Age of Wonders: Planetfall Review

Age of Wonders is an old school Turn Based Strategy series that started all the way back in 1999, after 3 games and many expansions devs decided to mix things up a little and do what Civilization did with their Beyond Earth game, they went full on SciFi with Planetfall. Planetfall is very much like old Age of Wonders games with some added 4X game elements like massive tech trees and diplomacy options that old Age of Wonders games had, but not as fleshed out and detailed like in Planetall. You essentially start with Planetfall as your colonization ship lands on a planet brimming with ruins of ancient civlizations and aggressive alien wildlife. Your goal is like in any 4X game to Explore, Exploit, Expand and Exterminate your opposition.

Big part of any 4X game is how different the playable factions are, and oh boy they certainly are. There are 6 different factions and each one is very interesting to explore in their own way, we have typical human faction called Vanguard, space dwarfs like faction Dvar, alien Zerglike Kir'Ko, psionic Syndicate, robotic Assembly and all female genetically modified Amazons. Every faction has very different units, tech trees, operations. All that faction diversity is easily one of the best parts of the game.

Age of Wonders games always had the same turn based combat mechanics in every game, Planetfall is no different, every unit has several different abilities, hitpoint pool, resistances and hero units. Hero units can be leveled up and modified depending on your playstyle, pair that with hundreds of different units in all main and neutral factions and you have a huge number of pieces on an intergalactic chessboard. Learning all that will take time and to master it will take even longer, so you need to expect confusion and many mistakes early on while playing Planetfall. It's a learning process.

Every 4X game needs to have a good economy, resource options and tech tree to be interesting and Planetfall has all that covered in abundance. Once you land on your planet you can build forward bases, you can annex nearby territories and build 4 types of productions on there, power, food, production and research options. You will need to balance those four main economy drivers in order to have a functioning society, if you focus on only one you will soon have serious problems and your economy will crumble. Tech tree will help you with some of the weaker points of your economy and army with two huge military and society tech trees.

All that will take many turns to complete and to truly enjoy a 4X game it needs to have relaxing atmosphere and graphics, Planetfall has all that nailed and then some. You can literally spend hours playing this and you will enjoy every moment with this game if that is your thing. If you enjoyed Alpha Centauri and Civilization Beyond Earth, Planetfall can be an interesting game for you to try. Score: 89/100!