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5 months ago
Feature: Hit Parade
An entirely objective ranking of the 50 best PC strategy games ever made, now freshened up to include our favourites from 2017 and 2018. From intricate, global-scale wargames to the tight thrills of guerrilla squads, the broad expanse of the genre contains something for everyone, and we've gathered the best of the best. The vast majority are available to buy digitally, a few are free…
7 months ago
One of the best things about Paradox's increasingly feature-studded and DLC-expanded 4X strategy sandbox Stellaris is its focus on storytelling. In the vein of Crusader Kings 2, you'll find yourself frequently confronted with decisions to make as the ever-living Emperor Of Space, which can often spiral into lengthy story arcs with sometimes spectacular end results. The next expansion for the game, Distant Stars, will be…
8 months ago
Feature: The Eternal Golden Age
All rise and no fall: how Civilization reinforces a dangerous myth
Civilization VI: Rise and Fall wants to solve a problem. That problem is perpetual growth, and it plagues many 4X games. Whether your aim is world conquest or cultural hegemony, victory in Civilization and many of its cohorts depends on domination. However peacefully you try to play, you're often straight-jacketed into a utilitarian-psychotic view where all resources and people are just raw material to be…
9 months ago
Feature: Be pilots, pirates and space truckers
Space games have experienced a rebirth over the past few years, particularly space sims, but as many in the comments pointed out, you don't need to be sitting in a cockpit to enjoy the stars. This updated list broadens our search for the best space games on PC, throwing strategy games, roguelikes and at least one RPG into the mix. Read on to see what…
10 months ago
Feature: The biggest hits of the past 12 months
Another year over, a new one just begun, which means, impossibly, even more games. But what about last year? Which were the games that most people were buying and, more importantly, playing? As is now something of a tradition, Valve have let slip a big ol' breakdown of the most successful titles released on Steam over the past twelve months. Below is the full, hundred-strong…
1 year ago
Feature: Update Night
Hi! I’m an incredibly charismatic space otter, and I love you! Not just you! I love everyone, be they otter analogues, bird people, or particularly advanced fungal infections! I even love murderous robots, which I’m aware is not a great idea because they’re murderous robots! At least that’s what Stellaris’ Scyldari would say, if they could do anything apart from bat their ears adorably on…
Feature: To the stars
A funny old week in the charts, which is to say, H1Z1 and The Witcher 3 have been shoved out by the hatrick of appearances from Stellaris. Also it's worth noting that Dishonored: Death Of The Outsider has disappeared after just one week, which seems a bit of a shame. Oh, and as correctly predicted last week, absolutely no sign of XCOM 2 making nearly…
Feature: Strategy of place
Civ 6, EUIV and Endless Legend designers on how their strategy games create the illusion of a world
Big, slow, sweeping strategy games expose their rules in a way no other game does. Call of Duty doesn’t have floating numbers above enemy heads, telling you their movement speed, for example. But in most 4X and grand strategy games, there is no attempt to hide exactly how everything works: the stats, their interactions, are all laid out and plain to see. Yet these games…
Feature: A wealth of splendid 2016-17 games for the lousiest of hardware
'Terrible' only in the sense of their gaming capability. Honestly, I'm sure your laptop is lovely to look at and it was definitely a extremely sensible idea to spend all that money on it instead of buying a holiday or helping to save the pandas. Truth is, though, that playing recently-released games on the vast majority of laptops is about as effective as starting an…
Feature: Music for televisions
2 years ago
Feature: Space turtles come out of their shell
Last time in this diary on grand space strategy Stellaris, my species of sugary, democratic Tortals invited everyone to their space nation regardless of race, creed or culture. It was a burgeoning multicultural utopia called the Open Gates. Then a terrifying horde of transdimensional beings arrived and started to eat everyone like a rack of saucy ribs, which is against the rules. The Tortals and…
Feature: Welcome to the Galactic Slop Pot
"It will all take care of itself" – infamous Tortal saying Welcome to the Open Gates of Tortal. All are welcome here. Are you a slithering conformist lizard looking for employment? Come and work in our power plants. Maybe you’re a consumerist mollusc seeking some retail therapy? Then visit our pleasure districts. Are you a titanic ocean beast of uncertain origin? Join our defensive military…
Feature: Top ten bestsellers for the past week
He was a boy. She was a girl. Can I make it anymore obvious? He wrote the weekly Steam charts. She read them. What more can I say? Other than that these are the ten Steam games with the most accumulated sales over the past week, obv. See ya later, boy.
Feature: It's Stellaris, Jim, but not as we know it,
Everything was in place for the Romulan invasion of the United Federation of Planets. Warbirds screeched out of the shipyards of Romulus and Remus on a direct course for the closest Federation worlds, those belonging to the chilly Andorians. The real goal, of course, was neighbouring Vulcan. This was a symbolic war. As my jade vessels bombarded the frozen Andorian homeworld, the Tal Shiar informed…
Feature:
I've played a million beginnings and around a thousand endings, or at least that's how it feels. Imagine having seen the first act of Romeo and Juliet a hundred times but never having seen how it ends. That's my experience with all manner of games, from big story-driven RPGs to some of my favourite strategy epics. I've founded so many starter cities that have never…
Feature: Peeping Tom
There are lots of games I see people thoroughly enjoying that interested me very little - mobas, online match-based multiplayer, rural management cuteness - and I'm really pleased they exist and provide such entertainment. But it's not for me. However, there are other games that I have absolutely no intention of ever playing that absolutely fascinate me, and I love to read about the adventures…
Feature: Badly implemented, badly designed
Every time you complete the colonisation of a planet in Stellaris, the game’s AI assistant cheerfully barks ‘New colony established.’ When I started the game, it was a pleasant reminder to plan the future of a new planet. By the time I was approaching the two victory conditions it warned me of a chore. By then, my empire was the strongest in the galaxy and…
Feature: Make space greater again
Stellaris [official site] is a wonderful sci-fi strategy endeavour but, like any game with so many concurrent moving parts, keen and inventive modders-cum-cosmonauts have dismantled it, inspected its innards, and put it all back together again with newer and shinier and quirkier parts so as to improve intergalactic space travel for one and all. In essence, they’re making space even greater. At the time of…
Feature: A bonus bestest best!
We usually do our enormous GAMES OF THE YEAR posting fest at the end of the year (as would seem logical) but because it seems silly to reserve praise for special occasions we're doing a Games Of The Half Year collection to tell you about everything we've loved playing so far. It can double as a summer holiday recommendations list too! We've listed ours in…
Feature: Pushy parent
Stellaris has accosted the RPS clan with its sci-fi strategy and alien-on-alien diplomacy. Adam thinks it is an elegant and joyful strategy and story-making machine, while Alec thinks its menus are annoying and John reckons it's nothing but inaccessible gubbins. Now, we are unleashing Brendan into this political maelstrom, where he will assume the role of an all-loving 'father' race of robot Overseers. What could…
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