Hegemony Gold: Wars of Ancient Greece
Hegemony Gold: Wars of Ancient Greece Review
Nostalgia Goggles Factor: Very Low
Bug Factor: Low
Crash Factor: Crashless
Replay Factor: Low
Developed by only a handful of people, Hegemony Gold: Wars of Ancient Greece is a pausable RTS game and logistics food management simulator set in the age of the destructive Peloponnesian war and the rise of Philip II’s Kingdom of Macedon. Wonderful game for any history buffs out there.
The Good
- Three scenarios; Philip II of Macedon, which is also the tutorial, the Archidamian War and the Ionian War.
– Real player with 191.0 hrs in game
Read More: Best Strategy Historical Games.
I bought this during the summer sale but it well worth the standard price. Its a simple concept (raise troops, pay them, feed them, attack your neighbors) but finding the right balence makes it much more complex than you might think. Definitely a different spin than any of the other strategy games you might also be playing, EUIV, Total War, CKII.
- Supply Lines/Logistics- Your cities each have a predetermined number of trade routes based on the economic power of that city. Some have 2, some have 16. These can connect to farms (which produce food, with varying amounts for each season), mines (which produce gold when worked by workers or slaves captured in battle), and they connect to other cities. Food moves along these routes with different capacities based on how long it is. Some routes that are very close (like a city to the farm next to it) can carry up to 100 a week and longer routes usually start at a base level of 15 per week, but can be upgraded by paying gold. Your units replentish their losses only if they are on one of these supply lines.
– Real player with 138.9 hrs in game
Red Planet Farming
What a great little game. Approachable for casual players, challenging for min/maxers, and those looking for all achievements. An incredible value considering it’s free; it took me about 15 hours to get every achievement and max out settlers in every map. It’s not hard to progress through the game, in fact if you’re trying to speed run it, it seems simply ballooning your population as quickly as possible is the way to go since all progression is based on population numbers. But if you’re trying to go for a certain strategy or goal you will find yourself restarting the 4 levels multiple times which can get frustrating. If you are such a player here’s a tip: the “results screen” is effectively the save point, so if run into a sudden bad result and want to avoid a population crash which will destroy an “optimal” run, alt+f4 at the results screen when you see your food production is significantly below your population needs, then continue the level when you restart the game. don’t do it if you’re only a little below, since knowing how to loose a few people without invoking the cemetery is necessary for an optimal run in the early game.
– Real player with 14.5 hrs in game
Read More: Best Strategy Sci-fi Games.
This development of this game was funded with a grant, and apparently it’s completely free, but if it were sold for money, I would pay for it. I would pay at least 5 dollars.
Red Planet Farming is a lot of fun. Disclosure, I am biased towards the theme, I love space and sci-fi. But I think the mechanics of this game work out pretty well. What makes the game fun is overcoming challenges and making progress. You have to figure out how to make a productive farm, how to plan developments, how to spread the seed base out so you don’t deplete a crop, and when you should mitigate risks (using protective measures or not).
– Real player with 13.8 hrs in game
Creeper World: Anniversary Edition
I originally found the Creeper World series on kongregate.com, and to be frank, I loathed the games then because I didn’t get how to play a strategy game, and definitely not one where each round or level lasts around 30-45 minutes, maybe more. Now that I’ve understood how to actually play Creeper World, I’ve kind of fallen in love with the game. It’s simple enough that with a little patience, you can pick it up with no difficulty. I can see myself now playing this game until I’ve completed every single Chronom level, and it looks like there’s a level for every day that’s ever existed. I played Skyrim until I beat everything, so I can definitely see myself doing this. There’s something about how the game is simplified enough where somebody who doesn’t understand strategy games can legitimately enjoy it, and yet can get so strategic, pretty much like a war simulator. There’s not pages upon pages of customizations, upgrades, troops, so on and so forth. You just have eight units to use as you please with no limit to how many you can use. I’m not even sure I’m doing this game justice with this review. Just remember that this game turned me from an absolute despiser of the series to absolutely loving this game. I don’t recommend the other two due to how different they look, though the graphics of this game just appeal to me really well. The gameplay is also extremely different in the second game, but that’s beside the point. My point is, if you have about an hour or so to spare and don’t want to perform mental gymnastics to enjoy a game, this is for you.
– Real player with 113.2 hrs in game
Read More: Best Strategy Tower Defense Games.
I’ve played way too much CW3 to be able to be objective about those games. But to sum things up they are strategic, tower defense-ish mechanics focusing on area control and will punish you if you try to do too much at the same time. It is a very interesting balancing act in prioritizing economy vs towers. The game play is very original but the UI and graphics are old and outdated.
If you are new to creeper world, get CW3 instead. It is more of the same but objectively better in all areas and has more content. Story might be a reason for starting with CW first, but personally I never cared for any of the story and skipped it all.
– Real player with 24.3 hrs in game
Lazerbait
OK, so maybe I’m a bit obsessed; but I love the hell out of this game! A game that is fun and easy enough to learn, and then frustrating and nearly impossible to master is probably the goal of any strategy game… Lazerbait nailed it. But then to hear the story behind the game, how it was this, like, a DIY experiment… I am blown away and inspired. I hope the next game from T.S. is not free, so I can pay for it twice. If there’s more dev’s to thank… they should have included credits in the game. I beg of you to include your fans suggestions (multiplayer, bug fixes and maybe a story?) in the sequal… as this game for free is a steal. Again, thank you… this game rules.
– Real player with 499.7 hrs in game
This is a simplistic strategy game similar to Eufloria, and highly reminiscent of command school in Ender’s Game. The game is an excellent demonstration of the timelessness of simple strategy games like chess and, to a lesser extent, checkers: very easy to pick up, but endlessly different possibilities that keep you coming back for more.
Highly recommended for at least a quick try as this is an independently developed game offered for free. While adding extra features might betray the minimalist approach, it could be worth a shot to add an extra twist to the experience. If multiplayer is released, this will undoubtedly be a must-have for quick 10 minute strategy battles on the Vive.
– Real player with 26.8 hrs in game
Baldi’s Basics Plus
There’s so much that I love about BB+.
The unique humor, the cruddy art style, the simplistic and satisfying gameplay, the replayability; it’s all great. I’ve been playing this game for quite some time now, and it still hasn’t lost its spark. It’s one of the only games you can replay over and over again, and not find yourself bored after the 20th time replaying.
This game offers a lot: It’s unpredictable, it’s capable of giving you an adrenaline rush that’ll last six hours, and it has a great community. I’ve always been a fan of strategy-based games, and I highly recommend that you buy the game. It’s only ten bucks. You’ll definitely find that the purchase was worth it.
– Real player with 82.2 hrs in game
In a sentence, this game is a procedurally-generated cat-and-mouse game where you must find all the necessary items in order to open the exit and escape to the next level, with a consistent style, multiple items, random events, and more.
Perks:
-Randomly Generated Levels which are very well-done with very little cheap dead-ends.
-Over 15+ items to use to defend yourself from Baldi.
-Random bell-ring events for unexpected challenge or reward the longer you stay in a level.
-All the old pros of the classic Baldi’s Basics return while refining the cons.
– Real player with 55.9 hrs in game
Astronarch
ASTRONARCH
| 🎭 Genre | 🔹Auto battler/Roguelike |
| ▶️ Game Modes | 🔹Single Player |
| 💳 Buying Power | 💲Worth full price |
| 📼 Replay Value | ⬆️ Moderately High |
| 🏆Metacritic Score | 🔹TBD |
☑️Recommended for fans of Roguelikes, RPG’s and/or Auto Battlers.
– Real player with 80.3 hrs in game
An Auto-Battling Lesson in Roguelikeing
I bought Astronarch hoping to have some fun with it for 5, 10 hours tops.
After an hour and a half, having beaten the game for the first time, on my first attempt, I thought, “Uh… that’s it?”
As you can see by my total play time, no, it wasn’t.
This is one of the first games in which I felt like deliberately going after all of its achievements, this is one of the the most well-balanced games I ever played, and it was made by a single guy.
– Real player with 58.1 hrs in game
Dungeon Warfare 2
Old Review (14 Oct, 2018):
I love the first Dungeon Warfare, but I’m not so sure with this one.
The graphics and gameplay stay pretty much the same, but there are more maps and more (types of) enemies.
It’s still possible to refund gems and re-allocate them on the trap-upgrades, but the traps themselves are bought permanently, also with gems. Map-specific missions (“Clear the map”, “Do it in under X min”, “Don’t loose any lives” etc) reward a 1-of-3 choice between extra gems, 1% more starting gold, a bonus skillpoint, % better items, % more items.
– Real player with 820.5 hrs in game
General
It’s a good Tower Defense game. I like the first Dungeon Warfare better, because it’s very easy to overlevel in Dungeon Warfare 2. With overleveling I mean: if you, at any point, take the time to focus on leveling up, you will reach a point where the regular levels are too easy and you don’t have to think about placement anymore.
You can create your own maps with any text editor, like for example Notepad++. However, any loot you get in these custom maps will also be available in regular levels. I would recommend not playing custom levels until after your first playthrough.
– Real player with 143.4 hrs in game
Raiders of the North Sea
I can’t stress how awesome this game is! The board game is fantastic. You get to build a crew and go off on raiding expeditions to get plunder! There’s something inherently satisfying about that. The game mechanics are innovative. You place a worker to take an action, and pick another up to take another action. And there are limitations on what actions you can take based on the color of the worker token. All of this adds to the strategic depth since it limits your options and therefore makes you plan ahead.
– Real player with 25.1 hrs in game
Raiders of the North Sea is a beautiful competitive digital board game, where each player represents a clan of warriors, racing for the most VP (Victory Points) and living the Viking mythos by pillaging, making choices that lead to pillaging, making offerings with the loot from pillaging and then pillaging a bit more! In case you didn’t get the memo pillage is the name of the game! The game is a worker placement where players each take a turn making strategic decisions about where to place their Viking workers. In each turn you either make two moves by placing and then removing another worker or you can straight up pillage (if you meet the criteria). The only thing that’s left to luck are some helpful dice that may aid you in conquering most locations and cards drawn that represent potential rading warriors that you can hire or 1 time use. Anything else is pure strategy, so there is not much luck involved! What I find most interesting, is the player dynamic. Each of your moves may (and should!) anticipate the other players possible moves, in order to stay one step ahead of the game, “forcing” your oponents to the lesser choices. The pillage locations are split in 4 tiers, each one giving potentially more VP (Victory Points) than the previous tiers! Interestingly, the game ends a) if someone conquers the second to last fort (last tier location), b) if someone runs out of offerings (base location that trades pillage loot for VP) or c) someone runs out of Valkyrie tokens (tokens that each represent your clan’s heroic deaths!).
– Real player with 17.7 hrs in game
Particle Fleet: Emergence
TLDR; Awesome game…get it!
I first discovered the KnuckleCracker games with CreeperWorld 1 on some flash games site. At first the game looked pretty basic and simplistic, but I soon found out that was far from correct. Fast forward a few more years to Creeper World 3 (CW3) and I was stunned not just by the game itself, but by the community of map builders. Virgil (the developer of the games) had introduced a scripting language to allow players to create practically anything they could imagine within the world.
– Real player with 201.0 hrs in game
TL;DR. A nice RTS, in the mold of previous games from the same developer, but different enough that you won’t feel you’ve paid twice for the same product.
If you were a fan of Creeper World (any one of the 3), you may be disappointed. There is no Creeper in this game. “Wot?”, I hear you say, “A Knuckle Cracker game with no Creeper? That’s an abomination!”
Maybe so. But remember there was not always Creeper, and maybe there will not be always Creeper - in the CW3 story, there were references to other, long-forgotten races, the Ticon and the Seloi. Maybe they too have stories. Maybe there was (or will be, or always has been) things that were not Creeper and that were hostile. Maybe they were not explicitly hostile - after all, if we need a canoe, are we explicitly hostile to the entities that occupied the ecosystem of that tree that we need for the canoe?
– Real player with 172.9 hrs in game
Immortal Defense
Some of you have probably been waiting for this game to pop up. I considered about where to put it for a little while before eventually deciding to have it be at the very end. That’s because, in my opinion, Immortal Defense is the best tower defense on Steam at the moment.
The peaceful planet Dukis finds itself under attack by the evil Bavakh empire, a war-faring race of red, devilish aliens. Their armadas are vast, and with no notable army of their own Dukis is no match. However, they have one trick up their sleeve: Subject K, who has volunteered to be a Path Defender, a process that involves separating his soul from his body and sending it up into space. It’s unclear whether K represents one of his names, or whether he’s the eleventh person they’ve tried this with. Once up there, K gains the ability to see the Bavakh’s ships as they move through Pathspace (basically hyperspace), and the power to attack and destroy them before they reach their destination.
– Real player with 89.3 hrs in game
Whether you’re new or old to tower defense games, Immortal Defense is a good buy. With tons of unique mechanics but still holding together what makes a good tower defense a good tower defense, and on top of that all a great story considering it’s a game where you’re shooting geometrical shapes flying on a line… Immortal Defense is amazing for what it is.
In Immortal Defense, you play as a Pathspace Defender whose goal is to defend your home planet by literally becoming a god and shooting invisible hellbeams from another plane of existence at people who are invading you. You do this by what else- placing towers! While the story and gameplay get more complicated than that (and bring all sorts of delightful twists and turns), that is the basic premise to the game.
– Real player with 39.4 hrs in game