I need a new vidya game.

March 2, 2013 12:19 PM

I need a new vidya game.

I have some vague ideas of what I want, so please bear with my rambling.

If I had to encapsulate what I'm looking for in one word, it would probably be 'technical'. I like Eve Online, but am having trouble having fun playing it vs. using it.

Sci-fi would be preferred, but not necessary. Big clunky robots would be cool. I've been thinking of tracking down Mech Commander.

I want to be able to customize whatever units I'm dealing with. The new XCOM is kind of good at this, but I don't like that the research tree is so short and that there are 'obvious' loadouts for each type of character. On the other hand, Sins of a Solar Empire has a GLORIOUS tech tree.

I like SimCity-ish building, focusing more on the city areas than on combat. Anno 2070 seems to fit the bill for this, but it's not clicking with me so far. Cities XL is similarly not clicking (splitting residential into wealth classes bothers me, for one) while SimCity 4 did, and I've been considering picking up SC4 again because of this.

If there is combat, I'd like to have a role in it. I tried Gratuitous Space Battles, and it has interesting ship customization, but the default mode is to have the fights be AI-controlled, and you get locked out of some features if you go manual.

Older games are fine.

Thanks!

posted by Evilspork to computers & internet (18 answers total)

You should try Faster Than Light!
posted by Perplexity at 12:25 PM on March 2 [6 favorites]

Dwarf Fortress sounds right up your alley.

If you don't feel like going blind and/or insane while learning it, people have made interface apps. Here's a bundle of the more popular ones.

There's also a sort of emerging genre of "DF-likes" with various amounts of crunchiness--Gnomoria and Towns are two of them
posted by kagredon at 12:28 PM on March 2 [1 favorite]

Oh! And on the non-dwarfy side, Galactic Civilizations 2 has a lot of what you're looking for.
posted by kagredon at 12:34 PM on March 2 [2 favorites]

Defense Grid
posted by Artw at 12:45 PM on March 2 [2 favorites]

The original Master of Orion: There's a large tech tree, you design custom ships, and have you control over combat. It is definitely an oldie, so the interface probably would feel clunky to someone learning the game now.

Lots of people also liked Master of Orion 2. I didn't care for, because I felt like there was too much micromanagement, but YMMV. And it's best to pretend that Master of Orion 3 never happened.
posted by jcreigh at 1:18 PM on March 2 [1 favorite]

The new Sim city comes out march 5.
posted by Melsky at 1:28 PM on March 2 [1 favorite]

Totally the new Sim City. Meanwhile, Tropico 4 ain't that bad.
posted by Foci for Analysis at 1:42 PM on March 2 [1 favorite]

Have you played any of the Fallout (Fallout3, Fallout:New Vegas) games?
techncal: FPS/RPG...Character building/equiptment/stats a big part of gameplay...though it's also an FPS (there is a 3rd person option), the targeting system makes quick reflexes not so necessary...but you don't have to use it if you don't want to...
Sci-Fi, Big Clunky Robots: Roger that! Bonus: 1950's style big clunky ATOMIC robots thrashed and battered from centuries wandering the post-nuclear wastelands around D.C./Vegas
Also: Lots of dark humor, alternate future mayhem, giant fire-breathing ants, crab people, glowing zombies, zombie BEARS, scrounging the ruins for twinkies, super mutants, hundreds of hours of gameplay, gorgeous locations...and laser weapons! (and used copies can be had for a song)
The same company (Bethesda) also makes Skyrim, which I also highly recommend...
posted by sexyrobot at 2:41 PM on March 2 [1 favorite]

SpaceChem, maybe?
posted by Merzbau at 3:14 PM on March 2 [1 favorite]

Full disclosure: I haven't actually PLAYED this game yet, but I just read about a space-themed roguelike that seems to offer lots of spaceship upgrading and other stuff to do, called Transcendence, and it was intriguing to me, a person who seems to like similar sorts of games.
posted by lilnublet at 3:22 PM on March 2 [3 favorites]

About DF: the last time I tried it the UIs were not all that great, so it's probably time to try it again.

I really like the Tropico series, good call.

I meant to mention Fallout+; for some reason I own both games but never got around to playing them, and writing the question reminded me about them.
posted by Evilspork at 5:40 PM on March 2

You should definitely check out AI War
posted by protorp at 11:04 PM on March 2 [1 favorite]

Also, I have played Trascendence, although not for a long time, and can highly reccomend it. It seems there's been a lot of new development recently, excited to play it again - thanks linublet for the reminder!
posted by protorp at 11:11 PM on March 2 [1 favorite]

i don't see endless space mentioned yet. highly recommended.
posted by paradroid at 11:28 PM on March 2 [1 favorite]

For a console game, you can try Front Mission. It's a tactical strat/RPG type game made by Square-Enix that allows you to customize mechs. It's a complete series that spans many consoles. I've only played the SNES one, and you can find it, provided you do some "searching" online.

The Jagged Alliance series is a isometric squad-based strategy game with customizable units similar to X-Com. It's a modern military setting where you play a mercenary firm hired to take back an island.

If you like building games, SimCity is pretty much the bar-none standard. It's hard to find a good city-building game. All the good games I can think that might be enjoyable are about a decade. For example, Transport Tycoon immediately came to mind. The deluxe version was released in 1995. Fortunately, there's still an active community out there that has made a free version called Open TTD. I just checked their site and they still update regularly. TTD is a very heavy urban and transportation planning sim. So, if you liked trying to build efficient transport systems in SC4, then you'll like Open TTD. It's extremely technical: railroad signals, airports, an economy that has inflation and recession, canals, and trains galore.

And as a long shot, I would recommend you try Rollercoaster Tycoon 2. It's a very involved strategy/sim game where you build and design parks. It has a very robust rollercoaster building tools and there are user's on its subreddit that have made some awesome rides. Both TTD and RCT are designed by the same guy, so that's why their graphics look alike so much.
posted by FJT at 1:55 AM on March 3 [1 favorite]

(In fallout, set your intelligence to 9 (you can boost it to 10 later)this will maximize yr level-up points...very important)
posted by sexyrobot at 8:33 AM on March 3 [1 favorite]

You should have fun with EVE, join us.
posted by Elmore at 5:18 PM on March 8

As an update, the new SimCity has gotten a ton of bad press following a rocky launch and numerous bugs/design flaws in the game. For anyone itching to play SimCity it might be better to wait until the game goes on sale, or if the rumored 2.0 patch fixes some of the outstanding issues.

In the meantime try some of the amazing user-created custom content for SimCity 4 which really makes it a whole new game. A good place to start is here (includes links to guides and content from SC4Devotion and Simtropolis).
posted by Wretch729 at 8:37 AM on April 6