Wizard Warfare 2: Cephalopod Wars

Great 4X with smooth gameplay and an easy to navigate UI. The empire management part is intuitive and magic allows to impact all tactical layers. There's no story or quests to follow here, it's pure gameplay and all information provided is informative and factual. The in-game encyclopedia tackles anything you'd like to know that is not already tooltiped. The auto-battler part is usefull to check troop behaviours but is optional, which greatly speeds up the experience. Even with a somehow large empire, it's still easy to keep track of what to do thanks to small icons appearing each turn as reminders of serious business to tackle. Replayability seems quite high with procedural maps and different rules for each Faction.

This one would get a neutral rating if you could. Most comparisons seem to be to CoE or Dominions, though I dont think it plays like either. I own both this and the predecessor. For the money they are fun CIV like games, and honestly, to me, thats the best comparison - a deceptively more enchanting CIV clone. Good? easy to play, smooth gameplay, charming and turn spending time, fun units engages your imagination. The basic graphics actaully are a plus IMO Bad? *this is a game breaker* no way to gauge how you'll do in combat before you attack. You'll spend dozens to hundreds of turns building armies. If you lose one you be reloading a save or starting over. to see what the other army has strength-wise you'll be clicking into a LOT of units and trying to remember what yours have stats wise. will you start to remember that 5 of these is tough to beat or 10 of those are a cakewalk? yes, is it tedious to get there YES! so much so that youll realize there are better options to scratch that basic CIV"lite" itch...

[h1]A brilliant indie gem with masterful tactical mechanics[/h1] A very well-thought-out 4X game with a surprising level of polish for an indie, single-developer title. After completing a full 325-turn playthrough as a Holy mage on Normal, the game felt a bit too abstract for my personal liking. However, I know this is more a result of the limited resources available to a single, highly dedicated developer—who reads every single post on the Steam forums and actively improves the game based on feedback—rather than a conscious design choice. While this game does many things well, one mechanic is handled exceptionally well and deserves the spotlight: tactical battles, which are usually a trap for most 4X developers. When developing a classic 4X title (which I essentially consider to be a Civ clone), you are faced with a few choices on how to approach combat: [list] [*] [b]A.[/b] Abstract tactics away completely, like the original [i]Civilization[/i]. [*] [b]B.[/b] Use the main map as a strategic-tactical hybrid layer by introducing a one-unit-per-tile rule, like [i]Civ 5[/i] (or approach it differently, like [i]Endless Legend[/i]). [*] [b]C.[/b] Have full-fledged tactical battles …

Dominions and Civilization, together at last! I've played a fair number of 4x games like this, but I much prefer the ones like this that don't copy the Might & Magic heroes paradigm. Instead, you have mages that are of great importance, but you can build them like "regular" units. Armies can also get very large. You pick a path of magic at the beginning. This path will be the "primary" path for all your mages, but you can roll possible side paths just like Dominions mages. These will get you a little bit of non-primary magic, but you probably won't get more than a point or two. There are 3 main school of magic to research and 5 levels total in each. I found this to be a little shallow, and did eventually run out of research to complete in the end game. I could probably have gotten away with using a few of my mages in combat a bit more often instead of sitting at home researching. Each path of magic feels fairly unique. You'll get lots of upkeep-free skeletons from Death, or Fire elementals from Chaos, etc. There are some worldwide spells as well, which are very powerful. For example, Death gets a zombie outbreak spell, which causes all combat deaths anywhere to rise as zombies u…

this is a good 4x game. if you know civ titles, you get into it easily. combat is a bit dominions-oriented, which is even better. auto-combat on a real tactical map that simulates every projectile and every hit on a unit according to weapons, armor, skills etc. the game is not easy to win, though. i just lost a game, i must admit. my skeletons were less powerful than i initially expected. no upkeep though ... my mages were nature casters, but wolves and spiders and stuff cost upkeep. one could summon skeletons ... and skeletons dont cost upkeep! highly recommend!!!1 okay, i was overrun by freely roaming wolves and beastmasters. but i digress. next time i will be specializing on holy magic. and my city placement will be better. in theis game you can also prosper with fewer but better qualitiy cities, just like in the first titel, it seems. more possible strategies are always welcome :) the AI seems good enough.

Very well made sequel in the theme of Masters of Magic. Lots of improvements to make game more tactical and fun. Auto combat is relaxing to watch and sip a quarter mouthful of hot drink.