Armageddon Empires

Yes, good old hidden gem. Recomended! For some reason my time played does not register on steam. Maybe because I've edited the shortcut and game to play in fullscreen.

I remember playing this game back in 2009 - thirteen years later, it is still a lesson in game design - no wonder that the developer switched to board games creation. Behind the vetust graphic there's a perfect product there.

This game seems interesting until you start playing. It's based on rolling dice to determine the order of turns or determining the winner of a battle. The problem is that the dice are rigged against the human player. You can roll 10 die but your average return is 2.5. You will spend all day reloading the save game and trying again over and over until you get something reasonable for a turn. You also have dice for fate and did 8 straight rolls with 0 positive dice rolls. Statistically that should happen 0.78% of the time. Yet it is fairly normal in this game. To top it off, the opponents have units that you can't see that once they spot you will kill you in one turn and there is nothing you can do to defend it. Then, if you get past the early stages of the game, there is no competition as the AI gives up and sits around doing nothing.

I had the first release back in 2007 from the cryptic comet website. This is a great blend of card and 4x game. Pick it up for sure. I hope more cryptic comet games come to steam in the future.

This is an amazing turn-based strategy game from Vic Davis the creator of Solium Infernum and a few other indie gems. it has incredible strengths and a couple of glaring weakness (the latter were sadly not fixed in this re-release). Any fan of strategy games, particularly turned based ones, should definitely give it a try, especially at this very reasonable price. The strengths of this game lie in its uniqueness: - Four very different factions each of which supports multiple play styles, and with unique units, heros, tech trees, and crafting resources. - Simple yet compelling logistics. Supply range is a key aspect of the game, and yet it's elegantly implemented by making supply distance respect terrain movement costs. This makes it tough to push supply through mountains or over long distances, and forces players to think about building and defending supply bases. - Scouting and intelligence gathering are crucial. Most units have zero visibility outside of their own hex, which requires players to include scout units in their deck and use them wisely. Sending a non-scout/non-stealth unit on exploration is a recipe for disaster, since it can stumble into enemy armies, minefields, etc. - The game ends when you have captured or destroyed the HQs of all your opponent's bases. That makes base-hunting a tense and enjoyable aspect of the game, since if ever leave your base undefended, a simple recon unit could capture it and end the game. Or if your opponent locates your base, they can either send an army to capture it (assuming they can secure a supply chain that allows them to do so), or they can use WMDs or airstrikes or saboteurs to eliminate your HQ building. The restricted based placement zone is the only weakness here, since in practice you know roughly where your opponent's base is every time. - There is a wonderful variety of neutral units and facilities to encounter on the map. Many are references to post-apocalyptic media for those who enjoy a wink and a nod to Mad Max, etc. - The interface is clean and easy to read, and the card art is amazing. The game does have some pretty serious weaknesses that I wish Vic would have fixed by now. Some are much easier to fix than others, but still... - Die rolling takes far too long. Each roll takes about a second, which doesn't seem like much, but when you've got about a thousand die rolls per full game, that adds up to a lot of wasted player time. It's particularly frustrating at the turn initiative screen, where you can spend ten seconds watching the AI reroll ties against itself. There should have been an option to skip all rolling animations and go straight to the result. Vic, if you're reading this, please implement and I will pay you $500 (or donate it to a charity of your choice). It means that much to me, and I suspect, to other players. - I wish the zone in which bases could be built was larger. Base hunting is one of the unique mechanics in the game, and yet the restrictive zoning means that after a few games, you know roughly where to look. - The supply overlay is crucial to making many decisions, but after you turn it on, the game turns if off between turns. I wish it didn't do that. I also wish the other overlays (intel, explored, etc) would display on the map, not just the minimap). - There is no multiplayer, likely because it would be too tedious to run battles for most players. That said, I would love to try hotseat multiplayer, even if it meant putting some aspects of the game on AI (example, the defender could be AI-controlled even if there is a battle between players). - i am not sure if the game is well-served by the deckbuilder mechanic. If you don't draw the cards you need in the early game (stealth heroes and/or recon units), this can really cripple your progress, and when you discard cards to try and draw new ones, they are gone forever, crippling your late game potential. I think discarded cards should be shuffled back into the deck. Or ideally, early game there should be an ability to pay a premium in action points (say 6 AP) to draw a specific card from your deck. That would ensure that players could at least get one scout out in the early game, at the cost of using up most of their APs. - This last complaint is perhaps shades of tinfoil hats, but I'm pretty sure the RNG is bugged. I've noticed a distinct tendency for offensive rolls to underperform, and defensive rolls to overperform. So a 7 die attacker loses to a 3 or 4 die defender far more often than chance would predict (and this is even after accounting for the fact that defenders win ties). I may or may not be right about this, but it's always bugged me.

Very board-gamey, but not bad at all.

Las reglas son fáciles de aprender, pero en cuanto te pongas a jugar verás que es lo único fácil. Juego de estrategia espectacular, cada decisión cuenta, rápido de jugar (a no ser que pienses y repienses cada jugada, entonces no) y muy satisfactorio. Si tienes un monitor grande las cartas se ven espectaculares. Viejarraco pero merece la pena si te gustan los juegos de estrategia y táctica sobre tablero hexagonal

I have about 2 hours on Steam, but back after it released in the late 2000's I sunk a ridiculous number of hours into this game that's probably only matched by idle game playtimes. The UI is janky and the mechanics can get downright arcane, so it's not for everyone, but if you want a deep hybrid board/card/4x with near infinite replay value, this is for you.

Good game that deserved to do better. Though it might be a bit dated and clunky for some, it works well on my windows 10 system and I found the game is not that hard to get to grips with. People who like tabletop games and settings like the 2000AD or the 1980's Games Workshop stuff will probably like this a lot. Pretty engrossing! Though I have not owned it that long, I have already played more than 0.3. hours as the Steam time seems to say. It might be because i'm loading it from the full screen option, which is not the default (which is a windowed mode that's too small for my liking and i'm unable to alter the size for).

The Xenos kept sending their armies into my base and losing, while my army were slowly getting pounded by their disgusting airborne abomination of insects. All the meantime, the Free Mutant faction trolled me by sending their invisible 4 handed kung fu hero that couldn't be seen by 8 units and broke one of my heroes's neck each turn until he left, sparing only 2 remaining heroes. 10/10, can't wait to bomb cultist's headquarter to save the world again. UPDATE: After 6 hours worth of attrition, 4 ground units, 2 heroes, and 1 single aircraft left, I SURPRISINGLY WON! There was an instance where the Free Mutant faction could've just assault my capital and win when my main army was far away clearing out Xeno scums, instead of laying siege all day and became easy prey for my copter, but overall, the AI was competent. They could play their cards, armies, and heroes really well without cheating in all phases of the game. Xenos wrecked my armies apart, The Free Mutant ripped my heroes necks and hit&run really well, and one of them actually finished off Empire of Man! RIP Sceptre, you were the reason I could hold on from all those disgusting tissues organisms...