Species: Artificial Life, Real Evolution
Species: ALRE is a game for those of us longing for the glory days of SimEarth and though those days are long gone we can atleast see some semblance of evolution happening here.
The Good
Species ALRE gives players a wide range of options to steer how evolution will occur throughout their playthrough. There are map-wide effects such as raising or lowering the sea level, increasing or decreasing land fertility, screwing around with the global temperature and more.
Other effects are to introduce artifical selection pressure for traits that the player finds (un)desirable. This is achieved through rovers, spawnable autonomous entities that are given a single mission, to either feed or kill those with the trait in question. This allows the player enough freedom to have his creatures evolve however he wants, such as giving them enormous necks or creating a biome consisting only of hyper-aggressive huge herbivores.
– Real player with 49.7 hrs in game
Read More: Best Real-Time Simulation Games.
I want to be clear: this is not a “game” for everyone, but if the idea is intriguing enough to you and you have some spare cash I would say take the risk and invest in it. There is nothing like this anywhere else. This isn’t some sort of half-assed early access stuff that will poorly mimic other titles then end up abandoned. This is a legit playground for anyone with a fascination with biology, genetics and evolution. If you want to make it a “game” and actively set goals you can. However, a good question to ask yourself is whether you’d be interested in letting the simulation play out without any interference.
– Real player with 45.5 hrs in game
Elva the Eco Dragon
While the concept of a dragon teaching how to care for our environment sounds cute, the game seems to be in need of some cleanup of its own first.
Note: This review was written Feb. 7, 2021 and published originally at SaveOrQuit.com on Feb. 11, 2021 prior to the release of version 1.5.
As a professional educator in the scientific study of the natural world, Elva the Eco Dragon seemed like a game with high potential to dovetail nicely with my day job. Unfortunately, what seemed to be a cute and engaging 3D action-adventure on the surface fails to go deeper in terms of gameplay experience or learning.
– Real player with 2.1 hrs in game
Read More: Best Real-Time Singleplayer Games.
Interstellar Transport Company
Excellent:
Theme. The game brings this out very well. It really feels like you are running the company that is responsible for the interstellar expansion of humanity. The visuals work well. The planets look cool. The ships have fun names. The line of ships you get going from home, out a colony, and back looks good. It is satisfying to see the progress as a colony develops. It feels like you are working to established permanent homes other worlds.
Strategy. You have a lot of choices. You are always deciding what ships to buy, what they should carry, and what route they should take. You usually have options that are either “cheaper and better now” or “more expensive and better later.” You always have “things to work on.” You can choose where new colonies will go. You can tinker with current trade routes to make them more profitable.
– Real player with 324.3 hrs in game
Read More: Best Real-Time Space Games.
This will be a bit of a long one. But I can’t help it.
On the surface I absolutely love everything about this game. I have turned back to it many times trying to make it work. But it just feels like the fundamentals of the gameplay is not working quite right with what the game is trying to be. And I always end up leaving a bit unsatisfied.
The game is about humanity colonizing the solar system and later going beyond. That’s what got me real exited about the game. But that is not what you are doing. You are there to make money. On the surface this is great.
– Real player with 85.7 hrs in game
Ancient Space
The Story, Voice, Music and overall ambiency is in my opinion, very well done. I like the way they used “ingamestoryreasons” to justify enclosed places and the use of buildings, which can be customized to heal, or shoot a specific damage type, or support, or whatever, like tower defense.
With respect to the main gameplay mechanic - ship combat - I think it resembles much Nexus, but it is done in a more micro-intense matter, because you have to SPACEBAR-pause every few seconds to allocate a power, swap repairs, spawn a replacement unit, or issue new orders. This game is thus not really real time strategy but more real time tactics, like ground control, with some Z-axis movement to call it 3D.
– Real player with 31.1 hrs in game
“Ancient Space” is a really decent entry into the space RTS genre, which (very refreshingly) gets away from the ironically boring routine of just having to be fast, fast, FAST!
Indeed, the game pretty much goes in the opposite direction. Many missions are downright…contemplative in pacing. However, this isn’t to say that there aren’t some pulse-pounding moments where you have to think quickly. Indeed, if you forget that you can “get on the gas,” you probably won’t complete all the missions.
Going along with the previous paragraph, I’m very pleased to say that this title emphasizes giving things thought, especially in terms of figuring out what fleet configuration works for you. Frantic micromanagement really isn’t the order of the day, although some micromanagement helps you get the most out of your units. The friendly ship AI isn’t brilliant, but it’s good enough that you can often let them make a number of decisions themselves. This emphasis on strategy (as opposed to hotkey mashing) even applies to those moments where you can’t dawdle: You have to recognize what’s going on and react swiftly but deliberately, whether it’s proceeding with a certain kind of build or just running away.
– Real player with 21.8 hrs in game
Generation Ship
You’re the AI responsible for a generation ship, mankind’s last hope for survival. Build efficient raw material cycles and help your crew in a realistic real-time simulation to survive the hardness of space on their long journey to a new home!
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Realistic Environment controls
air pressure, air composition
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Realistic Artificial Gravity
by spinning the ship
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Realistic Persons
Metabolism using air and nutrition, many needs to be fulfilled
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Realistic resource conversion
Resources are converted between each other
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Everything in real time
No fake time used
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Optimized for simulation
Extreme Gamespeed (100.000x and faster)
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Timewarp
to wait for something, automatic pause in critical situations
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Build a generation ship
as fast as possible
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Take care of your crew
Fulfill their needs
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Make the ship independent
Grow your own food, build resource cycles
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Build it large enough
to survive the long journey
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Connect Storages
To manage the resource flow
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Recycle Resources
Convert them into resources that are needed
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Get supplies from earth
Till you are independent from them
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Gather Resources in Missions
(coming soon)
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Life support
several Environment Controls
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Crew Supply
Toilets, Sleeping quarters, Canteens,…
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Food Production
Greenhouses, Kitchen,…
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Artificial Gravity buildings
Mass Balancers, Spinning engines
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and much more
Power Brain Trainer
Power Brain Trainer… Why not? I like it.
– Real player with 6.3 hrs in game
Nice update. Much better. It seems like it would be better to abstract the properties and get people into the game faster… You could have 3 settings… Easy, Medium, Hard, and then one or two custom setups.
At this point I would recommend the game, but if I change my recommendation it will “clear other users recommendations”… I don’t really know what that means… so I’ll leave the official recommendation the same.
– Real player with 5.1 hrs in game