Age of Wonders: Planetfall
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Emerge from the cosmic dark age of a fallen galactic empire to build a new future for your people. Age of Wonders: Planetfall is the new strategy game from Triumph Studios. Build your empire with one of six unique factions, ranging from the militant Vanguard to the dinosaur-riding Amazons and the cyborg-zombies of the Assembly. Progress through each faction’s missions using your wits, military strength and diplomacy, exploring planetary ruins and encountering other survivors as you unravel the history of a shattered civilization. Fight, build, negotiate and technologically advance your way to utopia in a deep single player campaign, on random skirmish maps, and against friends in multiplayer.
Steam User 53
Originally, I wasn't going to recommend this game because it didn't meet my expectations as a Paradox game, or as a complex 4X game. If you're expecting a typical Paradox deep grand strategy game, this definitely isn't for you. DO NOT PLAY THE ENTIRE GAME USING AUTO COMBAT, OR YOU WILL HATE THIS GAME. That was my initial mistake.
Once I was able to manage my expectations, Age of Wonders: Planetfall is a very good game. So if it's not a grand strategy game, what kind of game is it? There are strategy elements, but most of the choices are no-brainers on that level. Just blob and grow as fast as you can, while ensuring you have a strong enough army to explore the map and defend your territory.
However, where the game really shines is in its tactical combat. Each faction uses its own units; each faction has its own heroes; each leader has a different secret technology (which customizes 1/4th of their military tech tree); each unit has its own abilities. If that's not enough customization for you, you can also research mods to kit out your soldiers. Even better, you can find special weapons and equipment specifically designed for heroes by exploring the world map. If you don't have hero weapons/equipment, you can outfit them with normal equipment available to your regular troops that you've researched in the military tech tree. Unfortunately, there doesn't seem to be nearly as much variety with the navies as there is with land units--although to be fair, if you consider infantry, vehicles, tanks and air force to be separate unit types then naval units have a similar level of diversity.
Units can also gain combat experience and improve their skills. Regular units improve base stats, while heroes can be customized when they level up.
There are dozens upon dozens of different combat maps. Each map presents different tactical challenges. Environmental objects can be used as cover, but they can also be destroyed. So if your enemy tries to hunker down behind a building, send a grenadier to blow up the building with a rocket! But be careful, because your opponent can do the same thing to you.
If you treat this game as a tactical combat game, more along the lines of X-Com than say, Civilization, Age of Wonders: Planetfall is a wonderful title that will provide you with a great many hours of entertainment.
Steam User 37
Planetfall is tied (and likely exceeds) III as my favorite Age of Wonders game. Planetfall could easily be a desert island game for me.
I am quite saddened that Planetfall never gained traction or a sizable following...making a follow-up seem less likely or financially viable.
Age of Wonders 4 with its excessive focus on customization and lack of meaningful race/faction identities hasn't grabbed me as much. Each game of 4 feels very flat and similar. I'll keep giving 4 a try though.
Steam User 28
A great game I should have tried earlier; Age of Wonders 4 led me here.
I avoided this game because it was so unlike Age of Wonders 3 - the whole sci fi thing didn't really do it for me so I didn't bother and kept playing 3. Now 4 is out with its 'everyone wins a prize - you can be whoever the f you want' I decided to give it a go.
Actual meaningful factions with diverse differences and restrictions. Actual interesting side plots and stories providing an overview of worlds (not so much the campaign though but I digress). Actual meaningful decisions. Age of wonders 4 is still ok and I still play it, but it's rather soulless. This is the game I now play when I want things to feel unique (truly unique and not in the 'everyone is unique just like you' way).
The game runs perfectly on Linux: i5 7600K @ 5hz, Nvidia 1070, 24 gig 3000Mhz ram. Settings at ultra with vsync and it never deviates from a solid 60fps.
Steam User 19
By far the best 4X grand strategy game out there. If it's on sale, get it.
It does things better than Age of Wonders 3 (Heroes, unit customization, music, story impact, voice actors, damage types make more sense, looking better etc.) and even just crushes AOW4 in most aspects.
I recommend playing through the whole thing and then 100% the galaxy empire stuff, which is an meta progressing game mode where you level each race and technology separately to gain cross game currency and "upgrades". After that check out the interesting mods for this game which can completely change the way you have to manage your units.
It does have some flaws of course. Most important ones are the bad naval combat, stupid AI, unbalanced units, expensive DLCs (especially horrendous campaigns, I don't recommend playing these) and too few combat maps considering how many hours you can burn with this game and I did not play a single match online.
Even though I normally do not like sci-fi settings, this one is just interesting enough that I don't care.
Highly recommend, better than AOW4
Steam User 31
Initially I could not afford the new AofW4 so I bought Planetfall instead. LOVE THIS GAME!
A unique and successful mix of turn based strategy, with civilization-like game and RPG - all my favorite genres together!
From the art, lore through variety of playstyles and replayability it is a well made game. I especially enjoy playing its biggest maps with the most AI players. Different factions of this game have different strengths and weaknesses, so a big game keeps you awake and challenged. Exploration is fun, expansion and conquest are rewarding. Love that taking over other faction's city gives you access to their tech tree, increasing your options for units building. This in return expands your options and styles in fighting battles.
The campaign in AoW Planetfall is just fantastic! You have a chance to play every faction and they way they are introduced makes you fall in love with all of them. And the campaign has multiple ways and outcomes to finalize it.
My first exposure to the Age of Wonders franchise and its overwhelmingly positive!
Steam User 18
Playing AoW4 really helps you appreciate Planetfall more. The insane unit diversity, the voice-acted quotes when researching every technology (as opposed to having them only for tomes), even the campaign is better as Planetfall's take on "story campaigns" is actually pretty interesting for the genre, especially the original campaign - DLC ones are quite simpler.
The province system can be frustrating if you get a bad spawn but at least it makes population matter more and makes you think in advance about how you want to plan your cities, which is a good thing for a strategy game in my opinion. The AI is not amazing but still miles better than the one from AoW4 as of june 2023 - it will actually wage wars, clear map nodes and wonders, use higher-tier operations in battle, etc.
If you got bored of AoW4 already because of the lack of meaningful choices (every unit feeling the same, culture not mattering after 15 turns, etc.) but enjoyed the concept, I really encourage you to give Planetfall a try.
Steam User 12
Good game, takes time to get used to but worth the investment. I distinctly remember wondering whether or not to keep at 2 hours, as I know the amount of knowledge I would need to learn to play (I am getting lazy in my age) but was worth it. Nice diversity between races, heroes could do with feeling a little more unique.
Simply; Civilization in space, simplified, but having the combat expanded greatly.