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What are the best strategy games for PC?

30

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Considered

90

User
Recs.

Dec 21, 2022

Last
Updated

26 Games Considered

Best strategy games for PC	Price	Steam Rating	Genre
-- Factorio	$20.00	Overwhelmingly Positive	Realtime Strategy (RTS)
-- StarCraft II	$19.99	-	RTS
-- Supreme Commander	$14.99	Very Positive	RTS
-- XCOM 2	$59.99	Very Positive	Turn-based Tactical RPG
-- Crusader Kings II	$39.99	Very Positive	Grand Strategy

Factorio

Top Pro

Endless solutions

With proper planning users can "code" together very precise ways to create all the things needed for the game, some in very inventive ways that can differ quite a bit. This allows for tons of replayability. See More

Top Con

Can become rather repetitive

There's really little payoff for being able to build really long chains of automation, it usually results in being able to open a new tech tree which allows the player to continue the process of building automation chains ad infinitum, which, admittedly can become rather boring after a while. See More

Specs

Steam Rating:Overwhelmingly Positive

Genre:Realtime Strategy (RTS)

Co-Op:16+ Player Online (100+ has been done)

Top Pro

Rich modding community

From simple game enhancements, like being able to reach anything on the screen, to changing the difficulty of enemies or adding an experience system, Factorio is made to be modded and there's a large community making mods. See More

Top Con

Still in Alpha

The game is still in Alpha which means there will be bugs as well as missing features. See More

Top Pro

Under active development

The game is still in Alpha which means endless future possibilities. See More

Top Pro

Massive and infinite procedurally generated world

The playing world is as large as you want to explore, it automatically generates it as you explore more areas. See More

Top Pro

Cooperative or PvP building

Factorio also supports multiplayer, allowing many players to cooperate and assist each other, or work against each other in PvP. By default, multiplayer games run the CO-OP freeplay scenario where all players work together to launch a rocket with a satellite into space. See More

Top Pro

Charming old school graphics

While not the most technically advanced graphics the look of the game is much like a game from the 90s but seeing it in action when an assembly line starts moving there is an impressiveness to it that suits the game quite well. See More

Top Pro

Charming old school graphics

While not the most technically advanced graphics the look of the game is much like a game from the 90s but seeing it in action when an assembly line starts moving there is an impressiveness to it that suits the game quite well. See More

StarCraft II

Top Pro

Well balanced, asymmetrical gameplay

Opposing teams will have completely different skillsets allowing players to take wholly different approaches toward completing the same goal. This makes for asymmetrical gameplay that has been painstakingly balanced. See More

Top Con

Starcraft I units un-available

They removed/replaced some of the units with new units See More

Specs

Top Pro

Gives in-game access to a wide variety of community created games/mods

Users can publish their mods to the game so that other players may then apply them in-game. This makes for easy access to a wide variety of mods and games. See More

Top Con

Large focus on micromanagement

Following closely in StarCraft's footprints, StarCraft II relies on extensive micromanagement; engaging in a battle with an enemy while, at the same time, deploying a side force to harass the enemy base or to flank in a large fight. If titles featuring wars of attrition and slower-paced gameplay garner more of your interest, StarCraft II may prove a difficult challenge. See More

Top Pro

Has an active eSports scene

With a 1.6 million dollar prize pool for the world championships in 2015, StarCraft II has a very large and supported eSports scene that is participated in throughout the world. See More

Top Pro

Big player base

Has a very big player base and everyone will be able to find a suitable opponent whether you are a rookie or an experienced player. See More

Top Pro

A free starter edition is available

With the Starter Edition, players can start the beginning of the campaign, compete in ranked ladder matches, and play anything in the Arcade (a mode that offers a huge selection community-created games and mods). See More

Supreme Commander

Top Pro

Simulation of every shot

If there is a large building in between the line of sight of you and the target, your units might hit the building instead. To compensate you can use artillery or missiles. However this type of full scale simulation is at the expense of CPU power. See More

Top Con

Long learning curve

This game takes a while to pick up and learn to play well and since everything happens slowly you need to plan. See More

Specs

Steam Rating:Very Positive

Co-Op:yes (with FAF)

Controller Support:No

Top Pro

Fundamentally different factions that are equally balanced

Top Con

Standalone add-on Forged Alliance needed for stability

Vanilla game has balance issues, which is why it is recommended to install the add-on, Forged Alliance. See More

Top Pro

Strategic scale

The biggest maps are 81 km across. Ground units can take time on the order of tens of minutes to cross this distance, and even aircraft sometimes can't get places fast enough. If your scouts see an army coming, you have time to prepare. Artillery plus radar can hit things at long distance. It feels more strategic and less tactical than other RTS games. See More

Top Con

Developers abandoned the game

However there is great community support in which they have released patches in order to fix outstanding bugs as well as support hosting a map vault where players can download community made maps to use in the game. There is also a matchmaking lobby tool available here, which makes finding online matches to play pretty easy. See More

Top Pro

High skill cap

This game can satisfy you for hours with a very high level of play achievable that takes a long time to get and very rewarding feeling when mastered. See More

Top Con

Large battles with a poor CPU is not recommended in 4v4

The game can slow down significantly in large battles and on huge maps with a lot of players especially for those using lower end PCs. See More

Top Pro

Massive battles with plenty of outcomes

Battles can involve hundreds of units. This allows for even experimental units that can single-handedly take out entire armies due to their sheer size. This way there is room for experimentation in what can works, or just to see what outcomes they have. See More

Top Pro

Strategic zoom

You don't need a mini map to get an overview of the Battlefield. Just zoom out using the scroll wheel. If you want to "jump" somewhere else just zoom in to that spot. See More

Top Pro

Real time economy

When you spend resources on a building they are not spent instantly but over the time of building. Same for collecting. Your buffer is small so try to spend at the same rate as you gather. See More

Top Pro

Asynchronous tech system

Upgrading one factory doesn't magically upgrade all the others. Decide wisely how much you spend on advancing in tech. Low tech spam can sometimes still be an option. See More

Top Pro

Advanced command system

By holding the shift key, you can see the commands you gave as an overlay on the map. Drag and drop commands to adapt them whenever you have to. See More

XCOM 2

Top Pro

It's fun to upgrade and manage your squad

As you progress through the game you can train and promote your soldiers to make them more effective in combat, unlock new abilities and upgrade their weapons armor. The interesting part of it is if a member gets injured (which is really easy to happen on the harder difficulties) they are not available for the following missions until they heal. So if you only upgrade one solider and he/she gets injured, you're in a really tough spot. The weapons, abilities, items and armor you can unlock are varied and interesting enough to make it really fun to progress through the game and build a custom squad based around how you like to go about your missions. See More

Top Con

Performance could be better

Even when using well above the recommended hardware the game does show some performance issues as it is difficult to hold 60fps. While not the biggest problem thanks to this being a turn based game it would have been nice to see better performance and a constant 60fps when using what the developers recommended for best performance. See More

Specs

Steam Rating:Very Positive

Genre:Turn-based Tactical RPG

Top Pro

Excellent suspense

You're always against the clock in one way or another. Globally your enemies are moving forward with their plans and unless you actively work towards countering them, they will win. You'll be short on cash, manpower, and will have to work with inferior tech. On the field most missions have turn limits forcing you to act aggressively. This scrambling for resources, making with what you can, racing against the clock creates great suspense that makes it all the more satisfying to win an important mission. See More

The Banner Saga 2

Top Pro

Great combat

Much of the mechanics found in the original title remain the same, which is a good thing as the turn based tactical grid based combat is the strongest thing about this game series. There have been some slight improvements though making for a more balanced rhythm to the game by adding new units to both the players choices and the enemies, which mixes up the gameplay quite often to keep it feeling fresh. See More

Top Con

HP damage based attacks leave little room for expanding ones tactics

Due to the design of the gameplay, the amount of hit points a players unit has is the exact amount of damage they will inflict on an enemy. This makes for the winning strategy to always hit all enemy units on the playing field to ensure they inflict as little damage as possible. While players can go about it many other ways, this strategy tends to do the best, which is a bit limiting. See More

Specs

Genre:Turn-based RPG

Top Pro

Helps the player learn the gameplay

The first title in the series had a bit of trouble explaining all the aspects of play of the game. Luckily this has changed in the second release as there is now a camp where a trainer will give challenges to the player that explain the game a lot more in-depth. This is great for new players as they can learn the ins and outs a lot easier. See More

Top Con

Story feels a bit weak compared to the previous game

Much like the sophomore album syndrome (where the second album from a break out band falls flat) the story in this release feels a bit weak. While not horrible, it will have trouble connecting to players who are not already familiar with the series. There is also a sense that many of the story elements are setting up events to be found in the third game, meaning that players will be left unknowing what the conclusions are. See More

Top Pro

Allows for imports of gamesaves from first game

Players of the series can import their game saves from the previous title, giving them the option to start as one of two different characters. This ensures that choices made in the previous game are not lost when starting this game and experiencing the story it has to tell. See More

Top Pro

Great hand drawn graphics

The all hand drawn graphics are animated smoothly and are extremely detailed which makes for one heck of a good looking game. See More

Age of Empires II HD

Top Pro

Facilitates the user's preferred pace

This game neither gives the impression of being thrown to the wolves nor that of being left stranded on an island. Whether you want to move slowly and steadily through the game or take things at a more heightened pace, Age of Empires 2 will allow for both (given a little planning). See More

Specs

Controller Support:No

Top Pro

Runs on very old computers

As this game is quite old, requiring only a 1.2GHZ processor and 1 Gigabyte of RAM, this title will run on older PC's and laptops alike without issue. See More

Top Pro

Awesome ambiance with a great finish

While the graphics are slightly outdated, they were very well done for their time. And when combined with the history behind the game and its wonderful soundtrack, the game comes across as extremely polished. See More

Dota 2

Top Con

You love and hate the game

While infuriating at times the addictiveness of the game keeps the players coming back. See More

Top Pro

Has user-created custom games

Dota 2 includes Workshop Tools that allow users to create custom games as well as other play them. See More

Specs

Steam Rating:Mostly Positive

Top Con

Rude, toxic community

Many players feel free to flame and insult, especially in the lower ranks and from non-english speaking countries. See More

Top Pro

Players can trade self-made cosmetic items

The game includes a system for players to create, buy, and sell cosmetic items. See More

Top Con

Time-consuming and difficult to get into

Dota 2 is a very satisfying game, but only after hours upon hours are put into learning the games various in's and out's. Beginners should be warned that the game is very difficult and may not be fun for the first week or so. See More

Top Pro

No game enhancing purchases

Microtransactions involve only cosmetic items such as custom weapon designs or clothing colors and tickets to view live events. See More

Top Pro

Deny creeps

You can kill your own low-health creeps to deny experience and gold to the other team. See More

Top Pro

Very active professional scene

Dota 2 has one of the most if not the most active professional scenes in e-sports today. See More

Top Pro

Incredibly deep gameplay

For players who put the time into Dota 2 to get past the early beginner phase, Dota 2 can become an extremely satisfying game. There's a reason it's one of the most popular eSports titles in the world. The amount of strategy, skill and variables involved make it a very deep game where anything could happen. See More

Top Pro

Regularly updated

Dota 2 is regularly patched and changed with new characters being introduced and balance changes made. This can prevent the game from becoming too stale as the tactics utilized by players changes often. See More

Top Pro

Cross-platform

Available on Windows, OS X, and Linux. See More

Top Pro

Dota 2 has the world's biggest e-sports tournament

At The International 4 in summer 2014, players raised the prize pool to more than $10 million, one of the largest prize pools in E-Sports history. See More

Top Pro

Start with all heroes

There's no need to unlock or purchase characters unlike many other MOBA games. See More

SMITE

Top Pro

An aggressive Titan for each team

Unlike the Nexuses of DOTA 2 and League of Legends, SMITE features an aggressive Nexus called Titans, which defends themselves and their teammates. See More

Top Con

Meta is unstable

SMITE's meta has always been shifting ever since. In Season 2, the Hunter class is the most powerful class in the game, giving birth to certain unique builds like the Unicorn Build, an item build revolving on power, penetration and attack speed on hunters. Hunter items were soon nerfed. Then, back in Season 2, the Guardian class dominates the scene. Very long crowd control chains can kill almost everyone in an ability channeling gods era, and shuts down the powerhouses of team fights, the Mages and ADCs. Giving birth to the unique DirtyBubble Build, a build focused on protections and cooldown to counter the crowd-controls and burst damages from tanks. We all hope the Season 3 changes will balance overpowered classes and make the meta stable. See More

Specs

Top Pro

3rd person view is a unique twist on the genre

The 3rd person view used in SMITE is a big change from the top down views normally used in a MOBA. The game also utilizes WASD keys, unlike the traditional point-to-move system of traditional MOBAs. This creates a large blind spot behind the users character and also makes sneaking behind someone for stealth attacks a viable option. See More

Top Con

Excessive snowballing on certain characters

If not countered or shut down early, some characters can become extremely strong, making a comeback for the other team virtually impossible. See More

Top Pro

5 free gods and five more each week

You start with 5 free gods and a weekly rotation of 5 more. See More

Top Con

The third person view prevents sharing your teammates' vision

The lack of overhead view causes what happens to your teammates to be almost completely unknown. Without good communication, you are running blind and might as well be playing the game solo. In other MOBAs, communication isn't as much of a necessity. If a "jungler" is nearby, you assume he wants to gank. When an ally dashes in, you assume he's positioning himself for a setup. But in Smite, an ally might have dashed out in order to run away from a bigger threat, or you didn't notice he was waiting for a good opportunity to ambush someone in your lane. You NEED to communicate in Smite, or your allies won't have any idea what's going on, until it's too late. See More

Top Pro

Features three ranked modes

Smite features 3 ranked modes, mainly the 1v1, the newly added 3v3, both of which utilizes the new Joust map. And the 5v5, on the Conquest map. All of which features experienced players and intense matches to satiate your search for glory and honor in the league of Smite. See More

Top Pro

Completely play to win and not pay to win

There is no difference between a new player and a world champion. All players are equal. You don't buy your runes or as we call it, actives with real life cash, you buy them in game. You decide what active to use. This gives all players the ability to strategize and counter without using real cash. Microtransactions are only for buying gems (in game currency) which you can use to buy cosmetic items which does not necessarily affect your play style. See More

Top Pro

Shown difficulty levels

The game shows difficulty levels for each god such as hard, average or easy making it easier for players to find characters suited to their experience level. See More

Top Pro

Hi-Rez approaches the SMITE community for feedbacks, brilliant ideas and mechanics they could use in the game

The company behind SMITE, Hi-Rez studios, actually listens for community feedback and looks for potential ideas and mechanics provided by the community. For example, the Odyssey ultimate reward last 2014, was nominated by players. The SPL Ticket Announcer Packs reward were also picked by the community. And some in game skins are actually created by players. The Harajuku Neith skin, The Ba5s Drop Janus skin, the Opera Bacchus skin, were all conceptualized by Smite players. And the most recent one, the Demon Bull King mechanic, which disables the towers and phoenixes in Joust to prevent camping, and the addition of the Japanese Pantheon to the game, were taken from community feedback as well. See More

Top Pro

Voice Guided System (VGS)

SMITE has provided the best and most efficient way to communicate in game. The VGS provides keyboard shortcuts for in game commands like pressing the keys V>F>1 which stands for "Enemy missing left" and V>B>F meaning "Enemies at the Fire Giant'" or in simple terms, the enemies are doing the objective. This simple shortcuts are very useful in game communicating and keeping your team vigilant without losing focus in the game. See More

Top Pro

Cross platform

SMITE is playable on PC and Xbox One, and Playstation 4. See More

Top Pro

Beginner friendly

New to SMITE? Well, you don't have to worry. Get five free gods of every role at the start to help you learn the role you want. Learn the game basics and mechanics over the Practice mode and the Jungle Practice map where all gods are available for you to try and experiment with. The community is also friendly to new players. You won't have a hard time adjusting to SMITE's mechanics and gameplay. See More

Top Pro

Great graphics and art style

SMITE, by far, has the best graphics and art style in the scene, the map design is great, Hi-Rez studios tries their best to keep the gods as mythological lore-like as possible, and the cosmetic skins crushes the other cosmetic skins in other MOBAs. They have these what they call Tier 5 skins, like the Archon skin for Thanatos, and Ragnarok Force X skin for Thor, which are straight fire and worthy for its cost. See More

Top Pro

Odyssey event

Every year, SMITE releases an Odyssey event months before the Smite World Championships. Over the course of several weeks, cosmetic items are released every week until the start of the SWC. These cosmetic items will be available for purchase some time after the SWC and will be branded as "Exclusive Skins" after the event. Every purchase in the Odyssey contributes to the SWC Prize Pool. Players can obtain limited edition items when they purchase a certain amount of items. For example, the Archon Thanatos, and Ragnarok Force X Thor can be obtained by the player when they have purchased all the Odyssey Items. Additionally, every item purchase will grant an Odyssey Chest roll that can be claimed in the rewards center. This chest can contain god skins, ward skins, and voice packs . There is also a slim chance that the chest will grant exclusive in-game items. See More

Top Pro

Provides a lot of incentives to play the game often

You have the daily quests which rewards you favor and gems (in-game currency). So you don't have to worry logging in daily, like its previous predecessor, the daily log-in reward. There are gem events, which is a limited period of time in which players can get gems (valued in game currency). There's a First Win of the Day reward (FWOTD). Rewards every time we win a match, insane sale discounts. Also, Hi-Rez employees sometimes give away in-game freebies in their Twitter account. See More

Top Pro

Auto buy

SMITE has the ability for users to set an auto buy on items and abilities. See More

Top Pro

Updates often

Because Smite is young game, updates are really often, new gods, maps, balance-path, etc. Expect to receive patches in a biweekly manner, alternating between god release, balances and skins, then god release. See More

Top Pro

6 great game modes and a rotating match of the day

Smite has 6 game modes and all of them are extremely popular: Arena. A 5v5 death match, no lanes or objectives. Arena is best for people who prefer intense combat over strategy. Good for impatient but independent players. Joust. A 3v3 mode, with a single lane and buff camps on one side, and an objective lair on the other side. The Demon Bull King provides a clearly interesting mechanic to Joust, kill it, and it disables the enemy towers, to prevent turtling, which is pretty common in Joust. Joust is great for working with a team. Everyone has a role to fill, and learning how to adjust your play for your two teammates is half the battle. Surprisingly focused on teamwork, despite small teams. Conquest. The typical 5v5 mode, three lanes, jungle, towers, objectives. Conquest is the standard game that everyone knows, and requires lots of communication. Siege. A 4v4 objective push map. Siege is similar to Joust, but has massive battles compared to small skirmishes. Two lanes definitely adds chaos to the mix. Assault. A 5v5 ARAM. Assault is randomized. Nobody gets upset when the team of all tanks lose. Just queue up again in 15 minutes. Clash. A 5v5 Conquest and Arena mix of style mode. Plus, there's a rotating Match of the Day (MOTD). A random game mode with a twist, like max cooldowns, no basic attacking, god swapping and more. MOTD can sometimes be more fun and interesting than anything else. See More

Top Pro

The least toxic community for a MOBA

The community of Smite is the nicest in the Moba genre and has many members who are ready to provide help and role coaching's to new and less experienced players. See More

Top Pro

Ultimate god pack

SMITE has a god pack that costs $29.99. It unlocks all the current gods in the game plus the future gods to be released. See More

Top Pro

Even basic attacks are skill shots

All basic attacks are skill shots as there is no auto attacking. See More

Top Pro

Characters are derived from mythological gods

Instead of imaginary champions and heroes, Smite derives its characters from ancient mythological gods from around the world. Coming from the Norse, Hindu, Greek, Roman, Mayan, Egyptian, Chinese, and the recently added pantheon to join Smite, the Japanese Pantheon. The roster consists of 72 gods at the moment, from 8 different pantheons around the world. See More

Ashes of the Singularity: Escalation

Top Pro

Better framerate when ran in DX12

This game is DX12 compatible which allows for a higher frame rate over DX11. DX12 is only able to be taken advantage of on Windows 10, so that is something to consider, but for those that can take advantage, there is a slight gain to be had. See More

Top Con

Physics are unrealistic

Many of the units will pass right through each other, making for units that behave in an unrealistic way and can pull the player out of the immersion of the title. The units also all hover over the ground, which means they have no real weight to their actions, when combined with the unrealistic way they move makes for something that just does not looked polished. See More

Specs

Steam Rating:Mostly Positive

Top Pro

Pleasing graphics

The graphics stand out as polished and make for a really nice looking RTS. This is top of its class in graphics for an RTS in 2016. See More

Top Con

Demanding system requirements

The game requires a high end GPU as well as at-least a 4 core processor. This means the game is quite demanding and needs to take advantage of multi-cores in order to play smoothly at high graphical settings. So for those with a mid-range system, the game may play at lower frame-rates, which can be frustrating. See More

Top Pro

Cool mechanic for controlling troops

There is a tool in the game that allows one to "lasso" their units together into an army. By making an army the player can then control that army as they would one troop unit, meaning that all micromanagement for a large group of troops is unnecessary as the game will deal with it in a more intuitive an easy manner. This can be done with as little or as many troops as the player want, which overall makes for an easy way to control the game when in the heat of battle. See More

Top Con

Lacking in options for factions and units

There are only two factions available in the game to play with, so makes for limited choice. On top of this each faction has only so many different units, which also shows a lack of choice. Combined, once the game has been experienced and both factions played with there will be little in surprise as to what the game has to offer. See More

Top Pro

Good mix of gameplay modes for any skill level

The game features a single player story mode, a story mode called Ascendancy that will walk the player though how to play the game and multiplayer modes that are ranked as well as custom multiplayer modes. Through the assortment of modes the game allows for any type of player to find gameplay that they may like, whether they are a seasoned RTS player or a newcomer to the genre. Whether playing locally in single player or online with friends or random people, there should be plenty on offer for any skill level. See More

Top Pro

Focuses on positioning over micromanagement

The maps in this game are large, sometimes taking up as many as 20-30 zones in a single map. What this means is that the player will need to focus a lot more on position of their units over actually micromanaging every aspect of each unit (due to the vast size of maps and the amount of units on them). This allows for gameplay that has a broader scope in strategy, as it forces the player to plan out what is best to protect and the best position to hold of enemy attacks all while still trying to grow their army in order to overpower their enemy. See More

Top Pro

Easily allows the player to utilize specific info on their enemies

At all times the player can vies on a mini map how much their enemy has expanded and into what areas. There is also a thing called player power rating, which allows the player to know on a point scale what their enemies military and economic power level is. Which means you can get a sense of what fields your enemy is expanding into. Combining these tools allows for a quick way to know where the enemy is expanding and into what fields of tech they are concentrating on. This way the player can adjust their strategy accordingly, making for an even deeper level of strategy overall. See More

Age of Empires III

Top Pro

Wide selection of missions

Players will see many different missions ranging from rescue missions to defensive missions. What is even better is that many of these types of missions will be mixed together into one, so there is a varying structure to each making for a different feeling to each. See More

Top Con

Easily manipulated AI

During AI skirmishes, you can easily fortify your location with walls, cannon towers, and forts, ensuring that the AI continually sends large armies to their deaths. The AI will also only send their units to one certain spot of your base, thus you will always know where they will come from and which portion to build defenses at. Once your base is fortified enough, you can simply farm for experience, until no more can be gained, and then easily wipe your AI opponent out, making for one-note style of play See More

Specs

Steam Rating:Very Positive

Top Pro

Good selection of areas to play in

There are 8 different nations that the player can choose to lead to victory, each with their own different looking areas to explore. This makes for a good mix of differentiation of play depending on what the player chooses to use. See More

Top Con

Could use better sound cues

Keeping track of ones units can become a difficult job (but a fun one) and having audio cues of when something is happening to your units could greatly help in this area, sadly there is very little of this in the game and could have been utilized better. See More

Top Pro

Graphics-gameplay balance

It is difficult to find good real time strategy games with aesthetics. Its high resolution graphics combined with fairly good RTS experience makes Age of Empires III a rare gem. Its AI and gameplay may not be up to the mark when compared to its predecessor, but still provides you a fair challenge. See More

Top Pro

Card-based upgrades and reinforcements add more to each match

Age of Empires III features a new and unique card-based system that allows for you to deploy additional units and resources from your Town Hall. By eliminating enemy units and buildings, you are awarded experience, which not only goes toward your City Level (allowing you to purchase more cards out-of-match), but allows you to activate a card in-game. These cards can grant you additional soldiers, increase gathering speed of Banks and Workers, or even a fort that you can deploy anywhere in the map. See More

They Are Billions

Top Pro

Superb feeling of tension

Surviving in the post-apocalyptic world of TAB isn't an easy task. You always need to cover every side of your settlement with soldiers, walls, or defense turrets. When your settlement grows larger, it becomes much harder to defend everything evenly. As a result, you might accidentally let one zombie slip through your defenses, setting off a chain reaction that infects your entire settlement. This thought always stays at the back of your head, keeping you on your toes throughout a playthrough. It's a quality seen only in a few other games, making it a very memorable experience. See More

Top Con

Fairly difficult

They Are Billions is a game about optimization and micromanagement, requiring optimal building placements, efficient resource management, and precise unit control, even on the easiest difficulty settings. It's sometimes hard to keep up with these three tasks, especially if you've just started out with TAB or if you're new to strategy games in general. As a result, it might feel frustrating and needlessly difficult until you get a hang of it. See More

Specs

Steam Rating:Very Positive

Top Pro

Fun mix of genres

TAB is a mix of RTS gameplay, colony building, and tower defense elements where your main goal is to survive. You only have one building and a group of soldiers at first, so the key to success is gradually exploring the map, clearing out zombies, collecting resources, and constructing new buildings to expand your settlement. The main obstacle, however, are the increasingly large zombie hordes that occasionally try to invade your settlement. To prevent his, proper defenses and military might is a must, requiring you to properly balance your resources between expanding and training new soldiers. Even though it may seem difficult at first, you'll gradually improve, making it exciting to see how far you can get in each playthrough. See More

Top Con

Limited content

They Are Billions is still in early access, so not all the content that's been planned for it has been added yet. You're left with only being able to play the Survival mode, where you have to survive for over 80 in-game days to win. After beating it once, there's very little incentive to play again, other than improving your high score. See More

Top Pro

Unusual setting

While a post-apocalyptic world overrun by zombies isn't the most original game idea, the Victorian Era steampunk setting helps immensely to freshen it up. You get to witness the aftermath of a zombie apocalypse with a backdrop of Victorian Era architecture, brass structures, steam engines, and various steampunk gadgets. Even if you're already tired of killing zombies, seeing a gentleman with a top hat disintegrate zombies with a giant steam-powered robot is a new experience. See More

Total War: Warhammer

Top Pro

Gives players the ability to customize their generals and heroes

TW:W gives players the chance to customize the abilities of their chosen legendary lord, generals and even heroes through a detailed skill tree. Skills vary from individual character skills usable in battles (such as spells) to passive skills which influence army movement in the campaign map. See More

Top Con

Only four factions are available in the base game

There are only four factions are available without DLCs (The Empire, Vampire Counts, Greenskins and Dwarfes). Other playable races and factions are currently being released periodically as DLCs. See More

Specs

Steam Rating:Very Positive

Genre:Turn-based Strategy

Top Pro

Great setting

Being based around the Warhammer tabletop fantasy world allows for an in depth game with tons lore behind it. Fighting off vampires and zombies are just some of the things to be found in the game. See More

Top Con

Maps can feel constrained

Due to the compartmentalizing of factions and which land they can take over means that the games maps can feel smaller than they appear since only certain sections can be played on. See More

Top Pro

Tons of replayability

Thanks to the different factions available in the game, the player has a lot of choice as to how they would like to play, which gives a lot of replayability. There are five different campaigns available (four in the game and one as DLC) that each has its own faction to control and set story, which will take quite a bit of time to each be experience to their complete endings. See More

Total War: Warhammer 2

Top Pro

Epic battles

The Total War series is known for its large scale battles and tactical combat, so TW:W2 is no exception. You have armies advancing and clashing in massive brawls, squadrons of archers firing in unison, mounted troops performing flanking maneuvers, and siege engines such as catapults spreading havoc in enemy ranks. What makes it a lot more interesting, however, are the fantasy elements. This includes powerful spellcasters that can summon a rain of meteors, wiping away entire armies, massive dragons that soar over the battlefield while raining fire and death upon the enemies below them, and even gigantic dinosaurs that charge into enemy ranks, throwing them into every direction. Whenever a battle unfolds, it truly feels like a spectacle of epic proportions. See More

Top Con

You'll need to buy the prequel and eventually the sequel for the full experience

While TW:W2 is a solid experience by itself, if you also own the prequel (TW:W), you get a free DLC called "Mortal Empires." It unlocks a gigantic campaign map, making all factions from both games playable. This will eventually extend to TW:W3 as well, so you'll have to spend money on three separate games to fully immerse yourself in the storied Warhammer universe. See More

Specs

Steam Rating:Very Positive

Top Pro

Campaign mode that keeps you interested

While most similar games tend to have the total domination type of campaign, requiring you to capture all cities on the game map, TW:W2 instead attempts to focus on a grand objective – taking over the Great Vortex, a swirling mass of energy. Each of the game's races have their own reasons for wanting he Great Vortex's power, but taking control of it secures your victory. As a result, the campaign retains its focus throughout, keeping it fun and engaging without becoming tedious. See More

Top Con

Steep learning curve

There's a lot to learn in Total War: Warhammer 2. To start with - managing your empire, upgrading cities, diplomatic relations, recruiting soldiers, upkeep, and many other aspects that are different for each race. Then there are the battles themselves, requiring you to understand formations, positioning, terrain advantages, unit strengths and weaknesses, and even morale. The game relentlessly keeps throwing new concepts at you, which can be extremely daunting, especially if you're new to the Total War series. As a result, it might take a long time till you have a firm grasp on the game. See More

Top Pro

Outstanding visuals

The world of Warhammer is brought to life by the game's excellent graphics. This includes lighting, shadow-mapping, fog effects, particle effects, terrain, structures, and everything else you see on-screen. The most noteworthy aspect, however, is the incredible attention to detail on character models and their textures, with each unit looking like a finely crafted tabletop figure. This only becomes truly apparent when you zoom in during a battle and notice that no character model looks blocky at all. From the scales on a Lizardmans back, to the stitching on a Hell-pit abomination, to even the ripped webbing of a Black Dragon's wing. Whether you're a fantasy fan or not, it's something that's very easy to notice and appreciate. See More

Age of Empires: Definitive Edition

Top Pro

An interactive way to learn about history

Each civilization is based on historical facts, and there's plenty of optional in-game side reading for those who want to really dive into the experience. For example, you can play through the rise of Julius Caesar, Alexander the Great, or the Egyptian empire while learning the facts, myths, and history behind each one. See More

Top Con

Only works on Windows 10

It only runs on Windows 10, which is very limiting. See More

Specs

Genre:Real-Time Strategy

Top Pro

Remastered in high definition

All the graphics from the original Age of Empires (1997) release have been remastered in high definition. The original 2D units were created as 3D models this time around, and have better facing positions and animations. The structures now have more detail and appear a lot more crisp and clean. Trees and grass are lush and colorful. The new water especially looks great, which will be a treat if you're the seafaring type who will be spending a lot of time sending ships to battle. See More

Top Con

Very outdated gameplay

The game core is from 1997, so there's not a whole lot of quality of life aspects that modern gamers are used to. There are no hotkeys to quickly queue or move units around the map. The buildings don't have a lot of depth to them, meaning there's not a whole lot of room for inventive strategies. There are no unique combat units for each empire with special abilities. All of them essentially function the same between empires, with the only difference being a cosmetic appearance. See More

Top Pro

Lots of different victory conditions encourage alternative playstyles

Maps can be won in several ways, which is quite uncommon in the RTS genre. Usually victory involves wiping out all enemies on the map, but in AoE there are multiple ways to satisfy a victory condition. You can win the map by building and defending a specific structure called a Wonder, capture all the Ruins on the map, or holding all the special Artifact units. This encourages a plethora of other strategies besides just brute forcing your foes into submission with a relentless offense. See More

Top Con

Only available on the Microsoft store

It's not available on Steam, GoG, Origin, or other major distribution platforms. See More

Top Pro

Lots of gameplay variation among the different civilizations

Each of the 16 different civilizations has their own strength and weaknesses, which results in plenty of interesting decisions. For example, some empires have access to more skills overall, but they lack the top tier upgrade in each. Some may have more limited skill trees with less choice, which allows them access to the top tier skills faster. Some empires may have a high resource cost to produce workers. Others produce cheaper workers which allows a vibrant economy to form faster. The differences among the various civilizations ensure you can refine a unique strategy for each. See More

Top Con

Unit pathfinding is unreliable

When you give a unit orders, the pathfinding can be unreliable. Sometimes units will get stuck on one another, and then decide to take a path you didn't instruct. For example, if you're trying to navigate several units through a narrow passage, they may become stuck or confused. They may overlap each other and glitch out, stopping altogether. Some might reroute to different paths automatically, which may put them directly in harm's way. See More

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