Strategy and fun in equal measure
The Nations is actually the followup to Alien Nations and plays out in fairly similar to the Settlers franchise of real time strategy games. It's perhaps not quite as engaging as its rivals but remains worth playing for genre fans. This Gold edition packages the base game with a bonus pack with new missions and other content, making it the one to go for if you are interested. The basic goal of the game is to manage one of several different civilizations, including Amazons and a few other less well known races, and guide them through life. The game is a real time strategy one but unlike things like Command & Conquer, the focus here is not on combat but resource management. You have to consider things like diplomacy, with trading and discussion helping your expansion but if you like to fight, don't worry, as the option to go to war is always there. Changes and additions to this Gold edition include over 20 new missions, a whole new story, new music and even new video sequences. There's an all new research system to experiment with, along with new enemies, while the whole thing also displays better balancing. As far as strategy games go, this is pretty decent stuff. There's a good variety of things to keep you busy and the focus on resource management over combat makes a pleasant change. It's certainly fun building up your tribes and it proves quite satisfying to watch them expand. Throw in some nicely effective and atmospheric graphics and a lot of content, and you have a pack which is well worth picking up.
