Is anyone here a fan of Arcen Games? AI War and such?
I find myself drawn towards their games despite not falling in love with any. I don't get along with their adoration of cluttered fields of sprites and six digit numbers (plus these games are hell ugly and sound poor) but I like the weird story concepts and appreciate that they never do things the obvious way.
In The Last Federation, you play as one of two heads of the last living Hydra who's stolen a mercenary flagship and has taken on the task of balancing power between a number of alien species to keep them from annihilating each other.
You do this through diplomacy menus and ??? turn-based shmup combat.
I should mention that I have no idea what the actual winning or game over conditions are in this game. Last time I played I was tasked with removing a particular faction from gas giants. I don't even know how to go to war. At some point the game decided that I ran out of time to do this and they exploded the universe.
It's pretty opaque. I understand that they can't really afford polish, but some better tuning for usability and system balance would be wonderful.
That's kinda where I'm at; tough games to recommend but also impossible to ignore. I get pulled in like a tractor beam.