Another great year for strategy gaming comes to a close and we can look forward to…well, it’s not quite clear. Where 2005 had some huge sequels (Civ IV, AoE 3, EE 2) that we could rest our hopes on, 2006 has few marquee games on the horizon – certainly none with the oomph that Firaxis and Ensemble bring to the table.

Here’s what we can look forward to between now and July 1. Note that all the estimated release windows are based on guesswork and a very little bit of research. Some of these titles may slip.

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Hearts of Iron II: Doomsday – This is an expansion pack for Paradox’s WW2 strategy colossus. It moves the game forward into the early Cold War, meaning that you don’t just have to beat the Nazis; you also have win the battle of ideas over Communism. Or capitalism. Or crush them both under your iron fascist heel. Estimated release window – April

Heroes of Might and Magic V – I’m one of those few who never appreciated the HoMM series. I never found the games interesting at all, and it’s not the fantasy setting turning me off. I love Dragonshard. Anyway, this is eagerly anticipated by many people, but I’m not in line. Estimated release window – March

Heart of Empire: Rome – This Roman city builder is now being published in North America by Paradox. Deep Silver announced this game a while ago and development has moved forward despite the announcement that the former Impressions designers are taking another crack at the Caesar series. This game will have a more political focus though, limiting what the player is able to do until he gets enough status in the city. Estimated release window – June

Space Empires V – Yep. A space conquest strategy game with real time combat and pretty explosions. It is estimated to come out in March, but will have to distinguish itself from…

Galactic Civilizations II: The Dread Lords – GalCiv will beat Space Empires to the release gate by about a month, coming out in February instead of the estimated March for SE5. Stardock’s original GalCiv was what Master of Orion 3 should have been. I’m generally not to interested in sci-fi settings, but this one will be a must-have.

American Conquest: Divided Nation – You can’t keep the Cossacks engine down, despite my efforts to proclaim the general mediocrity of all the games so far. This is a sequel to the exploration and independence battles of American Conquest, centering on American expansion and Civil War. It could be good. It certainly looks pretty. Estimated release window- January.

Joint Task Force – The success of Act of War has softened my heart to modern/near-future RTS. With 5 separate campaigns set in the battlefields of the week after next, JTF promises lots of fireworks and “realistic physics”. Like there’s any other kind. Estimated release window – May

Lord of the Rings: The Battle for Middle Earth II – Orcs, hobbits and wizards. It could be terrible and it would still sell hundreds of thousands of copies. It won’t be terrible. Estimated release window – March

War on Terror – Still a stupid name for a war, but not necessarily a bad name for a game. Another today-ish RTS which has you running around the world killing bad guys in the name of freedom, democracy and safety. I have a bad feeling about this one. Estimated release window – June

Seven Kingdoms: Conquest – A new Seven Kingdoms game and I still haven’t gotten around to the earlier ones. Different human civs, different demon civs and a race for the future from the Age of Pyramids to the Age of Giant Robots. The art design looks…jumbled. At least at this point. There’s some lame backstory about the Akkadians opening Pandora’s box or something and the demons keep coming back to kill humans through seven ages of man. This could be very cool or the dumbest idea since calling a war a War on Terror. Estimated release window – March

Rise of Legends – If I buy any game in the next three months, this is it. Interesting new setting, a not-quite-sequel to the best RTS ever (Rise of Nations) and being developed right here in Maryland by Big Huge Games. Gotta buy local. Estimated release window – April

Cossacks II: Battle for Europe – These guys again? It’s an expansion to 2005’s oh-so-average and frustrating Napoleonic Wars. I’ll probably have to buy just to see if these CDV guys can ever surprise me. Estimated release window – May

Empire Earth II: The Art of Supremacy – Easily the worst subtitle for any expansion pack here. New nations, new weapons, new campaigns. Hopefully some new ideas. Estimated release window – February

Act of War: High Treason – Easily the most Tom Clancy subtitle for any expansion pack here. New campaign and new enemies and now with naval combat. I want it now. Estimated release window – March.

Rush for Berlin – Another Deep Silver game that is being published by Paradox in North America. And another WW2 RTS. Aren’t we tired of these yet? What about the Arab-Israeli Wars? Or some Central American civil conflict? More panzers? Yawn. Estimated release window – May

Faces of War – Except for the publishing information, ditto. WW2 RTS. The big difference here is that the campaign will try to focus on the same soldiers as they fight their way across Europe. Could make a good RPG. Estimated release window – March.

City Life – This is SimCity to the extreme. Beautiful 3D engine, the potential to see the city as your citizens see it. For city builders, this could be the one that gives Maxis a run for its simoleons. Estimated release window – May.
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I’ve probably missed a few. Rise and Fall: Civilizations at War was supposed to be an early 2006 release, but I suspect it will slip till summer. There are also lots of indie and smaller wargames that I can’t find information on at this point.

There isn’t a lot of potential for pleasant surprises in this list. City Life could be one. Maybe Joint Task Force. But I don’t see any equivalent to last year’s Act of War or Dragonshard – two games that were so much better than they had any right to be.

Have a good New Year and I’ll be back blogging in 2006.

In my never-ending struggle to bring you news you already know, only spun through my own private prism, Gamespy has announced its PC Games of the Year, as well as the usual genre awards.

I have fewer issues with Gamespy’s choices than I did IGN’s. This is not unusual, since I have fewer issues with Gamespy as a site than I do with IGN. But I digress.

The division of strategy games into RTS and TBS categories is a little anachronistic. There aren’t really enough TBS games out there in any given year. And it’s not like Civ IV had any real competition in any case. Dave Kosak, Gamespy’s strategy czar, reviewed both Age of Empires III and Civilization IV and gave both five stars. I liked Age of Empires III, but not that much. Age of Empires III wasn’t even nominated in any of the Gamespot award categories. It also wins for best graphics and earns a nomination for best music.

Though it’s not so unusual that Gamespy’s game of the year is the same as mine – Civ IV – but it is interesting that Diplomacy earns their “Coaster of the Year” award just as it earned my “worst strategy game” notice. Kosak eviscerated it in his review. Having not played through all the FPS or RPG or Adventure games out there, I figured that there had to be something worse than Diplomacy. (IGN didn’t name a “worst game.”) I gave it two stars in my review – the game is not a total disaster, but certainly not good. Kosak gave it one-half of a star.

IGN has announced its games of the year, and the PC choices aren’t full of surprises. Most reasonable people can agree on what a good game is. Plus, their ultimate choice of Civilization IV as their Game of the Year is in sync with mine.

But a few little things bother me.

How the hell is Empire Earth II anybody’s runner-up for strategy game of the year? As much as Age of Empires III annoys me with its familiarity, it is at least an enjoyable little formula. Act of War is better than both of them. Yeah, PCGamer liked Empire Earth II, too. A lot of people did. But very, very few rated it higher than both those other games.

“Best game no one played” goes one better and picks two duds – the impenetrably dull Gary Grigsby’s World at War and the mediocre Imperial Glory. No sign of Psychonauts. Or Darwinia. Or Space Rangers 2. Insanity.

Not sure that Civ IV, a game that almost everyone I know plays solo, is anyone’s pick for best online game – besides IGN. Their runner-up (Battlefield 2) is a more logical choice, but I’ll give IGN credit for going against the grain there, at least.

It’s easy to pick on IGN, for some reason. You can fisk their articles for vagueness or errors, mock their choices for columnists, or simply note that many of their scores seemed to be pulled out of a hat.

But rest assured that Gamespy will get examined in this space soon.

I’m not going to claim to be the best speller or writer out there. Typos and me go way back. But is it too much to ask for games to have their words spelled correctly?

Case in point, Legion Arena. The battles in the game are separated by a voice-over history of Rome with a map as the background. The narration is pretty good – and the voice strangely uncredited in the manual. But as the map zoomed out for a bit on the Punic Wars, I was horrified to see “Cathago” and “Puncia” on the map. (It should be “Carthago” and “Punica”.) Two of the game’s battles are misspelled, too – “Claudine Forks” instead of “Caudine” and Agrigentum gets a double-G after the A. (They refer Mark Antony as “Anthony”, but the H-spelling is an acceptable alternative in the UK.)

There’s an odd but frequent formatting problem, too. The text that introduces each battle often runs across the box in such a way to leave a single period at the beginning of a line.

None of this affects the gameplay in any way, naturally. And we’ve come to expect spelling errors in our games, especially as more and more of them are made in non-English speaking countries. But Slitherine is a British company and it’s not like the game was rushed out the door or anything.

Spelling errors do annoy me in games, probably out of all proportion to their importance or frequency. And considering how many words your typical strategy game has, it’s probably remarkable that I haven’t found more in Civilization IV. But these errors do have the effect of pulling me out of whatever zen-like gaming trance I am in, reminding me of the banality of fact-checking and how often it is left for later – and then never gotten around to at all.

Gamespot has announced its Game of the Year nomination list. I don’t know why they break it down into so many different catergories – I count 53. Sure, ten of the categories are “joke” categories like the one for excessive cursing or product placement. But clicking through all those pages is the best argument yet for ignoring platforms as a distinguishing characteristic.

The Strategy Game of the Year nominees are a bit of a surprise since there are two console games on the list: Advance Wars: Dual Strike and Metal Gear Acid. The PC entries are Act of War: Direct Action, Dragonshard and the odds-on favorite Civilization IV. Civ is also the only strategy entry in the PC Game of the Year category.

The failure of Age of Empires III to be nominated for a single category must be a serious disappointment for the folks at Ensemble. This is a marquee franchise that has brought lots of critical acclaim to the developers and they put together another good game – very good at times. Still, it wasn’t good enough for Gamespot. Not quite good enough for me either.

Come January, the major sites and magazines will announce all of their 2005 best-of lists, and I’ll be here to look at all the strategy relevant opinions.

OK. It’s not the end of the year. But it’s close enough. And I doubt I’ll get much blogging done in the days before January hits.

It’s been a good year for strategy games. The best indie game of the year is a strategy game. The best game of the year is a strategy game. The best budget game of the year is a wargame.

With every up, there’s a down. Missed opportunities. Fumbled franchises. Failures to learn from history. So, without further ado…

Best Trend: Console Strategy Games – Even if it leads to the end of AAA turn-based strategy titles for the PC, the continuing success of the Romance of the Three Kingdoms series is now coupled with the excellent Advance Wars and better than expected Shattered Union. It’s not quite enough to make me invest in a next gen console, but it is enough to make me stop looking down my nose at the machines altogether.

Worst Trend: WW2 RTS – It’s not that they are bad, it’s just that with Blitzkrieg II and Codename Panzer and now Company of Heroes on the way…enough already. Or at least change the formula some.

Best Idea Implemented in the Worst Way: Borders in Empire Earth II – When Rise of Nations introduced borders to the RTS a couple of years ago, they put a new wrinkle in the whole land rush mentality of the genre. When Empire Earth II did it this year, it lacked all of the urgency and importance. It had no dynamism – just sections that could be captured.

Worst Idea Implemented in the Best Way: All of Dragonshard – From the snicker-worthy name to the idea of a fantasy RTS set in the blah Eberron world, this D&D strategy title had little going for it. It turned out to be a gentle reminder that good art direction and a few changes to the old RTS formula could overcome even the most dubious of starting positions. I mean, come on. War golems?

Least Surprising Game: Cossacks II: The Napoleonic Wars – Given my tepid reaction to the earlier Cossacks games, my “Meh” tone to Cossacks II was completely expected. I opened the box, looked at the game and was only shocked by how little had been done to win me over.

Most Surprising Game: Act of War: Direct Action – Jingoistic, Jerry Bruckheimer-esque near future RTS against a tired opponent with full motion video interludes. I should have hated this game. I did not. It had an interesting single player campaign (that never happens) and had infantry in their proper role as versatile and essential battlefield units. And it’s getting an expansion titled High Treason. I won’t be surprised if it’s good.

Best Independent Game: Darwinia – It not only looked good, in a retro kind of way. It also had some very interesting level design and some interesting game challenges. Introversion is the master of self-promotion, but at least they have something to promote.

Best Budget Title: History Channel Bull Run Take Command 1861 – Or something like that. This Civil War wargame from Mad Minute Games was a critical darling and deservedly so. It took the one battle it had (and one battlefield) and somehow made every experience with it new and shocking. The news that they are working on another Civil War game is heartening. Lots of time and money went into making Bull Run and it gets sold for $19.99. Glad to see that they think they have another one in them.

Best Game the Mainstream Game Press Didn’t Tell Me About: Ticket to Ride Online – Game suggestions that come from friends can be iffy. Board games doubly so. But the friendly recommendation of Ticket to Ride Online was such a success that you have to wonder why most of the gaming press ignores the entire online board game world. TTR is not a “casual game” as is usually understood, but involves just enough thinking to make it a great strategy game. I’m already planning for the PC version’s arrival. Then the game will get some press. And a year late.

Worst Game: Diplomacy – There haven’t been a lot of terrible strategy games this year. You had Heritage of Kings: The Settlers. I never even looked for a Cold War Conflicts demo – Gamespot didn’t bother reviewing it either. But Diplomacy gets my vote for worst strategy game simply because of all the misplaced energy. A 3D board that spins and never lets you focus on what’s happening. Grunting enemy avatars. No real way to engage in private negotiations in game. Well, the latest patch includes private chat – after weeks of people defending this design decision. Given the failure of other attempts to translate the classic game to PC, Paradox deserves some credit for ignoring the past and surging ahead. They also deserve the blame for repeating the past.

Best Game: Civilization IV – This isn’t even close. No other game has given me the joy, anger, thrill of discovery, and remembrances of things past. Sid Meier’s name’s on the box, but the afterword in the manual shows that Soren Johnson gets it. He gets what makes Civ great. I can’t think of a single addition to the game that was a mistake or misstep. This will be the PC game of the year, I suspect, for most of the major gaming press outlets. Unless Gamespy does something stupid and picks Empire Earth II (they picked the first one, after all).