King of Dragon Pass

That's the only way I can describe this amazing hidden gem. The only game I can think of where abandoning an orphan in the woods or returning runaway slaves to their masters is not just accepted but strategically sound. Survival is the rule of the day for your tribe; no Mass Effect binary "choice" system here, all your actions (or inaction) carry real consequences years down the line. Remember, humans and monsters hold grudges, form pacts, create conspiracies, worship different gods, and these are just the ones within the walls of your village. This would all be well and good but don't worry, the gameplay underneath is addictive and deep, and is supported by beautiful hand drawn graphics that still hold up even today. So if you believe that the choices you make should amount to more than the blue alien being replaced by a green alien in the cutscene get this game.

A young noble of our clan hopes to marry his sweetheart, but her clan will not allow it unless we steal the famed magical plough of the Isolting clan. Our war-leader, the warrior-woman Nallindia, impetuous, brilliant and brave, is champing at the bit. And we've always had a soft-spot for lovers. In the dead of night, the two creep into the steads of the Isoltings and steal the plough. This act begins a feud which will last more than twenty years. Raids steep our clan sometimes in glory, sometimes in blood. There are magical swords, tenuous allainces with nomad warriors, we hire shamans to curse one another, individuals go looking for revenge for dead kin, with murders, kidnaps, and in one case curses so dire that their own tribe disowns them in horror. At last, a new age dawning, our queen steps into the world of the gods hoping to bring back peace. Every playthrough will give you half a dozen such glorious tales. Some have been deliberately written in, sequences of story events. Others, like our feud with the Isoltings, grow organically from the individual feats of your clansmen. The game has more than 640,000 words (for context, the average novel is about 90,000). It's *huge* and even in a long game you'll see half or less of what it has to offer. Your advisers have tremendous character and half the game is knowing who to listen to when - when to heed the farmers, when the warriors, when the magicians - and when (on those rare occasions) to listen to the trickster. How do you know whose advice to follow? You learn to think in terms of its world. It runs on saga-logic, myth-logic, bronze-age logic. It will not tolerate attempts to play it with a modern cast of mind. Simply a masterpiece.

The game plays better than the original, has an in-built manual and a better explained tutorial. The UI and menus are all re-arranged and redone though, losing their distinctive look which is drawback for me. Overall it remains a good, solid game.

I think a lot of games are overrated as far as appeal to the modern gamer goes on this website, this one isn't. There's a complexity and calculated risk in every action that modern Grand Strategy Gamers wish Paradox could achieve. It seems like a choose your own adventure game the first 20 hours or so you play it, but once you start realizing what works and what doesn't - which is almost always unique to a specific playthrough - it's a glorious realization that makes you want to start worshiping whatever dreamt up god your tribe of bullshitters and douchebags happens to be worshiping. At the same time you can still have a great time if you're absolutely clueless. There hasn't been a game with such a perfect synthesis between playability and complexity made in the history of gaming. And there won't be.

I usually hate managerial games as it usually boils down to balancing numbers, watching one counter tick up and another tick down. King of Dragon Pass creates a rich world that has a unique culture very similar to Nordic mythology. Events are woven together in such a way that I actually cared about the people in them. The hand drawn pictures that accompany these events are simply stunning. There are literally hundreds of them. You have a council that you fill with advisors, to help you make decisions. Each have their own strengths and drawbacks, and are devotees to one god or another. They often disagree so you will have to pay attention to who is an expert in what since they all have an opinion on everything. Appointing a devotee of the trickster god to the council is risky, on one hand they always possess keen insight into dilemmas on the other they will sometimes give you the wrong advise because otherwise they wouldn't be very good believers. You will watch their portraits grow old and eventually die. Whether on the field of battle or at the hands of Father Time. There is no right way to play. You can be a peaceful clan that depends on trading, or a war clan that steals from it's neighbors. You can decide to enslave your enemies, or ransom them back to their families. In one game I was playing as a clan that kept slaves, after a particularly large battle with a rival clan I captured over 80 of them. On this occasion I ransomed them back because I thought paying the ransom would bankrupt them. I lost out on a large workforce but it worked and they were severely weakened which made them easier to raid for years. Each choice has it's drawbacks and advantages. I carefully managed crop percentages and cattle purchases, because the story made me care about the people behind the numbers.