You have courtiers, spouses, children and rivals to worry about, and with this exploration of the human side of empire-building also comes a bounty of events, plots and surprises. You might even find yourself assassinated by a family member. There's more than a hint of Crusader Kings here.
You can't have a best strategy games list without a bit of Civ. Civilization 6 is our game of choice in the series right now, especially now that it's seen a couple of expansions.
The biggest change this time around is the district system, which unstacks cities in the way that its predecessor unstacked armies. Cities are now these sprawling things full of specialised areas that force you to really think about the future when you developing tiles. The expansions added some more novel wrinkles that are very welcome but do stop short of revolutionising the venerable series. They introduce the concept of Golden Ages and Dark Ages, giving you bonuses and debuffs depending on your civilisation's development across the years, as well as climate change and environmental disasters.
It's a forward-thinking, modern Civ. This is a game about star-spanning empires that rise, stabilise and fall in the space of an afternoon: and, particularly, about the moment when the vast capital ships of those empires emerge from hyperspace above half-burning worlds. Diplomacy is an option too, of course, but also: giant spaceships.
Play the Rebellion expansion to enlarge said spaceships to ridiculous proportions. Stellaris takes an 'everything and the kicthen sink' approach to the space 4X. It's got a dose of EU4, Paradox's grand strategy game, but applied to a sci-fi game that contains everything from robotic uprisings to aliens living in black holes. It arguably tries to do to much and lacks the focus of some of the other genre greats, but as a celebration of interstellar sci-fi there are none that come close.
It's a liberating sandbox designed to generate a cavalcade of stories as you guide your species and empire through the stars, meddling with their genetic code, enslaving aliens, or consuming the galaxy as a ravenous hive of cunning insects.
Fantasy 4X Endless Legend is proof that you don't need to sacrifice story to make a compelling 4X game. Each of its asymmetrical factions sports all sorts of unique and unusual traits, elevated by story quests featuring some of the best writing in any strategy game.
The Broken Lords, for instance, are vampiric ghosts living in suits of armour, wrestling with their dangerous nature; while the necrophage is a relentless force of nature that just wants to consume, ignoring diplomacy in favour of complete conquest. Including the expansions, there are 13 factions, each blessed or cursed with their own strange quirks.
Faction design doesn't get better than this. Civ in space is a convenient shorthand for Alpha Centauri, but a bit reductive. Brian Reynolds' ambitious 4X journey took us to a mind-worm-infested world and ditched nation states and empires in favour of ideological factions who were adamant that they could guide humanity to its next evolution. The techs, the conflicts, the characters— it was unlike any of its contemporaries and, with only a few exceptions, nobody has really attempted to replicate it.
Not even when Firaxis literally made a Civ in space, which wasn't very good. Alpha Centauri is as fascinating and weird now as it was back in '99, when we were first getting our taste of nerve stapling naughty drones and getting into yet another war with Sister Miriam. More than 20 years later, some of us are still holding out hope for Alpha Centauri 2.
Pick an Age of Wonders and you really can't go wrong. If sci-fi isn't your thing, absolutely give Age of Wonders 3 a try, but it's Age of Wonders: Planetfall that's got us all hot and bothered at the moment. Set in a galaxy that's waking up after a long period of decline, you've got to squabble over a lively world with a bunch of other ambitious factions that run the gamut from dinosaur-riding Amazons to psychic bugs.
The methodical empire building is a big improvement over its fantastical predecessors, benefiting from big changes to its structure and pace, but just as engaging are the turn-based tactical battles between highly customisable units. Stick lasers on giant lizards, give everyone jetpacks, and nurture your heroes like they're RPG protagonists—there's so much fiddling to do, and it's all great.
Set in an alternate 's Europe, factions duke it out with squishy soldiers, tanks and, the headline attraction, clunky steampunk mechs. There are plenty of them, from little exosuits to massive, smoke-spewing behemoths, and they're all a lot of fun to play with and, crucially, blow up. Iron Harvest does love its explosions.
When the dust settles after a big fight, you'll hardly recognise the area. Thanks to mortars, tank shells and mechs that can walk right through buildings, expect little to remain standing.
The level of destruction is as impressive as it is grim. To cheer yourself up, you can watch a bear fight a mech. Each faction has a heroic unit, each accompanied by their very own pet. All of them have some handy unique abilities, and yes, they can go toe-to-toe with massive war machines. Battlefleet Gothic: Armada 2 's cosmic battles are spectacular. There's a trio of vaguely 4X-y campaigns following the three of the Warhammer 40K factions: The Imperium, Necron Empire and the nasty Tyranid Hives, but you can ignore them if you want and just dive into some messy skirmishes full of spiky space cathedrals colliding with giant, tentacle-covered leviathans.
The real-time tactical combat manages to be thrilling even when you're commanding the most sluggish of armadas. You need to manage a whole fleet while broadside attacks pound your hulls, enemies start boarding and your own crews turn mutinous. And with all the tabletop factions present, you can experiment with countless fleet configurations and play with all sorts of weird weapons. Viking-themed RTS Northgard pays dues to Settlers and Age of Empires, but challenged us with its smart expansion systems that force you to plan your growth into new territories carefully.
Weather is important, too. Loop Hero is a fantastic strategy game with a unique premise and some serious nostalgic vibes. That said, players with high-end PCs shouldn't sleep on this title just because it looks and feels like a retro release.
The world of Loop Hero is complex, giving players the opportunity to "influence a world" rather than simply control a character. They'll need to place down cards, create paths, manage resources, and "strategize for the future. Those who enjoy punishing gameplay and strategy elements should put Darkest Dungeon at the top of their list.
This gritty, macabre RPG is downright unfair at times, hitting players with strings of bad luck and RNG-generated madness. Even the smartest and most prepared players can find themselves hopelessly clinging to life at the hands of Darkest Dungeon's mechanics. Thanks to its charming 2D aesthetics and side-scrolling action, Darkest Dungeon doesn't require an immense amount of PC power to run smoothly. A lack of complex particle effects paired with its hand-drawn and sometimes simplistic graphics allows players with low-end PCs to join in on the fun.
It also features a pretty dedicated modding community, so there's a lot of customization to be found. There's a lot of debate found throughout the gaming world on whether or not games need expressive graphics and gameplay to be considered truly great.
Undertale firmly plants itself as an Indie release that proves that a game can have a fantastic story, fun gameplay, and engaging characters with minimal graphics and effects. Toby Fox created an incredibly imaginative world that spawned a massive cult following thanks to its colorful cast of characters, incredible soundtrack, and fast-paced dodge-based gameplay elements.
Anyone who hasn't played Undertale is seriously missing out and its ability to run well on even the lowest of low-end PCs gives almost anyone a chance to experience it. Tycoon games are both bigger than ever and also a lost genre. There are plenty of titles, particularly in the mobile space, that attempt to replicate the experience without much of the charm.
One of the best options is Game Dev Tycoon , a game about developing video games and becoming a major developing in historical replica of the game's industry at least, in the PAL Regions. Game Dev Tycoon doesn't offer a lot of complexity in creating literal video games, but in terms of a business simulator, it's incredibly solid. While definitely challenging at first, after a few attempts the game is easy to navigate. The best part is that it can run not just on low-end PC's, but also cheaper Chromebooks through the Google Play Store.
It's addictive and fun and able to be played on just about any device. Monster Train is one of the best deckbuilding roguelites on the market, only subjectively beaten out by Slay the Spire. The game, in terms of intensive visuals, is about as simple to run as any other card game on the market.
Most devices should be able to run the game and have it look about as good as the highest end rigs. The game is endlessly addictive, fusing traditional deckbuilding with a tower defense element of sorts. It offers dozens of combinations in what kinds of decks can be drafted during a run. It's also a lot easier to get successful runs compared to other games, with the challenge coming in the higher difficulties the game has to offer.
The end goal of clearing every combination at the highest difficulty level is a challenge both daunting and enticing. The Monster Train is definitely a good ride. Farming games, like tycoon games, are typically great for low-end devices. The goals of the game are simple on the surface, but with layers and layers of depth to keep players engaged.
The night driving modes are very challenging if you hit something and lose your car's headlights it becomes really difficult to compete with computer-managed competition cars who just can drive like Micheal Schumacher in complete darkness. The game was revolutionary when it was released in the year , November It was the first street racing game from the Need for Speed series, and N. The music was twisted, and the game was so much better in graphics compared to the games released by Electronics Arts before this.
The game first had the concept where you start with a beginning Car and Race against the best Racers to increase your Reputation and then challenge the ultimate racer in the end. Unfortunately, the Need for Speed series barring 1 or 2 games, did not create anything new regarding story and engagement in the current generation games.
Even the Need for Speed Most Wanted had the same story that got started in Underground and later improved with Most wanted The game was the second in the series of Need for Speed Underground and what was improved in the game was the addition of new cars, more customization, and one of the best Music games ever had in a game. The game had not too many new elements compared to Underground 1 but still had good gameplay and graphics for the time. You can easily play both the games on a core 2 duo or dual-core processor or an old Nvidia or even previous generation of graphics cards.
The game was released in the year November. The Need for Speed fans was bored after the release of Need for Speed Carbon, which offered nothing new compared to the underground series. The game was different from what the fans had experienced in the earlier generation of games and was a massive success.
The graphics and soundtracks are good; the motion blur effects and cop chases are the best needed for speed older titles. The Gamer's first time had such a massive open-world game where they could do whatever they wanted. The game was coded lightly, and you can play it with a primary graphics card and processor. The game has small missions and a great story, along with hundreds of options to explore in vice city.
The game was released on October 27, The game size is around 1. San Andreas is still one of the most famous open-world games and has been downloaded thousands of times by P. It had better graphics and a colossal open world to explore than what we saw in the G. Vice City. The game size is 2. The game is one of the most fun games to play, and several mods have been released since its release, including the infamous Hot Coffee mod with all the adult content.
Excellent background music, one of the best stories, the graphics were unmatched when the game was released in The game was a massive hit among the Gamers community back then. It was so engulfing that Gamers did not sleep before ending the game. The story was fluent and the best experience in any game, even current generation games lack the kind of story flow that the original Max Payne had.
There are choices you can latch onto all by themselves, and others that you can use to fill time between meetings. These are mostly newer games with accessible system requirements, but of course there are tons of classic PC games, from Doom to Half-Life 2, that will run smooth as silk on any modern laptop.
Looking for a new laptop to game on the go? Here's our guide to the best gaming laptops. If you're up for a bit of subterfuge with friends, Among Us is one you can be sure they'll be able to play almost no matter how old their machine is. It even has cross-play between PCs and phones if that's all they have handy. Among Us is a familiar format to anyone who's played Werewolf or other similar group tabletop games. A crew of brightly-colored space engineers are stuck trying to repair a ship while discovering who among them get it?
The fun is in how well you and your friends can fool one another more than fancy lighting effects, so it's an easy one to pick up and play on a low-spec machine. Release date: Developer: Jagex Link: Steam. This oldie hails from the era when today's low end PCs were hot stuff.
Runescape has been around for a long time and there's definitely a reason why. This MMO hails from the days when online games didn't always guide you down a paved path of quests and leveling opportunities. The Old School version of Runescape takes you back to those early days of its online world. You may struggle to get started in this one without the wiki handy, but at least it won't put your PC to the test. The not titled goose game is plenty short and so are its required system specs.
If you somehow went dark on the internet in the weeks following the Goose Game's launch, you may have missed how many goose memes it birthed into the unsuspecting mainstream social media sphere.
The Goose Game is a charming little stealth puzzler about being a terribly foul goose on the loose in a quaint little British village. Release date: Developer: Valve Link: Steam page. We could have included pretty much any Source engine game here, such is the impressive way it scales to lower-spec hardware.
Admittedly, that might be because it's getting on a bit. While Half-Life 2 shines these days with visual mods and at higher resolutions, Portal 2 remains one of the funniest, smartest puzzle games around, even if you had cause to play it at x with all the settings turned to 'Low'. You're not playing this one to be wowed by fancy graphical effects—you're playing for Stephen Merchant's, J. Simmons', and Ellen McLain's terrific voice acting, and of course for that bit with the potato.
Release date: Developer: Mojang Link: Official site. Mojang's infinite block-'em-up isn't terribly demanding specs-wise, and it's the perfect game to mess around with on a laptop when you're supposed to be writing features for PC Gamer about low-spec games.
While it's often played on a tablet, phone or console these days, you're getting the latest updates and mod support if you choose to build stuff with your PC. Here's our frequently updated list of the best Minecraft mods.
An indie sensation that brought the idyllic farm life of Harvest Moon to PC. Build your farm into a vegetable empire, go exploring, learn about the lives of your neighbors, fall in love and settle down.
Simple graphics ensure this one will run like a dream on your laptop, and it'll make long flights pass by in a snap. Stardew Valley has officially supported co-op farming for a couple years now, which is undoubtedly a great way to go back to Pelican Town. This tiny strategy game was one of our early favorites in Most importantly, all that classically-inspired goodness comes in a tiny installation that shouldn't challenge your PC nearly as much as your strategy skills.
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