Sidney K. Meier is an American businessman and computer programmer. A programmer, designer, and producer of several strategy video games and simulation video games, including the Civilization series, Meier co-founded MicroProse in 1982 with Bill Stealey and is the Director of Creative Development of Firaxis Games, which he co-founded with Jeff Briggs and Brian Reynolds in 1996. For his contributions to the video game industry, Meier was inducted into the Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences Hall of Fame.
Ubisoft Blue Byte GmbH is a German video game holding company owned by Ubisoft. It was founded in October 1988 by Thomas Hertzler and Lothar Schmitt as a developer and was best known for developing the Anno and The Settlers series. The studio was acquired by Ubisoft in 2001. Related Designs was merged into Blue Byte in 2013, and a third studio in Berlin was established in 2018. Since 2019, Ubisoft Blue Byte acts as the parent company of Ubisoft's three German studios, which became branded as Ubisoft Düsseldorf, Ubisoft Mainz and Ubisoft Berlin. By 2020, the "Blue Byte" name was phased out.
Tactical role-playing games, also known as strategy role-playing games and in Japan as simulation RPGs, are a video game genre that combines core elements of role-playing video games with those of tactical strategy video games. The formats of tactical RPGs are much like traditional tabletop role-playing games and strategy games in appearance, pacing, and rule structure. Likewise, early tabletop role-playing games are descended from skirmish wargames such as Chainmail, which were primarily concerned with combat.
IL-2 Sturmovik is a 2001 World War II combat flight simulator video game and is the first installment in the IL-2 Sturmovik series. The release focused on the air battles of the Eastern Front. It was named after the Soviet Ilyushin Il-2 ground-attack fighter, which played a prominent role in this theatre and is the single most produced military aircraft design to date. Along with its sequels, IL-2 Sturmovik is considered one of the leading World War II flight simulators.
A government simulation or political simulation is a game that attempts to simulate the government and politics of all or part of a nation. These games may include geopolitical situations, the creation of domestic political policies, or the simulation of political campaigns. They differ from the genre of classical wargames due to their discouragement or abstraction of military or action elements.
Ascaron Entertainment was a video game developer based in Germany. Founded as Ascon by Holger Flöttmann in 1991 and later renamed in October 1996 due to the possible confusion with the Swiss company Ascom AG, the company produced titles primarily for the PC until it became insolvent in 2009.
X2: The Threat is a space simulation video game developed by Egosoft for Windows, Linux, and Mac OS X. It is part of the X series. It was released in 2003 and is a sequel to X: Beyond the Frontier. Freeverse Software ported the game to Mac OS X in 2004/2005, while Linux Game Publishing produced their Linux port in 2005/2006. An expansion pack, X2: The Return, was cancelled.
Dwarf Fortress is a construction and management simulation and roguelike indie video game created by Bay 12 Games. Available as freeware and in development since 2002, its first alpha version was released in 2006 and received attention for being a two-member project surviving solely on donations.
Democracy is a government simulation game that was first developed by Positech Games in 2005, with a sequel released in December 2007, a third game in 2013 and a fourth in 2022. The player becomes the president or prime minister of a democratic government. The player must introduce and alter policies in seven areas – tax, economy, welfare, foreign policy, transport, law and order and public services. Each policy has an effect on the happiness of various voter groups, as well as affecting factors such as crime and air quality. The player has to deal with "situations", which are typically problems such as petrol protests or homelessness, and also has to make decisions on dilemmas that arise on each turn.
Social simulation games are a subgenre of life simulation game that explore social interactions between multiple artificial lives. Some examples include The Sims and Animal Crossing series.
Slitherine Software UK Limited is a British video game developer and publisher founded on 25 June 2000. It is responsible for the production of a range of over 200 strategy and war video games. Slitherine developed and/or published a number of licensed games with brands including Battlestar Galactica, Warhammer 40,000, Starship Troopers, Horrible Histories and The History Channel. It also produces rules for a series of tabletop wargames called Field of Glory.
Gratuitous Space Battles is a video game developed by the UK-based company Positech Games. It was released on November 17, 2009. On one level the title is a space warfare simulation consisting of a number of engagements between two opposing fleets of ships. While sometimes assumed to be a real-time strategy (RTS) game based on screenshots, actual gameplay focuses on the setup prior to the battle, making it play more like a tower defense game.
CI Games S.A. is a Polish video game developer and publisher based in Warsaw. Founded in 2002, originally as a budget-range game company, CI Games is best known for the Sniper: Ghost Warrior and Lords of the Fallen series.
The Sims Medieval is a life simulation game that was released in March 2011 by Electronic Arts for Microsoft Windows and Mac OS X, and on September 22, 2011 for iOS, as part of The Sims series. It was also made available for Windows Phone on March 26, 2013. Set in medieval times, it allows the player to build a kingdom through quest-driven gameplay. During presentation at E3 2010, a pre-order exclusive Limited Edition was also available.
Kixeye is a video game company founded in July 2007 and headquartered in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada. The company creates, develops and publishes massively multiplayer online real-time strategy games (MMORTS) for PC and mobile devices. Kixeye gained popularity as a pioneer in midcore action games featuring real-time combat on the social networking website Facebook. Following their initial launch, Kixeye's games generated twenty times more revenue per daily active user than other social games, retaining active users five times longer on average.
Star Citizen is an in-development multiplayer, space trading and combat simulation game. The game is being developed and published by Cloud Imperium Games for Windows. An extended retry of unrealized plans for Freelancer, Star Citizen is led by director Chris Roberts. The game was announced via a private crowdfunding page in September 2012, followed on October 18, 2012 by a successful Kickstarter campaign which drew over US$2 million. Pre-production of the game began in 2010, with production starting in 2011.
Big Pharma is a simulation game developed by Twice Circled and published by Positech Games where the player builds a drug factory. The game was released on August 27, 2015.
Redshirt is a social simulation game developed by Mitu Khandaker, developing under the company name The Tiniest Shark, and published by Positech Games for Windows, MacOS, and iOS. The game follows the player's custom character as they work through a fictional social media account as they try to "climb the ladder" on a space station. The game's title refers to a redshirt, a stock character in fiction who dies soon after being introduced.
