OK, I know this is my second Have You Played…? to find an excuse to start by talking about Age Of Empires 2, and I imagine Alice Bee is making a proper wolf noise out of frustration as she edits this. I am almost sorry. But like a smug schoolboy proclaiming he’s "home" in a game of "it" by touching a tree, I've got a cast iron excuse here. Because Offworld Trading Company's lead developer Soren Johnson told me himself that this cracking solar-system economics-'em-up was directly inspired by the simple yet robust supply/demand modelling behind the market building in AoE2.
]]>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.
]]>From our first years we know what it means to build. As babies we're given clacky wooden blocks and colourful Duplo bricks. We are architects long before we are capable eaters of raw carrot. If you're anything like the staff of RPS, you've not outgrown the habit of child-like town planning. Yes, building games often take a managerial approach (at least many on this list do), but a sense of play is always present. It's there when you draw out a road in Cities Skylines, just to watch it populate with toy-like traffic. When you brick up another hole in your mighty Stronghold to fend off enemy swordsmen. When you painstakingly dig a trench for water to flow in Timberborn, just like you did all those years ago on the beach, in an effort to stop the tide washing away your sandcastles. You'll find all these games and more on our list. So here you go: the best building games on PC.
]]>Folks still like freebies 'round these parts, right? Hope so, because there's a pretty kickin' lineup of games to snatch on the Epic Games Store over the next week. Offworld Trading Company and Gonner are both free right now. That's one capitalism strategy simulator and one procedurally generated platformer for your library. Both are free until March 12th, at which point Epic roll out three more free games: A Short Hike, Mutazione, and Anodyne 2: Return To Dust.
]]>Has Offworld Trading Company, the combat-free RTS about big businesses competing for a slice of Martian pie, now become renowned enough that we don't need to stick 'Soren Johnson's' in front of it any more?
The Civ 4 designer's bullet-free strategy game always did a smart job of recreating the tension of conflict and agonies of decision-making within the world of science-fictional business, but if you've long been unconvinced from afar, here's a late chance to sample it for no-pennies. Its promised free multiplayer client, acting as a demo of uncommon largesse, is out today.
]]>Economic space strategy game Offworld Trading Company will be far easier to play with friends soon - as of February 28th, the game's multiplayer will be available as a free, standalone game. Mohawk Games's extraterrestrial number-cruncher is still expanding, with more DLC due along with the multiplayer client, but the chance to play for free against other humans strikes me as the bigger deal here. With any luck it'll help put the game back on the radar for folks looking for a new kind of RTS - destroying your foes without building any tanks is a hard sell, admittedly.
]]>Whatever your weapon of choice--plasma rifle, axe, M1 Garand, or raw capitalism, baby!--you may well be able to dabble in your favoured violence this weekend for free. The full versions of XCOM 2, For Honor, Call Of Duty: WWII's competitive multiplayer (okay, so not really the full version), and Offworld Trading Company are all available in free trial weekends for the next few days - mostly through Steam.
]]>“Sid [Meier] didn’t know he was inventing a genre back in ’91 - if he had he might have been a lot more careful. He was just making it up as he went along.”
That’s how genres begin. By mistake. Somebody creates a set of rules and systems for the needs of a particular game, and then either people adopt and adapt those rules. Soren Johnson, creator of Offworld Trading Company and lead designer of Civilization IV, is working on a new game called Ten Crowns and after spending almost an hour talking with him at GDC, I get the impression he’s going to be very careful indeed. Not cautious, because I expect some bold reinvention of 4X strategy fundamentals, but careful in his treatment of a genre that we both agree needs to escape its own past.
]]>If you go on Twitter, where every second image is of a dog being cuddled, rated, or dressed up as a Star Wars character, it's a reasonable assumption that every year is the year of the dog - however Valve, not to mention the ancient Chinese zodiac, are here to tell you that's not the case. As of today, it legitimately is the year of the dog, which is why Valve's latest sale is adorned with images of famous game pups including Okami's Amaterasu, Half-Life 2's DOG, and I, er, don't recognise any of the other doggos.
]]>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.
]]>Following a few wee DLC packs, Offworld Trading Company [official site] is getting its first proper expansion. Named Jupiter's Forge, it's due later in spring. The swell sci-fi economic strategy game's expansion will visit the harsh Jovian moon of Io, where Martian rules of business don't apply. Players will get to eke out a spaceliving with new factions, a new campaign, a new challenge mode, new events, new buildings, and no water. That's the perils of spacecapitalism for you. Here, check out how much Io sucks in the Jupiter's Forge announcement trailer:
]]>When Elon Musk reaches Mars and founds the capital city of New PayPal, we’ll all be packing our bags*. But in the meantime the closest you can get to a corporate Martian future is Offworld Trading Company [official site], the RTS game that eschews tanks and troops for market manipulation and corporate espionage. Today that dark vision of the red planet is getting a big expansion in the form of The Patron and the Patriot DLC, which is bringing new game modes, stories and CEO characters.
]]>Soren Johnson's ace outer space economy sim, Offworld Trading Company [official site], has some new DLC this week. Titled The Ceres Initiative, it adds a fresh location with some extra challenges. The DLC is set on a frozen asteroid, where a new colony is being developed. It's a promising money making venture, if the colonists can survive the er...rocky conditions.
]]>Our Adam was awfully fond of Offworld Trading Company [official site], making kissy faces as he called the real-time financial strategy game "an exceedingly intelligent game" and "one of the smartest strategy games I've ever played." Smitted. If you also sent a big fluffy teddy bear to designer Soren Johnson (formerly of Firaxis) and his studio Mohawk Games, you may well like to know that it now has a map editor. You might be a touch less pleased to hear it's paid DLC. But what do I know about you?
]]>Offworld Trading Company [official site], the new game from Civ IV lead designer Soren Johnson and his team at Mohawk Games, is a strategic simulation of a sci-fi Martian economy. It's also one of the smartest strategy games I've ever played.
]]>Offworld Trading Company [official site] is the combat-free, trading-centric sci-fi RTS from Soren Johnson, best known as the lead on the beloved Civ 4. It's been kicking around in Early Access for a while now, and both Adam and I rather liked it. If you've been holding off because you fear the unfinished, you may be glad to know that the Mars-set building'n'business game gets itself a full release on April 28th.
]]>Last week I visited Mohawk Studios to speak to Soren Johnson. His short but impressive CV has one standout entry - he was the lead designer of Civilization IV, a game which I hold in very high regard. His latest project is a short-form sci-fi strategy game with no military component and, in fact, no combat whatsoever. Offworld Trading Company [official site] is an economic strategy game and it's about as far from Civ as a strategy game could be.
]]>Offworld Trading Company [official site] is a competitive, multiplayer RTS set on Mars, but instead of fighting with lasers, players compete to dominate a fluctuating commodities market. The winner is the person who buys low, sells high and uses their gains to launch hostile takeovers of their opponent's companies.
At GDC, I spoke to designer Soren Johnson (formerly of Civilization IV) and artist Dorian Newcomb (formerly of Civilization V) about Early Access, how player's had surprised them in the months since its initial release, why they wish the game was hidden on Steam, and what small companies can do that big .
]]>Until their functional closure yesterday, Maxis were "one of the great PC developers". From the seminal SimCity and adventurous SimAnt, to the breakthrough The Sims and absurdly ambitious Spore, the studio made two decades of strange, thoughtful, risky games.
One of the people who helped was Soren Johnson, who joined the studio in 2007 to work on finishing Spore. I was talking to Johnson about his new game Offworld Trading Company [official site] just a few hours after news of the closure broke and took the opportunity to ask him about his former employer, the studio's closure, and the difficulties of working with big studios that have "a laundry list of requirements" for a game.
]]>Offworld Trading Company is a combat-free, sci-fi real-time strategy game from the lead designer of the sumptuous Civilization IV.
A great concept with a great pedigree – can it possibly be as good as it sounds? But enough about Snickers More Nuts, let’s talk about Soren Johnson’s new game, an Early Access version of which was released this week.
]]>It's impossible not to be interested in whatever Civ IV designer Soren Johnson is up to, despite a disconcerting dalliance with wait/pay/spam social games at EA a while back, but even so his next project, Offworld Trading Company, is pressing even more of my buttons than I'd already expected. A real-time strategy game which isn't at all militaristic, but instead focused on colony expansion and economy, and the Machiavellian manipulation thereof? Gimme! While a prototype has been available since July to anyone who feels comfortable throwing $80 at speculative projects, Mohawk have just now broken cover with first footage for everyone. It looks out of this world no no no I'm so sorry, I mean it looks like a very interesting and attractive game from this world.
]]>Offworld Trading Company, the "economic RTS" being developed by Civilization IV designer Soren Johnson and Mohawk Games, now has a playable prototype available. The catch: it costs $80, its under NDA, and there's no publicly available screenshots, videos or comments to help you decide whether it's worth your time.
The game's FAQ explains that they "intend the $80 Founder's Elite Edition to cater to people who want to get their feedback into the design process as early as possible, either out of love for the concept of Offworld Trading Company or respect for Soren Johnson and the rest of the Mohawk team's previous work."
Is this a good thing? I can't decide, so you tell me.
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