When Populous: The Beginning was announced back in the late 90's many people were skeptical. Not only was it created without Peter Molyneux, it also largely abandoned the concept of the original games. Rather than a god-sim this is "just an RTS". But what an RTS it is! Rather than being another Warcraft or C&C clone this one went its completely own, novel and brilliant way. Base building is simple and resource gathering almost non-existent. The center of the game is the incredibly powerful shaman unit who is each player's avatar. She starts off weak, just able to throw fireballs but as the campaign progresses she becomes so powerful that The Beginning puts any god-sim to shame, eventually being able to let fire rain, volcanoes explode and simply shape the world. But a shaman requires followers to gain mana and even she has her limits and won't be able to stop a huge army of warriors. The result is an incredibly fun, dynamic and chaotic game about huge battles and insane destruction. The view of an enemy's village going up in flames and being torn apart by tornadoes while warriors and simple villagers massacre each other never gets old. Neither does using a fireball to catapult the enemy shaman into the sea. The campaign is long, the missions diverse and the multiplayer timeless. The game not only plays well, it also has beautiful unique visuals and music which hold up to this day and provide a hauntingly alien yet beautiful atmosphere. Also the technical execution is mindblowingly good for a game this old and aside from the occasional pathfinding problem there's nothing I can complain about. It can be honestly said that there has never been anything like Populous: The Beginning before or after (although Sacrifice had some similarities), as a result this game is perfectly timeless and absolutely deserves to be played. To me it's not only one of the most original but easily best games ever made, both in singleplayer and multiplayer.
