UK retailer Gamesplanet is running a medieval and strategy sale in honour of their 15th anniversary, including a pretty outstanding offer - get the excellent Viking strategy game Northgard for free when you spend more than £3.50 and use code NORSEGODS. There's plenty discounted in the sale too, including some of the best PC strategy games ever made, so take a look!
]]>Northgard is the only RTS I routinely play. It's extremely pleasant to look at, it's easy to understand what's going on at all times, and it finds ways to introduce complexity and depth without resorting to large building and technology pools. It's as delightfully enjoyable to return to after a while away as it is challenging to avoid starvation and defeat.
]]>Strategy games is an enormous genre in PC gaming, with real-time, turn-based, 4X and tactics games all flying the same flag to stake their claim as the one true best strategy game. Our list of the best strategy games on PC covers the lot of them. We like to take a broad view here at RPS, and every game listed below is something we firmly believe that you could love and play today. You'll find 30-year-old classics nestled right up against recent favourites here, so whether you're to the genre or want to dig deep for some hidden gems, we've got you covered. Here are our 50 best strategy games for 2023.
]]>After watching the trailer a bajillion more times, I am extremely excited for Assassin's Creed Valhalla. It's been around 48 hours since the announcement and I cannot possibly retain this state for much longer. By the time the Christmas-ish release date rolls around I will either have exploded like a poor little meat balloon, or gone full circle and lapsed into a coma. Like the engines of the Enterprise, she cannae hold - definitely not for around six more months, anyway.
Thank god that Vikings are an enduring and popular theme for games, then! I can inoculate myself against disaster by playing a few of these existing ones while I wait. Such is the versatility of Vikings that they pop up in almost every genre imaginable, too. So if, like me, you are already on the edge of your seat (and that seat is in a longship), here are some recommendations for varied and quality video games that will get you prepared for Assassin's Creed Valhalla.
]]>‘Tis the season / use a brolly / tra la la la / la la la la.
Hello, it's me, the list goblin, here in this festive first week of December to deliver a big black bin bag of presents to you. And by presents, I mean a single irrevocable inventory of the most disastrous and terrible winters in the videogames of recent history. Yes, there will be cannibalism. Yes, thousands will die of exposure. But from this great compendium of coldness will come knowledge, strength, and, okay, at least one adorable puppy. Here are the 9 harshest winters in videogames. Wrap up.
]]>You wimps. So what if there's a terrifying eldritch beast spooking about the ocean: you're still Vikings, aren't you? A Norseman without a longship is laughable. Though I have to admit your replacement fisheries look rad. And the kraken does seem nasty.
RTS Northgard has added the Clan of the Kraken as paid DLC. They're a motley non-crew of squid-worshipping, Valkyrie-training spellcasters. I've spent too long away from Northgard's shores, and whacking a kraken right next to them is a promising way to tempt me back.
]]>The best free updates are those that make me instantly go "yes, I'd like to do that". Yes, I would like to build a monument that summons friendly boars in every forest tile. Yes, I'd like to send giants on raiding parties, or spend food to conjure sheep.
My point is that the latest update for Viking RTS Northgard's goes beyond tinkering with damage numbers and resource costs (though it does that too). My point is that Northgard's latest update lets you befriend giant boars and then eat them.
]]>Another impressive month of deals in the Humble Monthly - I'm impressed at how consistently good Humble's subscribe-o-bundle has been this past year, and the next set headlines with a trio of gems. Northgard, Mutant Year Zero: Road To Eden and Absolver cover a wide spread of genres, but all three games are united by one common thread; they all got free expansions recently. You can snag all three together for a mere $12 (roughly £9), and you'll get an extra sack-full of mystery games at the end of the month. See some trailers and thoughts on the three games below.
]]>I don't what is this? How many? Are we sure we're in the right charts? This is definitely the Steam Charts, where the mad-brained broken people just buy the same four games over and over and over? Because something is up. People have only bought the same three games over and over!
]]>It turned out that the end of the world came with a bang and a whimper. The bang came from the volcano at the centre of Northgard’s map — a new feature added to the Viking-themed strategy game as part of its free Ragnarok update.
The whimper was me, realising that the blobs of molten rock that its eruption deposited around my territory would soon turn into angry stone golems and start punching my precious villagers to death. I wasn’t ready.
]]>The latest to mine from the rich vein of inspiration that is the Norse apocalypse is Shiro Games's excellent viking strateg 'em up Northgard. Released today, Ragnarok is a big free update to the game adding an hostile and haunted new map, dark elves to tussle with, new game systems and more. As if a free apocalypse wasn't enough, the game is half off until October 5th. Check out the trailer below, and the extensive update patch notes here.
]]>We love a good multiplayer game here at RPS, because let's be honset, there's just something about doing battle with others over the internet that adds an extra bit of spice to the experience. You get the thrill of competition and friendship as you knock those scores upwards and combine your powers to outdo your enemies. To help you chase that feeling, we've curated this list of the very best multiplayer games on PC for your perusal.
]]>The Clan Of The Snake DLC is out for Northgard, and yep, they're bastards. For £4, you can now make the viking-starvation RTS even more miserable for your opponents by stealing their lore and burning their homes. Classy stuff, Snake clan.
This first dose of DLC from Shiro Games arrives alongside a hefty free update, which adds a new stealthy military unit and some sweeping balance changes. They've made colonising tiles use up even more food, the monsters.
]]>The axe-weilding pillagers of Northgard ought to be used to the seasons changing by now, considering it's the crux of the wolf-killing strategy game. But a particularly harsh winter now befalls them, because all their programmer daddies and mummies are off to work on another game. Darksburg is a top-down action game for up to four players in which you’ll be killing zombos instead of befriending Norse giants. We don't know much about it, but we do know there's a friendly, playable werewolf.
]]>We've just passed the half-way point of 2018, so Ian Gatekeeper and all his fabulously wealthy chums over at Valve have revealed which hundred games have sold best on Steam over the past six months. It's a list dominated by pre-2018 names, to be frank, a great many of which you'll be expected, but there are a few surprises in there.
2018 releases Jurassic World Evolution, Far Cry 5 Kingdom Come: Deliverance and Warhammer: Vermintide II are wearing some spectacular money-hats, for example, while the relatively lesser-known likes of Raft, Eco and Deep Rock Galactic have made themselves heard above the din of triple-A marketing budgets.
]]>The ambiguity in that headline has got me thinking about how great it'd be if Northgard's new clan revolved around earthworms or slugs, but sadly it isn't to be. Along with a free update, the money-costing clan of the Snake DLC will land at some point in July. In a shocking example of stereotyping, they've been typecast as "the most roguish clan in Northgard'. When I was seven I couldn't understand why everyone gave snakes such a hard time, so I wrote a story where every animal except the snake protagonist was a prick. It saddens me that society can't seem to move on.
This update will also add a new military unit, and developers Shiro Games have been teasing their plans for future updates too.
]]>The old quote is wrong: neither death nor taxes are, it seems to me, as terrifyingly certain as the Steam Summer Sale. Yes, once more we can add to the heap that is our backlog by buying games for, what, five quid, on average? But there are so many to choose from that it's easy to get flustered, so who better than the staff of RPS to hand-pick the best ones for your consideration (rhetorical question; do not answer)?
Check out the full list below for a mix of games that should suit all pockets and tastes.
]]>Northgard is a splendid RTS about rearing a clan of vikings in a punishing climate that makes every decision matter. But you've read my review, and you already know all that. Northgard is a fantastic game in the present, but what does its future hold? I spoke to CEO of Shiro Games and Northgard dev Sebastien Vidal about what we'll see in the next update, competitive play, and expansion plans for further down the line.
]]>My clan folk are starving, freezing and diseased. It was a harsh winter, and the rats that raided our food supply in January have forced me to butcher my only remaining sheep. The future looks grim, but my people’s suffering is curtailed when one of my opponents becomes so famous that he wins the game outright. Losing is a strange kind of mercy.
Despite its harshness, Northgard is a superb RTS that’s easy to pick up but difficult to master. That may be an overused phrase, but it’s justified here - let me tell you why. Hurry up, winter is coming.
]]>Correction: The early access piece was from a year & two weeks ago, not two weeks.
We come from the land of the ice and snow~ From the midnight sun, where the hot springs flow~
If you've been anywhere near the UK this past week, you'll have probably seen Winter (with a capital W) coming back for one last clawing grasp at our dreary little isle. Perhaps some of you even took a liking to the sight of snow on the ground, and your breath condensing in the air. These people are wrong and bad, but we love them anyway.
Mercifully, we exile those poor, wrong-headed folks to the frozen north now, albeit in RTS form. Northgard, the clever little Viking town-building strategy game from French outfit Shiro Games is out now, after a well-received stretch in the icy fjords of Steam Early Access.
]]>The blizzards of Siberia have gone on holiday to the United Kingdom this week. But the RPS podcast, the Electronic Wireless Show, doesn’t do snow days. The pod squad have trekked hard through the whiteout (from their bedrooms to their computers) to gather on their respective microphones. To what end? Well, to talk about the weather. Blizzards, thunderclouds, sandstorms and, er, night-time? In videogames, it all counts.
]]>When we declared Northgard one of the best games of 2017, the Norse mythology RTS was still in early access. If it was that great then, how swell will it be when it's actually finished? We'll see on March 7th, the release date announced today by developers Shiro Games. One big feature coming with the full launch is a singleplayer story campaign, sending a young prince and his mate across the land of stone circles, armoured bears, and terrible winters on the trail of his father's murderer. Also, did I mention the game has armoured bears? Because it does.
]]>Sorry to frighten the more sensitive reader, but, goodness me, among the miserably common entries, this week's chart welcomes a fair few newbies and indies! Are customers about to get better at buying? Or will we just see these games in the charts every week for the rest of the year? STAY TUNED!
]]>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 roster, complete with links to our coverage if you want to find out more about any of the games, or simply to marvel at how much seemed to happen in the space of 52 short weeks.
]]>The calendar's doors have been opened and the games inside have been eaten. But fear not, latecomer - we've reconstructed the list in this single post for easy re-consumption. Click on to discover the best games of 2017.
]]>What do you mean there's a whole month of 2017 left? Well, the disembodied mouths of the RPS podcast, the Electronic Wireless Show, are tired of waiting. This week the team look at some of the most exciting upcoming games of 2018. Adam is looking forward to smashing big robots with other, bigger robots in Battletech. Matt wants to make trousers from dinosaur skin in Monster Hunter World. And Brendan forgot all about how much he's excited by surreal isometric detective game No Truce With The Furies.
We've also got some chat about Viking strategy game Northgard and yet more love for FTL follow-up Into The Breach. Plus, our Patch Adam quiz is back!
]]>Yonder strategy Northgard has added a new clan to its longboat full of cartoonish Viking pillagers. Previous clans like the bear boys, introduced new warriors like a giant ursine killer with heavy armour plating on his furry back. The new clan of the Boar are a little less spectacular, but they are a hard-living and resistant lot. On top of this, developers Shiro Games have laid out a plan for future updates, including a single player campaign and better enemy AI.
]]>Hello. This is Spawn Point, a new not-quite-regular feature in which we take a genre, series or other facet of gaming culture, and try to convince you to give it a shot. It might be those hero shooters you’ve always wanted to get into, or that terrifying space game played by thousands of jerks. We’ll briefly explain the thing, followed by some ways for you to breach it.
First up, it’s... the real-time strategy.
]]>Shield maidens and armoured bears have arrived in strategic Viking 'em up Northgard [official site] with the addition of a new faction. The Clan of the Bear have come from the north to cause trouble and conquer the land with their hardiness and, y'know, flipping great big armoured bears. Northgard is still in early access but our warboy Brendy already declared it one of the best games of 2017 so far. Bring on the bears!
]]>The Steam summer sale is in full blaze. For a while it even blazed so hot that the servers went on fire and all the price stickers peeled off the games. Either that or the store just got swamped with cheapskates looking for the best bargains. Cheapskates like you! Well, don’t worry. We’ve rounded up some recommendations - both general tips and some newly added staff choices.
Here are the things you should consider owning in your endless consumeristic lust for a happiness which always seems beyond reach. You're welcome.
]]>Have you heard about Steam? It's a sort of shop, but not a shop with a door and a roof and some shelves. It's a "virtual shop", a place where you can buy games that, incredibly, has no walls whatsoever! It's entirely rendered digitally, using computers.
We've taken a look, and totted up the games people are buying the most often.
]]>Update: The year is finished, which means you can now read the final list of our favourite games of 2017.
2017 has already been an extraordinary year for PC games, from both big-name AAA successes to no-name surprise indie smashes. Keeping up with so much that's worth playing is a tough job, but we've got your back. Here is a collection of the games that have rocked the RPS Treehouse so far this year.
We've all picked our favourites, and present them here in alphabetical order so as not to start any fights. You're bound to have a game you'd have wanted to see on the list, so please do add it to the comments below.
]]>Blood for the blood god, it's only the weekly Steam charts! These are the ten games which sold best on Steam last week.
The debate has raged for an eternity. The infinite dilemma that has defeated even humanity's greatest minds.
Which is best: guns or swords? Today, I have a definitive answer for you.
]]>Every Monday we send Brendan to scout the early access ruins for hidden treasures. This week, the careful Viking tactics of Northgard [official site]
This is Blainn, below. He’s just killed a Wyvern. He's my best mate because I gave him and his giant pals, the Jötunn, enough food to last a lifetime. They reckon we in the Goat clan are excellent humans and now Chief Blainn is fighting alongside us in our hoofed conquest of the whole land. This is one endgame that comes in Northgard, a rock-solid RTS about allocating and reallocating your Viking workforce in just the right way. Technically this match ended over an hour ago, when my opponent reached a “wisdom victory”. But it’s a testament to Northgard’s foundations that, when given the option to leave or continue following my defeat, I happily clicked “keep playing”.
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