Micro-or-Mini Management PC Strategy Game? 89
darth_MALL writes "I've been looking high and low for the ultimate (could even be free!) single-player PC strategy game that offers detailed troop/battle management. I've met a few contenders that fit the bill: Medieval: Total War is a primo candidate, but Europe just ain't enough! I hate to say, the magic is gone - what I really want is to conquer the known universe from top to bottom. I checked out Ferion, as per another /.'ers suggestion, but it wasn't quite the same thrill as M:TW. What is a bloodthirsty, single player tyrant to do?"
Pocket War is pretty good especially for on the go (Score:1, Interesting)
It has very large randomly generated maps that take forever to beat, and even better the core of the product is written in a javascript like language that is exposed so its really easy to add new units, AIs, etc. It even comes with script documentation and sample files showing how to make your own mods.
It runs on Pocket PCs and Windows and you can sync games back and forth between to the two for continued play on the go. I've really enjoyed it. It looks like the whole company that makes it though is run by a single person.
Freeciv (Score:5, Interesting)
Oldie but a goodie! (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Oldie but a goodie! (Score:3, Interesting)
If you like Master of Magic, try Age of Wonders: Shadow Magic.
Myth (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Pocket War is pretty good especially for on the (Score:2, Interesting)
Civ3 (Score:4, Interesting)
Technology's going too fast. One of the only way to win when you play at higher difficulties is to have the best techs, so you can have the most powerful units. However, by the time you build an army to attack, your units are already obsolete, and upgrading is quite expensive. Thus, the only time where there is real war is when everybody has the modern tanks and ICMBs and stealth jets. Thus, all the other units are in case you get attacked.
This is of course if you don't annihilate your ennemy at the start of the game. So, that's either at the start, or at the end of the technology tree that things move.
I wonder if there is a mod that makes technologies MUCH more expensive ( I think of something like 3X or 4X more expensive ). I guess it would make the game much more enjoyable, and would make it *necessary* to trade technologies in order to reach the 4th age before 2050, and even if everybody still is at 2nd age at 2050, that would have been a cool game
X-COM? (Score:4, Interesting)
Combat Mission (Score:4, Interesting)
It's sort of turn-based. You give instructions to all of your units that are in-command (yes, it takes communication between units into account) and then it executes 10 seconds worth of time (which you can view from any vantage point that is in your area of control), and then you repeat. It is extremely historically accurate, and the most detailed *tactical* computer game I have ever seen. It has the feel of a miniatures game that has been translated over to computer, but done extremely well.
Most of their games also have Mac versions (unfortunately OS9 only -- and don't work in Classic). Their newest Combat Mission game is going to be OSX, but I can't remember if that's out yet.
Re:VGA Planets 3 / Planets 4 (Score:2, Interesting)
MTW is cool (Score:3, Interesting)
I tend to play games 12 hours at a time, its a symptom of my conditio^^^personality. In case anyone was wondering about M:TW, here's my review/strategy guide. Summary: 7 out of 10.
I crank up the difficulty level to max, and just start conquering early on. Build a keep on your starting province, and start pumping out the vikings/infantry.
Conquer your neighbors with the intention of minimizing your borders with other countries. Look for coastal provinces (destroy the piers, so they can't sneak troops in), and natural bottlenecks in the terrain.
Keep your main army centralized, build a keep in every province you capture, and only start building money-making infrastructure once the province isn't bordering someone else's turf. Keep a unit of peasants in each castle so the pleb's don't revolt.
Expand outwards, always be fighting. Even if you can't keep a province, take it over and destroy all the buildings for money. Your army should mostly pay for itself, and the computer doesn't tend to rebuild castles.
If the folks revolt, send in the bishops and build a church. Assassinate the imams, they cause civil unrest. Only build units of vikings, feudal sargeants, and heavy cavalry - everything else is a waste. Go into battle with 50% more strength than the enemy has, and retreat from any even fights (its expensive to loose).
Once you get established, build a shipyard and start cranking out the baddest ships you can. I find it helpul to have a province on the atlantic and the mediterranean with a shipyard, so you can replace destroyed vessels more quickly. Naval superiority is easy to get if you start early, and will allow you lots of advantages.
Don't mess with the pope - you can conquer his little territory, but you get excommunicated and there's tons of rebellions. Sometimes he asks you to stop attacking nations, and its generally a good idea to listen unless you can get a major strategic advantage by conquering.
I like to start as the Danes, and conquer the bordering German province in the first few years of play. Then, once a foothold is established on the mainland, swing north and conquer Sweden. Sweden's a cash cow, tons of resouces and agriculture. Once the swede's are pacified, then resume the attack on the mainland.
If I play all night I can usually conquer most of the world, such that the game conceeds defeat. Its fun, but the AI doesn't use much long-term strategy. The game manages to be challenging just by throwing up random rebellions of really strong units.
The beginning is great fun, and your little men have their own personalities and descriptions. The endgame is a little disappointing for the amount of work required to get there. The tactical combat can be fun at first, but after the first 5 or 10 battles I just click auto-resolve. I never go into a fair fight, and its no fun to manually route and chase down a couple squads of archers.
The graphics are decent (for a strategy game), the music is good. Its one of the only games I've ever played that causes me stress. There really is alot to manage when you own 70% of the known world.
This was my longest slashdot post ever, whew!
Uncommon Valor (Score:3, Interesting)
It is *not* a tactical sim. The most control you have is to set operational postures and aircraft missions. Each day's action is fought out by friendly and enemy AI. Watching a major airstrike go after the wrong group is definitely exciting, maybe too frustrating for some. Your main concern as the player will be to keep your bases supplied and a steady flow of aircraft to the front lines. You get to do plenty of micromanagement in logistics.
The game is well supported, it got plenty of patching - sadly it needed it. The developers are now upgrading the engine to cover the whole frickin' war in the Pacific (and will then retrofit the new engine back to the South Pacific campaign).
Mod parent up! :) (Score:2, Interesting)
However, i must also talk about this blissful game.
I never got into VGA4 testing, as it is even more micromanagement (more than i can take). But having played my share of VGA 3 games i must praise it as one of the best multiplayer games ever. You could play it on your own, but the "AIs" out there (Admiral.exe, Dominate.exe
The ELEVEN factions are extremely balanced. You can play as the Borg! How cool is that? I played versus 10 other people with weekly turns, and the possibilities for alliances, treason, double play and the likes are endless
There are UFOs, Meteorites, Cloaking, Space Minefields, Warp Speeds, Lasers, Torpedoes, Shields, Carriers with Fighters, Terraforming, Assimilation, Orbital Bases, Transports
Although the initial GUI is horrible, there are tons of programs you can use as the file formats are well documented. I used VPA as my main GUI
Alrigh, i'm getting nostalgic. Time to download it again (it's shareware, with a limit on tech, but nothing that dampens mixed play with registered players
Re:HoI (Score:3, Interesting)
Good grief! Do not touch Hearts of Iron or EU (I or II) with a ten-foot barge-pole.
EU was a good strategy game (it's based on a boardgame of the same name) but the implementation was appaulling and it is incredibly bugged.
EU II was a marginal improvement (really an expansion for which you had to pay full price) but even more buggy and the game balance was even more screwed: and don't get me started on their historical events. These "happen" regardless of what's going on in the game. For example, playing Spain I had several bouts of hyperinflation brought on by the "Spanish Armada" event. This despite the fact that not only had I not launched the Armad: I wasn't even at war with England, in fact they were an ally !!
Hearts of Iron though is the crowning pile of crap. EU at least had the advantage of some play balance as a result of basing it on an existing board game. Hearts of Iron is just awful, it is so unbalanced and unplayable and plain silly. For example it is easy to get an event, playing as the USA, that sees the USA suddenly switch to Communist. Yeah right.
Medieval:Total War is just so much better than any of Paradox's offerings.
Dominions II (Score:3, Interesting)
On the downside, the initial learning curve is a bit steep. Check out the demo [shrapnelgames.com] but believe me, even the veteran gamer will want to take a run through the fan created tutorial [maladjustite.com]