ASTRO EMPIRES GAMEPLAY SERIES

Sid Meier's Civilization is one of most famous exemplars of the latter. Gameplay is usually either real-time or turn-based. Futuristic versions tend to use a lot of Techno Babble in their unit/weapon/technology names and descriptions. A player's civilization might reach tanks and battleships by 1000 AD while the computer players are still in the iron age or develop genetic engineering before electricity. Historical versions of the genre tend towards allowing Anachronism Stew, but at the direction of the player. While all victory conditions are usually open to all players, some factions are often more suited to pursuing certain endgames than others. If you ally with all other (surviving) empires, then you win in some games.

ASTRO EMPIRES GAMEPLAY SERIES

In some games, researching a long series of technologies (typically that do not provide any immediate benefit) causes victory. If you can do that, spending all of those resources while defending your borders from people trying to stop you, you win. Some allow you to pool your civilization's production in order to produce a gigantic monument, such as Civilization's UN Unity Spaceship, or Alpha Centauri's Ascent to Transcendence. However, 4X games are usually expected to offer one or more alternative victory conditions. Victory in 4X games will always be available by e xterminating all or most of your opposition.

Just to make sure you can't be completely pacifist, you will usually encounter barbarian tribes (pirates/guerrillas/terrorists/angry alien fungi) that appear out of nowhere and cannot be negotiated with (although their units may be captured instead of destroyed if the player is clever). Of course, some of them can act as Chest Monsters, as well. One other staple originated by Civilization is the 'goodie hut' random local tribes/lost cargo pods/space anomalies that act as Inexplicable Treasure Chests for the first player to discover them.

These typically provide a large bonus to a specific city. More recent 4X games offer less powerful non-global 'Wonders' that each empire can build, but can only be built in one of their cities. It generally confers a substantial benefit to the civilization that produced it, and it can only change hands if the city it is built in changes hands. Whichever empire builds it first gets its benefits, and everyone else gets zilch. It is a city-produced construct that only one city in the entire gameworld can produce. Technologies provide upgrades for cities, letting you better use their resources, build new units, buildings, or weapons, and so forth.Ī staple of the genre, borrowed from the originator of the genre Civilization, is the 'Wonder'. You can't learn 'Alphabet' until you've learned 'Writing', for example. The Tech Tree is so named because you cannot research a technology until you have its prerequisites.

Cities produce research, which is used to research new technologies. Most 4X games feature a Tech Tree, though others may use Technology Levels instead some even combine the two. Be careful: they will do the same to you, and they will remember what you've done to them. You can talk to other empires, broker peace with them, trade with them, ally with them against a common foe, or kill them. Other empires work under the same restrictions as you (except when they are cheating bastards). Some games allow you to create customized units based on your technology base (see below), in addition to the default units included in the game. You almost always have to produce a special type of unit that can create another city to let you e xpand your empire. Units can move various distances on the map, possibly with terrain restrictions, and perform a variety of tasks - which may or may not include combat. Cities e xploit the resources in the region where they are built, and can transform those resources into 'buildings' (improvements to the city's efficiency), money, or units. On whatever map the player chooses, there are territories on which you can build 'cities' (whether planetary colonies, space stations, or just cities).

Astro empires gameplay