Of Hydralisks & Phalanxes #1: Yes, Strategy Games Are Awesome

When you're playing video games, do you just want to turn off your brain, blow up stuff, and collect loot? Then Of Hydralisks & Phalanxes isn't for you. In a column with a name as awkward and parochial as some of the games themselves, strategy wonk Tom Chick takes a look at the latest and greatest in real-time strategy, turn-based games, city builders, wargames, and other such quasi-cerebral pursuits.



Not Contemporary?

Just last week, a fairly prominent fellow at 2K Games, the company that published Civilization V, declared that strategy games "aren't contemporary." He could be right. Last March, I sat on a big stage at the 2011 Game Developers Conference and declared that we're in a golden age of strategy gaming. Four months later at the annual E3 Expo, I could count the number of great upcoming strategy games on one hand, even if that hand had been maimed because I held a lit M-80 for too long when I was a kid. The thing about the M-80 didn't actually happen, but it graphically illustrates why this column isn't called "Top 10 Upcoming Strategy Games That Looked Great at E3."

So what happened? Well, the main thing that happened is that E3 isn't a barometer for anything other than what's showing at E3. And the other thing that happened is nothing at all, because I still believe we're in a golden age of strategy gaming -- so long as you don't measure golden ages by advertising dollars or comments from higher-ups at 2K. The genre is alive, well, thriving, and more commercially viable than ever, and not just because you people are buying downloadable Vikings and whatnot for the brain-dead Civilization V. I can think of some far better reasons why it's a great time to be the sort of person who would read a column on strategy games. To wit:

A sequel to Creeper World. One dude named Virgil Wall made a nifty-but-obscure (and butt-ugly) tower defense game called Creeper World, in which you fight against fluid dynamics. However, strategy gamers care so little about publicity and ugly, that they bought enough copies to encourage Wall to make Creeper World 2, in which you fight against fluid dynamics and gravity. It's a great sign when unsung, unlovely games flourish.


The return of Creative Assembly. I had written off Creative Assembly. Then Shogun 2 came out. Has any developer ever made such a dramatic comeback? When a developer starts that long, sad slide from mediocrity into awfulness (see: the two previous Total War games), how many of them pull out of it? And how many of them pull out of it as spectacularly as Creative Assembly did with Shogun 2?

Stardock's Elemental amends. Speaking of comebacks, Stardock appears to be staging one with Elemental: War of Magic. After the game's disastrous release last year, Stardock seems intent on making amends without charging you another nickel. Derek Paxton's Fallen Enchantress, a standalone game build on Elemental's engine (and provided free to anyone who got burned by Elemental's release), looks like the most exciting fantasy game since, well, his Fall from Heaven mod for Civilization IV. American lives may not have second acts, but strategy game development sure does.

Atom Zombie Smasher's energy. I've played some lively games over the last year. But none has more energy, atmosphere, and overall spirit than Atom Zombie Smasher -- a charming, thrilling, and unforgettable real-time strategy game made by one guy, in which dots representing zombies overrun dots representing survivors. The artwork, the sound design, the music, the pacing, and the general vibe is every bit as good as the multimillion dollar Shogun 2.

Troy Goodfellow's national character series. Blogger, public relations ninja, and former GameSpy writer Troy Goodfellow has been plugging away at a series of articles exploring how different nationalities are expressed in various strategy games. Let me know when shooters, role-playing games, or dating sims produce an equally thoughtful, erudite, and historically relevant series. Strategy games are a lens into politics and history that other genres can't even dream of. For instance, who can wade into Victoria 2's sophisticated-yet-simple model for the Industrial Revolution without thinking of the Arab Spring?


The iPhone is brimming with strategy games. And I don't just mean all those ports of Reiner Knizia boardgames (many of which have good A.I.). For instance, I just discovered a boardgame port called Wabash Cannonball, a Euro-elegant design in which you try to make money from railroad companies by laying track, developing industries, and gaming the stock market. It's the niftiest railroad game this side of 1830, it's been out for a year, and I'd never even heard of it until recently. How often do you hear about some awesome shooter or driving game or RPG that came out last year that you'd never even heard of?

StarCraft II's e-sports. When I watch tournament-level players in fighting games or shooters, I have no idea how they're doing what they're doing, even when I know the game. The level of skill, reflexes, and near-supernatural timing beggars belief. But you don't have to be a hardcore StarCraft II player to understand exactly what's going on in a high-level tournament. Here is a game carefully built as an e-sport, with an almost infinite learning curve, but easy to understand and entirely bare to viewers. And it's also a remarkably successful RTS.

League of Legends' business model. Riot Games' greatest accomplishment with League of Legends is a free-to-play business model that convinces you your money is well-spent. In most free-to-play games, when I hit that wall where the game asks for money, I can't help but feel vaguely resentful. But when it happens in League of Legends, the typical reaction is more like "Well of course I should give you some money! How much do you need? That's all? Well, that's more than fair, so how about I buy a few skins while my wallet is open?" League of Legends' developers have brought a sense of goodwill to an often adversarial business model. The fact that it's also a great game is just gravy.

Crusader Kings 2. My favorite thing at this year's E3 was the Tomb Raider reboot. Crusader Kings 2, in which Paradox shows how far its developers have come in terms of giving their games personality and good interfaces, was a close second. Paradox's sprawling, messy, and often-dry strategy games have been a rough-hewn blessing to the genre. But Crusader Kings 2 seems like it will skip the sprawling, messy, and dry, going straight for the ambitious with its character-driven tales of medieval conquest and intrigue. Who knew strategy games would be the first genre to deliver Shakespeare in a box?


Rise of Nations' timelessness. I fired up Big Huge Games' Rise of Nations the other day with a friend. Yes, it came out in 2003, but it's still as good as it's ever been. Strategy games don't age like other genres. In the last year, I've played Sacrifice, Rise of Nations, Alpha Centauri, and Imperialism 2 -- each of which is every bit as good as it was when it came out. And has any game had legs as crazy-long as Civilization IV's? Has any other genre ever been so age-proof?

GameSpy hired some dude to write a strategy gaming column! GameSpy is part of IGN, which is part of News Corp. So, really, News Corp. thinks strategy games are worth a monthly column. And when have you ever known a Rupert Murdoch joint to back the wrong horse?



Tom Chick thinks he knows more about strategy gaming than he really does. You should probably just humor him, or he'll try to use the word "emergent" and embarrass himself in the process. You can read more and find his regular podcasts at Quarter to Three.