Elemental: War of Magic Preview
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If I haven't lost you yet, you'll probably love Elemental. It has the kind of stuff that 4X players dream about. There are no constructors from GalCiv or workers from Civ -- cities' additions basically build themselves on command, assuming you've got the resources to build them. The worlds are gigantic (fully zoomed out, you get a cloth map representation, with your custom town names inscribed in the right places) and randomly generated, so quests are always available and different. There's little tricks like a currency called "Diplomacy Capital": Having a lot of it helps your standing with other factions, or you can trade it away for money or resources, earning you quick cash but giving good will to your friends ... or enemies.
Even with the innovations, Elemental is stubbornly traditional in places. "I hate hexes," says Wardell when asked what he thinks of Civ 5's big new feature. "One, I like being able to move in eight directions. I don't like only being able to move in six. Two, it makes the game feel like playing on a hardcore board tile game. I just don't like that look." Wardell also shrugs at Civ's attempt to remove multi-unit "stacks of doom" from the genre. "First of all, we call them armies. And historically, there have been armies, and I like them. I don't like stacks, though -- I don't want to have fifty units that are fighting individually," hence Elemental's seperate tactical combat sequences.
