Wallet in serious danger. Last week there were all these tombs that need to be raided (working on it), now here we are with an alien world and ancient Egypt.

Good thing there are no more games I want at this time, those might've happened next.
(or some that are so new here that no fear of that just yet...)

If you go to the main page and see the cover art for this sale on the top right the cover art itself is from this movie- https://www.gog.com/movie/tpb_afk_the_pirate_bay_away_from_keyboard

In case you need it, here is my review for Caesar IV I wrote after finishing it:

Caesar IV

A wonderful gift from Grargar and Judas, thanks a lot guys!

Another great city builder game that I’ve finished! Apparently it follows the rule "If it ain't broke, don't fix it" as it is basically the same game with just a few new features, some enhancements and improved visuals (frankly, I don’t care about it at all so it was not anything good for me). I don’t complain but perhaps changing the historic background is not enough? Maybe it’s time to implement something totally fresh in the series? Oh well…

I had a feeling that the game improved the stability of your city. I’m sure every Caesar III/Pharaoh/Zeus player experienced a mass reduction of houses even though all needed resources were available just badly distributed. Caesar IV is by far less chaotic and thus it requires less of tedious micro-managing. This way you can use more time to develop your city which is good…

…or not so good because sadly building in 3D environment is more difficult and tedious. It’s the biggest drawback of the game IMHO. Building good fortifications was especially dreadful and in many scenarios I didn’t build any walls at all because, as it was implemented in Zeus, in most cases you can bribe your opponents and avoid fighting at all. This was something I didn’t like in Zeus and I still don’t like it here. Sure, I get it, it’s a city-building game not war-oriented RTS but still… it doesn’t sound realistic. Furthermore managing your armies is the most tedious task of them all. They move slowly, get stuck behind some buildings etc. What’s even worse out of four different types of troops you only need one heavy infantry and if you get attacked early maybe light infantry. Sure, they added some nice features like xp gained from battle > xp gained from training but what’s the point of it if overall the whole fighting part is essentially broken? I’ve chosen non-military missions because of it…

…because managing your city is still the best part of the game and it’s very rewarding to see how your little village thrives and becomes a major city. Oh yeah! So if you like city-building genres Caesar IV is for you. Nothing spectacular here but a solid entertainment. Recommended.

Hey, GOG, had you hired Yennifer or other sorceresswes into your ranks, or you just developed some mind reading device? Because I actually wanted to ask a question about more or less peaceful builder games, geez!:D

As for this promo, I own most of those games here or elsewhere (ahem, like physical copy (damn I'm old)), and I certainly do recommend "classic" Impressions Games' games (no typo (I hope:D)) to anyone new to the genre - they may be old, but are quite attractive, interesting, entertaining and, well, time consuming, despite some flaws.

Europa Universalis series, on the other hand, are also interesting games, yet offering you a lot of opportunities on totally different scale, but... they are games for happy retirement - as they are horrendous time cemeteries (I don't want to know how much time I buried there, and I guess every other player don't want to know that too). That's why I prefer to steer clear of them for now, otherwise I'd missed such marvel as Witcher 3 entirely, and that would be like superbad, because Witcher 3 is one of few games that really do deserve Game of the Year title. Heh, I'd went even as far as naming it Game of the Decade./grin But I digress.

Strange we don't have other games from Paradox, more suitable for the title of promo, such as Cities in Motion (honestly, I prefer first over second by huge margin), Cities Skylines (AFAIK not available here yet), Majesty, or non-Paradox games like Constructor, or Banished, which is very, very meditative title. And with disasters disabled, indeed one of most peaceful in genre.

Speaking of which, are there any other games like those I mentioned, but may not be familiar with? I do own Stardew Valley and Lethis, among few others, but they kinda exhausting their potential for me, so I look for something to supplement them with.

Memphis wasn't built in a day.

So, I'm not particularly fond of this type of games, mainly because I believe I lack the patience, persistence and perhaps the "strategic mind" that is required to play them. But let's say that I want to try something of this batch, something that is engaging and suitable for a beginner like me. What do you propose?

Caesar III for you then. It doesn't involve deep strategic decisions across many issues, as you are just organically building a city from scratch. The tutorial is excellent, and there is a gradual progression in the scope and difficulty of the missions.

The next closest contender would be For the Glory (which is basically a polished version of Europa Universalis II). It's probably the simplest and most dynamic game of all from Paradox. The game may look overwhelming at first but in reality it is very fluid, and the mechanics are not complicated once you have a whack at it (reading EU2 Wiki helps a lot here). Your decisions are mostly whether to jump into a war and which alliances to forge, and most of the game you are just trying to survive and expand.

If you are familiar with the Civilization series, then Alpha Centauri may be worth a look, because the game formula is the same. I never really got into it unlike Civilization and Civilization II though.

Seems like a subliminal message has been sneaked into the sale... am I the only one getting that vibe?

Thanks, Igrok! I'll check them out sooner or later!

I'll expand Igrok's offer, if he doesn't mind.

Games present here represent two different types of games - global strategies and city builders.

Zeus/Cleopatra/Caesar III represent the latter, and if you are into this subtype I recommend them, they look nice, have interesting gameplay and relatively easy to learn.
Children of the Nile and Caesar IV represent nearly the same genre, but with certain limitations of 3D engines, resulting in, well, scale issues or rather edgy graphics. YMMV of course, but I prefer older 2D here. Still, gameplay is relatively close to trio mentioned above.

Other games represent global strategies, and, by and large, are essentially same game (with the exception of Alpha Centauri) only set in different time periods, visuals, and certain gameplay elements present or lacking, depending on game They give you global "patchwork" map where you work with provinces at large, and don't deal with individual cities at all, you deal with politics, get some a bit "personal" touch here and there, Paradox's games generally a bit more difficult to learn, master, and be entertained with, as their learning curve, especially for early titles such as these offered, is quite steep.

I'd like to think so, but I gave up searching for deeper meaning into gog's tactics long ago... ironically, it was somewhere around the same time they stopped doing regular enigmatic hint updates.

This wasn't built in a day

No. No it wasn't. It took a REALLY FECKING LONG TIME.

Centuries. Eons. Millennia. EPOCHS. In fact, by the time it was built all the original goggers who were waiting for it had died of old age.

Emperor: Rise of the Middle Kingdom. Where is it? Not in the GOG-catalogue...

Compared to the rest (that are generally better) I feel Caesar IV is a wee bit overpriced.

Anyone ever find a reliable fix for the speed issues in Zeus that doesn't require third party CPU throttling apps, disabling sound or other craziness i'm not comfortable trying?

https://www.gog.com/forum/zeus_poseidon_acropolis/windows_7probably_xp_too_slow_gods_spawnblessattack_animations/page1

https://www.gog.com/forum/zeus_poseidon_acropolis/any_news_on_the_slow_godsweird_building_animations_bug

The only thing that's really kept me from buying it all these years.

Now that I have all of these I've got them all installed and I'm trying to find one to dig into. Is it bad that I'm enjoying the simpler ones the most? :P I wanted to start with Cleopatra but the farming thing killed me. It's so vague as to where to plant, how to connect, not to mention the flooding that totally fucks everything up. I'm either too simple minded or an idiot. :P

Nice collection of time killers. But sadly not a single game in this promo comes with official Linux support.