Balls! Balls!
the game is simple and fine but the music… oh my god it is so bad.
– Real player with 0.1 hrs in game
Read More: Best Tutorial Puzzle Games.
Cauldrons of War - Barbarossa
This is a highly abstract wargame where the abstractions combine elegantly to become more than the sum of its parts. For example, the game has a concept of command points each turn. Each area also has a number representing rail capacity. A rail capacity of 3 means 3 free supply points per turn. When rail capacity decreases in certain area of operations, you are forced to make decisions around prioritizing supply (via truck or horse, which is not always successful) vs. attack/movement. The player is thus forced to tradeoff meeting supply vs. achieving objectives which I think does a good job of conveying a decision that a general would actually need to make.
– Real player with 101.0 hrs in game
Read More: Best Tutorial Grand Strategy Games.
Cauldrons of War is brilliantly designed wargame that puts you in total command of either the Axis or Soviet forces from the German Invasion of the Soviet Union in June of 1941 until the Soviet Counter offensive in the Winter of 1942. It is one of the most tightly designed wargames on the market and yet its surprisingly complex. The game worries you primarily about issues that would worry a General In Chief, (Supply, Type of Operations, Force Composition of those Operations, how hard and far to push etc…) without worrying you about things a lot of wargames try to force on you, even if your rank doesn’t make that make much sense (micro-management) and in that sense this might be the closest experience to being a Field Marshall during the Second World War of anything that’s been released as a game. There are only a few things I’d change to make this game even better, 1. I’d like higher resolution maps, the games imagery does what it needs to do but it could be even better with an eye popping military style atlas with a great resolution. 2. The campaign needs to extend a bit further into 1942, playing as the Russian’s is nowhere near as fun as playing as the Germans because you’re the punching bag for the entire game and only have a few weeks at the very end of the game to counter strike, the game should extend a bit further, in line with the historical Soviet counter offensive in front of Moscow. 3. At times some key information about why certain tactics work and why later those same tactics don’t work, feels hidden. The game might benefit from displaying combat modifiers or other items that help inform the player why things are working and why they aren’t. Those are minor issues however, overall this is a brilliant game and for only $5, you can’t go wrong with it.
– Real player with 20.6 hrs in game
Cauldrons of War - Stalingrad
This game is a good sequel for the last game of this series CoW barbarossa and it seems to have improved a lot. The AI seems much smarter in this game than in the last one and there are a lot more actions to do than before.
I intend to play this game for a long time just like I did with Barbarossa.
I RECOMMEND that you check the game out if you are interested in a large scale operational strategy in a WW2 setting.
– Real player with 92.0 hrs in game
Read More: Best Tutorial Grand Strategy Games.
Pros- URAAAAAA!
Cons- the 6th Army is surrounded in Stalingrad please send help.
I’ve had the game since the beta dropped, and I’m happy to say I’ve enjoyed every minute of it. It gives fresh perspective to the massive amount of challenges both sides face during 42', while still being very tasteful or pulling punches, which I respect.
It’s not a game where one strategy works every time, where yesterday’s blitz straight to Stalingrad means today’s attack will also proceed flawlessly. It’s not a game where the AI will sit and let you roll over them; it’s a fight, sometimes for every inch.
– Real player with 58.3 hrs in game
Tafl Champions: Ancient Chess
This is a fine game, and a free one on top of that.
There’s a surprising amount of tactics behind a very simple core concept.
Played with my friend, enjoyed it quite a bit!
Thought the attacker has a huge advantage by not being too greedy and encircling the field, as well as engaging in fair warrior trades, but defender can do quite a lot with his throne and a retinue of fighters preventing the enemy from capturing too many nearby squares.
Main cons would be unclear rules with the throne - it would be better if UI would suggest what will be captured by each move and King / Throne would be highlighted somehow whenever the Throne is left. This would help recognise that the King can be captured like a normal warrior now and the throne is hostile to defenders too - otherwise too easy to forget it and lose on the spot.
– Real player with 2.0 hrs in game
Bannerlord brought me here, have a review dev, ya deserve it lad
– Real player with 1.2 hrs in game
REM Cycles
Fun game with awesome sound track
– Real player with 9.5 hrs in game
This game has so much character! The action feels quick and intuitive and the music is soo cool. I’m excited to try all the characters I haven’t gotten to yet, so far exploding cats is a personal favorite
– Real player with 5.9 hrs in game
Active Neurons - Puzzle game
This is a fun and engaging game, easy to learn hard to master. Worth more than the asking price; 5/5 would recommend. Honestly a really fun way to spend some spare time for those who are into strategy and puzzle games. Shout out to the dev(s)/designer(s), thanks!
– Real player with 33.8 hrs in game
Its a casual puzzler.Not enaugh challenge for me,infact 70% of the game is like a tutorial.You can find better titles for this price.I really wanted to like this game because it looks nice,it has nice music and plays well overall.Not for me but I would recommend to someone who is getting into puzzlers.Nice but too easy.
– Real player with 6.3 hrs in game
Gaia Project
I had zero Gaia Project experience before booting this up. I think there’s a marginal learning curve to the UI, but after you run through the tutorial and get a game or so in, it’s totally reasonable.
The AI is also fantastic, really an exceptionally well done AI for a game of this complexity. I have about 15 games under my belt, all on 3-player 8-sector, and Hard AI continues to offer a real challenge (winning scores tend to be in the 160-170 range, whether it’s me or the AI pulling it off). The paths taken to victory also seem quite varied, so it’s not like it’s just programmed to spam Econ4 or something dumb; there’s real complexity going on under the hood. It’s not like every decision is perfect, but I seriously think it’d be difficult to find a better done digital board game AI for a game of this sheer scale.
– Real player with 88.7 hrs in game
Honestly I’ve played countless games of Gaia Project IRL, it’s absolutely my favorite TTG, and this digital adaptation is perfectly fine. Yes, there are grammatical errors, but how many of us actually read the EULA to begin with? Oh noes, they forgot the C in Bescods in the achievements! Time to review bomb the game, amirite?
And sure, the UI is “clunky” compared to in-person, but let’s be real here - Gaia Project is probably one of the most complex games most people will ever learn. If you’re taking the time to learn it, you probably have enough smarts in you to get through some menu screens. Upgrade your cognitive navigation track past 1 before you throw your hands up in defeat.
– Real player with 49.5 hrs in game
Brain Games
This is not an ordinary game, this is a whole complex for the development of a megamind. such games are not enough for the modern generation!
– Real player with 13.6 hrs in game
Perfect for playing on my laptop while flying on an airplane, since the game doesn’t require good system resources and is quite suitable for weak PCs or laptops.
– Real player with 4.0 hrs in game
Handball Manager 2021
Awesome game! Finally a good handball game, especially at times, when we can’t play real handball.
It’s fun to progress with your favourite club and create a team of all your favoutire players. You also learn a lot about managing / coaching a real club / team.
Unfortunately it only has the real players for German, Spanish and Czech leagues, but with the editor mode, the community can create the other teams. I will share a data set including all Championsleague teams as soon as I’m done.
There are still some little bugs and crashes in the game, but only one week after sending a bug report, most of them were already fixed.
– Real player with 184.6 hrs in game
The best handball simulator on the market! Although, to be fair, that’s sadly not saying much when looking at the handball games available currently.
The game offers all the options that one could want from being a handball coach. Additionally, the ability to customize your experience through the editor certaintely gives the game a lot more depth and replayability.
However, there are notable flaws. This mainly has to do with the sometimes poor English grammar as well as the fairly outdated graphics - both of these aspects really take you out of the experience. I have also experienced a few crashes from time to time which has resulted in a bit of loss in my game progression. Lastly, the lack of certain official team licenses as well as the sometimes seemingly inconsistent match simulation are also worth noting.
– Real player with 55.4 hrs in game
Monstermonger
Disclaimer: I helped to playtest this.
I had really good fun with this - it’s got that “easy to learn, hard to master” feel. The mechanics are straightforwards, but that disguises some depth of strategy, as I found out when I went from the tutorial to the hard AI and got schooled :-) I’m looking forward to trying multiplayer and finding out how much more there is I don’t know yet!
Very easy to just dip in for a quick game, but also very easy to get sucked into “just one more”…
– Real player with 5.9 hrs in game
I originally downvoted this because I hit a bug fairly early that stopped progression. The developer was very responsive. I sent him some screenshots of the bug and he is making a number of changes. The game is fun, and the creatures are cool. It’s not the world’s deepest game, but it is fun and it’s not expensive. If you like these sort of soft strategy games to relax with, this is actually one of the better ones I’ve seen in recent years.
– Real player with 5.5 hrs in game