Populous™: The Beginning

Currently GoG are selling a broken game here. Until they patch it the game just isn't compatible with win10. Will crash in launch 100% of the time. Do not waste your money here until they've fixed it, but I don't think that time is ever going to happen because it's been broken for years now and nothing has been done about it. Shame on you GoG, you're meant to be keeping old games alive on new systems and you've failed on this one.

I am just goıing to review the technical state of the game out of the box. On Windows 10 and with a 1920 x 1080 display it works right out of the box. I didn't touch a single setting just launched the executable.

I played Dungeon Keeper 2 with my friend on his PC and I lovded it instantly - that's how I was introduced to Bullfrog, one of the best studios in history of gaming, and that's how I learned about their earlier game: Populous: The Beginning... ...and I lovded it instantly! :D This is one of those games that I come back from timet to time (Heroes of Might and Magic 3, Fallout 1 & 2, GTA 3 & San Andreas, Diablo 1, Etherlords, Dungeon Keeper 2, Blood, Quake 1,2 & 3, Carmageddon to name some), to dive in and feel this nice tingle when you play excelent game that is rarely made these days! This is title that proves how creative and talented people can amaze you with whole new type of gameplay, whole new World that is so different and unique than anything else you've experienced! Not to mention soundtrack and whole new 'language' of the tribes ;p Great stuff - I recommend this heartfelt!

This is my first review ever. I never reviewed anything else, for anyone else. That said, you can easily guess that, if I'm writing this, it must mean something. Oh and it means. I bought my first computer in 1998 (fantastic overpowered PII 350mhz), and the only contact I had with games so far was in my Sega Megadrive. However, my cousins had an IBM computer for years, and a Spectrum which I discovered later, and my contact with a computer was very very brief and crude. Well, I was just a kid, and computers were something I always loved. So, when I first experienced Populous: The Beginning, it was a fantastic and brave new world: -It was a strategy game. I never had played a strategy game before. -The interface was very nice and easy. Seriously, not too many buttons, not intrusive, easy to work with. The game controlled like anything else I had experienced so far. -The maps are always a sphere, which changes completly the relation you have with the map, and it really gives the feeling of being a god (a commander can't rotate a world to look at whats happening at something 3000000000 km can he?) - The graphics... oh... those are top notch. Fantastic textures that still look good, and funny, cute animated sprites for characters, make a unique blend. -You have LOTS of powers at your disposal: how fun can it be to whipe an entire village with a tornado just because you feel like it?... And that's not the only thing you can do. -The difficulty scales in a fantastic way through the campaign, never being too easy nor too hard on you, which leads to some epic satisfaction after beating a level. Oh... I hope I said everything. I wasn't counting on this to be so long... well, buy it. Really. GOG deserves it, and you will be hooked up for a long time with this title!

This and Roller Coaster Tycoon were among the first real PC games I played. I had an amazing time playing this game as a child, and it still surprisingly holds up very well to this day.