the game mechanics and strategy is easy. I do want to warn people that my opinion of this game is biased largely by nostalgia. I do think for its time it is an excellent strategy game but compared to contemporary games in its genre is simplistic and lacks intricacies that strategy game buffs come to expect for exciting gameplay. I recommend this game, but if you are on the fence about it, I would wait for the price to come down, I argue that 10$ for this game is too high. Also hold down the right mouse button to speed up gameplay.
– Real player with 109.2 hrs in game
Field of Arms: Tactics
Field of Arms: Tactics is a strategy game set in the 18th century Caribbean, recreating clashes between the empires of the time for control of territories, with a unique board game aesthetic, players will face the enemy in a tactical map to defend or attack strongholds in sieges and maneuver units during tense battles.
Using a real time with pause system where every move and action counts, the player will need to be aware of each of their unit’s defensive and offensive capabilities, and also the type of terrain they are standing on.
Features
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Play as different empires (England, Spain)
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Play through Scenarios in Historical Battles
– Command different units, each one with unique gameplay elements and abilities. Unit types: Infantry, Artillery, Cavalry, and Naval vessels.
- 18th Century maneuver warfare: Take into account unit properties like fields of fire and broadsides of ships.
–Battlefields with different objectives and plenty of opportunities for a variety of tactics and approaches
– Use different tactics taking into account the terrain. Also be wary of enemy fortifications and Structures.
– Built on Unreal Engine 4
Gameplay Mechanics
Units have the following characteristics:
-Firing arc: Units can only fire in their respective arcs. Infantry fires forward and ships sideways.
-Facing: The unit has to rotate to bring weapons to bear, during which it will be unable to move or fire.
-Terrain properties: Each terrain has defensive bonuses and movement speed depending on the type.
-Unit damage dynamics: Each unit has different damage bonuses depending on the unit they attack.
Unit Flanks: Depending on where the unit is attacked (front, flanks or rear) it will receive damage accordingly.
Roles and gameplay variety
Careful use and positioning of units make the base gameplay for the tactical battles in Field of Arms: Tactics.
Infantry: Main units, makes up the bulk of the armed forces. Exercise a variety of roles and are used to control territory.
Artillery: Long Range units focused on attacking enemy fortifications.
Naval Units: One of the most important features in Field of Arms: Tactics is that you can not only play with the soldiers on the ground but also command the available ships on the sea bombarding from afar and help your army achieve victory.
Wonhon: A Vengeful Spirit
After playing the demo I waited for this for so long…. and the full game surpasses my expectations. More enemy types and mechanisms and more brain racking to finish a mission. Also if you played the demo, the full game lets you CARRY OVER YOUR SAVE FILE. Awesome.
So what’s this game? Well in addition to the descriptions above I must say, the AIs can be pretty aggressive… not knowing the map fully on first tries, you are prone to die a lot. (remember: your hon gauge fills up when newly possessing someone and use a bit of that to dash through walls at the end of the gauge to get away) The game does let you play with fewer enemies if you die too many times or are having trouble but no real manual difficulty setting which I like. It’s immersive. You can’t choose the difficulty in life. It was nightmare mode for the Koreans in 1920 every day.
– Real player with 20.6 hrs in game
I was captivated by the E3 presentation so much that I had to play. I love horror, especially eastern stuff like Fatal Frame, so I might be a bit biased.
It’s a fun game, but quite repetitive. There are a lot of bumps that I’ll explain, but nothing to serious to stop you from playing. It’s significantly easier than it looks, even offering to replay missions with fewer enemies when you die often, and never (visibly) penalizing you for it.
Much of the game consists of three different types of missions; slaying, in which you’ll kill everyone in sight, fetch quests, where you’ll sneak around to get something for some spirits eternal rest, and the unfortunate bulk of them, will be rescue missions (escorts). The Ai can only really get stuck in the same places you would, which you will likely memorize and avoid, which is bearable, it’s okay as they follow you quite closely at an inconsistent speed. Most of Challenge mode consists of escorts, which is off putting, but the main game is enjoyable enough for 4-5 hours, especially in terms of rich atmosphere, and locations through different seasons, the best part.
– Real player with 13.8 hrs in game
The Stone of Madness
The Stone of Madness is a hardcore real-time tactics and stealth game set in a Spanish madhouse in the late 18th century. Located in the Pyrenees, a timeworn Jesuit monastery is home both to a madhouse and an inquisitorial prison. Five mysterious characters have been imprisoned between its walls under different pretenses. Plagued by cruel punishment, madness and despair, they will soon devise a plan to escape this place.
Escape the Madness
Using an isometric perspective take and alternate control of your characters and aid their escape. Depending on how you play, their sanity will deteriorate, gaining them a “Stone of Madness” and triggering new disabilities and negative effects such as paranoia, dementia or bouts of violence.
Explore your surroundings, find clues and tools to help you achieve your goal. Be careful though, if you’re caught being somewhere you shouldn’t be the guards will not be kind…
Character Progression & Regression
We all have our strengths and weaknesses and our heroes are no different. Each character starts with various traumas and phobias. Depending on how you play, their sanity will deteriorate, gaining them a “Stone of Madness” and triggering new disabilities and negative effects such as paranoia, dementia or bouts of violence. This in turn increases the game’s difficulty. Characters can also unlock positive skills or reverse the negative effects on their sanity by finding “Stones of Clarity” which are scattered throughout the monastery. Some actions may exacerbate phobias and other mental conditions or even trigger new conditions to develop.
Discover the Secrets of the Monastery
Choose from several different escape plans to execute, each with its own stories, objectives, special characters and other surprises. While exploring the monastery you may come across items or clues that can aid different escape plans or future attempts. These items can unlock new content for your future play-through’s.
You have no memory of this place…
Each new game generates a different monastery thanks to a semi-procedural system. Everything from the monastery lay-out to item location is variable making each play session as fresh as the first.
Day/Night Cycle
Time is continuous in The Stone of Madness; Day & Night phases are split with actions to complete during the day and preparation activities (healing/crafting/resting) at night. Most actions can be completed during the day while others, are better done at night with fewer eyes watching. But there are reasons you should not go prowling at night…
Stunning and Original Artwork
The Stone of Madness' visuals are heavily inspired by 18th century artist, Francisco De Goya. Everything from scenery, to clothes and even character faces are influenced by De Goya’s works. Combining his styles with our artist team’s sketching and animation has resulted in numerous hand-painted scenes and hundreds of traditional-style animations that is both eye-catching and enhances the isometric-perspective The Stone of Madness uses.
Features Overview
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Master Tactician– Plan and execute your escape in real-time, utilize each characters’ unique abilities and escape the Monastery.
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The Prisoners – Play as five unique and flawed characters, discover why each has imprisoned.
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Secrets of the Monastery - Explore the monastery and you may come across items or clues to unlock new content for future play-through’s.
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Character Progression/Regression – Each character has special skills and unique flaws that can help or hinder or progress.
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Endless Escapes - There are multiple escape plans to attempt by exploring the monastery. The monastery map also changes with each play-through, moving key and items to other locations.
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Stunning and Original Art - Exquisite hand-painted and original works inspired by 18th century artist, Francisco De Goya
The Stone of Madness takes inspiration from;
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Shadow Tactics: Blades of the Shogun
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Desperados 3
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Broken Lines
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Darkwood
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Darkwood
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Commandos
Partisans 1941
Introduction
I was naturally interested in Partisans 1941, as real-time tactics games based on World War 2 are quite rare lately, especially when they offer a bit more unique view on skirmishes behind the enemy lines rather than on commanding the Red Army. In the end, it surprised me how I was thrilled to start a new mission each time, but my enthusiasm went a bit down due to constant performance issues and occasional minor bugs. As if we could not get a decently done game in all aspects lately.
– Real player with 44.2 hrs in game
I was really craving a game like this for a very long time and it has definitelly scratched that itch. It really reminded mo a lot of the old Commandos games. I’ve been ingame for 32 hours, but I would say it took me about ~28 to complete the story. If you can afford is, the game is totally worth the buy, I really enjoyed it, but that said I would like to go into details about some (not all) of the games mechanics and give my feedback about what I enjoyed and disliked. Please feel free to comment with anything and especially with updates if something has been resolved. Sooo this is my first proper review on steam, and I didnt know there was a word limit. I was actually 5650 words over the limit in my original review which you can find here here and nelow is a very, very reduced version of the original.
– Real player with 32.2 hrs in game
Scramble
–Overall 8/10–
-Graphics: 6/10: Some parts of the map has icon issues and map looks oddly similar but overall OK UI design and little complexity makes the game more clear to understand
-Gameplay: 7/10: more than enough for a indie developer tycoon/colonisation game.
-Sounds: 10/10: i love the music that plays on the background.Other sounds are great
First of all, this is an indie game even tho it has potential in it you can see by the lack of some aspect; that potential never been used to its maximum. I considered this fact while reviewing keep in mind.
– Real player with 6.3 hrs in game
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Fun to play
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Have potential
+Diffrent type beat for a game
+Great Achivements
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Short play time
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Too repetitive after some games
-Would be great if it had multiplayer or coop
– Real player with 2.4 hrs in game