Cyber Empires
A mix of global strategy and top-down cyborg combat.
Cyber Empires, released as Steel Empire in Europe, is a strategy and top-view fighting game developed by Silicon Knights. It was published for MS-DOS, Atari ST, and Amiga in March 1992, with rights later held by Strategic Simulations, Inc. The game is notable for blending Risk-style strategic conquest with arcade-style battle sequences.
Quick Facts
- Developer
- Silicon Knights
- Publisher
- Strategic Simulations
- Producer
- George MacDonald
- Designer
- Denis Dyack; Rick Goertz
- Composer
- Richard Joseph
- Platforms
- Amiga
- Atari ST
- MS-DOS
- Released
- March 1992
- Genre
- Action, strategy
Facts from the source article.
Gameplay
The game consists of two main components. In the strategic phase, the player conquers a land mass by raising cyborg armies, similar to the board game Risk. The second component is a top-down battle mode where the player may manually control one cyborg during offensive or defensive engagements, or let the computer simulate the battle for more predictable outcomes. Players can choose to play only the strategic board-game portion or only the battles. Nine cyborg types are available, from the fast but weak Mercury to the Titan, which uses long-range missiles and short-range auto-cannons. Armies may contain up to 10 units per country. The player can place capitals in occupied countries to generate extra revenue each turn and enable construction. Buildings include three levels of fortifications (light, medium, heavy), which protect a country only if a cyborg is present, and factories with 1, 2, or 4 bays that determine how many cyborgs can be built simultaneously, while factory upgrade level affects construction speed.
Reception
Computer Gaming World cautioned that Cyber Empires blended action with strategy, making it a poor fit for pure strategy fans. The magazine deemed it a competent but unremarkable title, with merely passable graphics and audio, and suggested it for action gamers fond of BattleTech, Robotech, or giant robot settings. A 1994 roundup of futuristic space strategy games rated it two-plus stars out of five.
More in Turn-Based Strategy Games of the 1990s
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