A final list of the strategy games on display at this year’s E3. Lots of big titles here. Civ4. AoE3. Rise of Legends. And, most anticipated by far, Spore.
Fantasy strategy seems to be making a comeback and tycoon games are still going strong.
The shocking title is Frog City’s Snow. One of my all-time favorite developers – the makers of the Imperialism games – is now doing a drug lord tycoon game. Since I openly admit to targeting civilians in my RTS games, I shouldn’t get on my high horse about ethical behavior in games, but there does seem to be a qualitative difference somewhere in there.
Age of Empires III (Microsoft/Ensemble)
American Conquest: Divided Nation (CDV/GSC)
Ascension to the Throne (1C Company/DVS)
Battle Mages: Sign of Darkness (Buka Entertainment/Targem Games)
Black and White 2 (Electronic Arts/Lionhead)
Blitzkrieg 2 (CDV/Nival Interactive)
Brigade E5: New Jagged Union (1C Company/Apeiron)
Civilization IV (2K Games/Firaxis)
Codename: Panzers, Phase Two (CDV/Stormregion)
Company of Heroes (THQ/Relic)
Cuban Missile Crisis (1C Company/G5 Software)
Desert Law (1C Company/Arise)
Diplomacy (Paradox)
Dragonshard (Atari/Liquid)
Earth 2160 (Zuxxez/Reality Pump)
ER (2005) (Vivendi Universal/Legacy Interactive)
Galactic Civilizations II: Dread Lords (Strategy First/Stardock)
Ghost Wars (Hip Games/Digital Reality)
The Guild 2 (JoWood/Deep Silver)
Hard Truck Tycoon (Buka Entertainment/G5 Software)
Heart of Empire: Rome (Deep Silver/Deep Red)
Heaven vs. Hell (TKO Software)
Heroes of Might and Magic V (Ubisoft/Nival Interactive)
Hotel Giant 2 (JoWood/Game Factory)
Imperivm: Great Battles of Rome (FX Interactive/Haemimont)
Joint Task Force (HD Interactive/Mithis)
The Movies (Activision/Lionhead)
Outfront II(1c Company)
Pacific Storm (Buka/Lesta Studio)
Paraworld (Sunflowers)
Perimeter: Emperor’s Testament (1C Company/KD Labs)
Panzer Elite Action (JoWood/Zootfly)
Rollercoast Tycoon 3: Soaked (Atari/Frontier Dev.)
Rise & Fall: Civilizations at War (Midway/Stainless Steel)
Rise of Nations: Rise of Legends (Microsoft/Big Huge Games)
Rush for Berlin (Deep Silver/Storm Region)
Seven Kingdoms: Conquest (Enlight Software)
The Sims 2: Nightlife (Electronic Arts/Maxis)
Singles 2: Triple Trouble (Deep Silver/Rotobee)
Snow (2K Games/Frog City)
Space Rangers 2: Dominators (1C Company/Elemental Games)
Spellforce 2 (JoWood/Phenomic Game Development)
Spore (EA Games/Maxis)
Stalingrad (1C Company/4X Studios)
Star Wars: Empire at War (LucasArts/Petroglyph)
Tycoon City: New York (Atari/Deep Red)
UFO: Aftershock (Cenega/Altar)
An Untitled RTS (Deep Silver)
War Front: Turning Point (CDV/Digital Reality)
Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War – Winter Assault (THQ/Relic)
War Leaders: Clash of Nations (CDV/Enigma Software)
World War I (1C Company/Nival Interactive)
A World War II RTS (1C Company)
XIII Century: Sword and Honor (1C Company/One Small World)
Zoo Tycoon 2: Endangered Species (Microsoft/Blue Fang Games)
Lots of big titles indeed, but why do I get the feeling of “been there, done that, only in slightly poorer graphics” with just about every title on that list?
Or maybe its just me being pessimistic. I do look forward to Galactic Civilization II, and a few of the RTS’s may provide some new entertainment, but still…
Absolutely right, Michael. The number of familiar standbys is huge, and not just in the strategy environment.
I think that there will be surprises through the year, and that even some of the ho-hum sequel offerings could offer something new. But you are right to point out the copycat nature of the whole thing.