Also:While it might look a little raw compared to the current crop of hyper-polished real-time strategy games, Zero-K brings a lot to the table. The competitive/esports stuff is to be expected, but those wanting a more solitary experience are well served here. On top of skirmish and AI horde survival modes (all of which can be played cooperatively, and the horde mode features an entirely new alien race to fight), there is an enormous branching 70+ mission campaign.
The campaign mode opens with a gentle tutorial, explaining the interface and the basic flow of gameplay, so it’s a perfect place for less experienced players to hop in. Playing out over a galactic map, each planet holds a mission, and every mission completed unlocks new units on the enormous tech-tree, or provides you with some persistent upgrade to your Commander unit. Plus, multiple difficulty settings and optional objectives add replay value on top of all that.
Zero-K shares a core design with Total Annihilation. You start each battle with a lone Commander mech. If it explodes: Game over. You use it to build your first few resource-extractors (mines for metal, solar or wind power for energy), a robot factory or two, and from there your options balloon. While Zero-K does a lot of little things to define itself, its biggest feature is the ability to alter the terrain itself, opening up a whole world of weird new strategies.
Terrain has always been important to Total Annihilation and its successors. Many weapons fire in arcs, meaning a cleverly placed unit can hide behind cover while still attacking. Zero-K’s terraforming also allows you to seal off base entrances and exit ramps, or even cut your way inland to allow a naval invasion of a land-locked enemy base. All this combined with the quite frankly silly number of options you’ve got in terms of unit choice makes this one of the most freeform real-time strategy games around.
SourceIf you keep graphical options low, it seems to run on pretty weak computers.
Otherwise, it is pretty good, yes. It is more or less Total Annihilation after a few major cycles of redesign and interface improvements.
Notable big changes are:
– Only one “faction”, everyone has access to the same units.
– All factories are “T1”, you can start the game with any (though starting with an air factory is generally a bad idea in 1v1 matches). In fact, everything is buildable from the start. No Starcraft-like tech, nor Building A unlocks Building or Unit B. Obviously you won’t start with a superweapon, as by the time it is half done, your opponents will have raided your base to oblivion. Note that the first factory is free and will instantly appear when your Commander build it.
– No damage/armour types. Every unit does the same damage to every other unit – apart from anti-air: dedicated anti-air units won’t attack ground (and do 10% damage if they do somehow hit)
– Everything has the same cost ratio in time, energy and metal. So if an unit costs 600 Metal, it also costs 600 Energy and takes 600 buildpower/time units.
– A modern UI, with extensive customisation options.
– Decently smart unit behaviour. For example, small, fast raiders will randomly run around to avoid slow anti-heavy rockets, and kite slower, shorter-ranged enemies. Units will also choose their targets reasonably well and avoid overkill.
– Very good non-cheating AI. While the best players will consistently beat it, its non-handicapped difficulty level isn’t called “brutal” for nothing.
Get it on Steam if you're a fan of late 90s RTS (with a modern makeover). It's free, so why not???
