Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri is a 4X video game, considered a spiritual sequel to the Civilization series. Set in a science fiction depiction of the 22nd century, the game begins as seven competing ideological factions land on the planet Chiron ("Planet") in the Alpha Centauri star system. As the game progresses, Planet's growing sentience becomes a formidable obstacle to the human colonists.
Descent: FreeSpace – The Great War, known as Conflict: FreeSpace – The Great War in Europe, is a 1998 space combat simulation IBM PC compatible computer game developed by Volition, when it was split off from Parallax Software, and published by Interplay Productions. In 2001, it was ported to the Amiga platform as FreeSpace: The Great War by Hyperion Entertainment. The game places players in the role of a human pilot, who operates in several classes of starfighter and combats against opposing forces, either human or alien, in various space-faring environments, such as in orbit above a planet or within an asteroid belt. The story of the game's single player campaign focuses on a war in the 24th century between two factions, one human and the other alien, that is interrupted in its fourteenth year by the arrival of an enigmatic and militant alien race, whose genocidal advance forces the two sides into a ceasefire in order to work together to halt the threat.
Mantis is the common name of any insect in the order Mantodea, also commonly known as praying mantises.
X-COM: Terror from the Deep is a strategy video game developed and published by MicroProse for the PC in 1995 and for the PlayStation in 1996. It is a sequel to X-COM: UFO Defense and the second game of the X-COM series, this time taking the war against a renewed alien invasion into the Earth's oceans.
Frederik Pohl's Gateway is a 1992 interactive fiction video game released by Legend Entertainment, and written by Glen Dahlgren and Mike Verdu. It is based on Frederik Pohl's Heechee universe. It was followed by a sequel Gateway II: Homeworld, in 1993.
Vega Strike is a first-person space trading and combat simulator, developed for Microsoft Windows, Linux, FreeBSD and OS X systems. Many of the core game mechanics of Vega Strike are indirectly inspired by Elite. Other games, such as Wing Commander: Privateer, influenced the original developer.
Paragon Software Corporation was an American video game developer based in Greensburg, Pennsylvania. Founded on December 12, 1985, by Mark E. Seremet and Antony Davies, the company was best known for games developed around licenses from Marvel Comics, including The Amazing Spider-Man and Captain America in Dr. Doom's Revenge!, and licenses from Game Designers' Workshop, such as the MegaTraveller series. On July 27, 1992, MicroProse announced that they had acquired Paragon Software, and that the company would be merged into MicroProse as a result of it. The company had 19 employees at the time. The studio's final game, XF5700 Mantis Experimental Fighter, was released under the MicroProse branding on September 2, 1992.
X-COM: Interceptor is the fourth main game in the X-COM series, developed and published by MicroProse in 1998. The game is a combination of many genres, including space flight simulation, business simulation game and strategy game elements. More specifically, the player's role includes managing a number of X-COM space stations, piloting starfighters during hostile encounters whilst co-ordinating wingmen, and managing resources and research. X-COM Interceptor, although released as the fourth game, is actually set before X-COM: Apocalypse, thus making it the third game in the chronological order. The game was re-released in 2008 for Steam and GamersGate, and again in 2016 on GOG.com.
Warhead is a 3D space combat simulator for Amiga and Atari ST platforms. It was created by British developer Glyn Williams in 1989.
Lightspeed is a video game developed and released by MicroProse in 1990. It features a space flight simulator game and action game elements with an emphasis on strategy and exploration. The box describes the title as an "Interstellar Action and Adventure" game. The game features space exploration, trade, combat and diplomacy in the same vein as 4X s such as Master of Orion. Lightspeed, unlike the popular series of turn-based strategy games, plays out in real-time.
The planetary systems of stars other than the Sun and the Solar System are a staple element in many works of the science fiction genre.
Nomad is a 1993 space trading and combat game developed by Intense! Interactive and Papyrus Design Group. It was published by GameTek for MS-DOS.
X is a science fiction space trading and combat simulator series created by German developer Egosoft. The series is set in the X-Universe where several races populate a number of worlds connected by jumpgates. The games feature free roaming gameplay with trading, combat, empire building, and missions; leading to the series' phrase: "Trade, Fight, Build, Think". The series, which was launched in 1999 on the Windows platform, consists of five base games: X: Beyond the Frontier, X2: The Threat, X3: Reunion, X Rebirth, and X4: Foundations. X Rebirth introduced a new rendering engine as well as a new plot, one which X4: Foundations now extends the storyline beyond ten years after the events in X Rebirth.
Star Wars: TIE Fighter is a 1994 Star Wars space flight simulator and space combat video game, a sequel in the Star Wars: X-Wing series. It places the player in the role of an Imperial starfighter pilot during events that occur between The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi.
Burning Soldier is a 1994 rail shooter video game developed by Genki and originally published by Panasonic and Pack-In-Video in North America, Japan and Europe exclusively for the 3DO Interactive Multiplayer. The first title created by Genki for the 3DO platform, the game is set in a futuristic Solar System in 2095 where a war against humanity erupts with the arrival of the Kaisertian alien race, as players assume the role of an Earth Defense Force fighter pilot taking control of the mecha-style Strike space fighter craft in an effort to overthrow the invaders and end the conflict. Its gameplay mainly consists of shooting mixed alongside full motion video with sprite-based enemies imposed on them using a main two-button configuration.
Hyperspeed is a space combat role-playing video game developed by MicroProse Software in 1991 for DOS, and is a sequel to Lightspeed.
Pie in the Sky is a 2.5D and 3D first-person shooter engine most popular in the mid-to-late 1990s by Pie in the Sky Software, also known as Power 3D and the 3D Game Creation or 3D Game Creation System engine. The engine was used in two games by the company as well as many other independent games and amateur projects after it was turned into a commercial game creator, largely because it minimized the amount of computer programming knowledge needed to make 3D games in its editing tools, making it suitable even for beginners with no game-design experience.
Zero-5 is a shooter video game developed and published by Caspian Software for the Atari STe in 1994. It is one of the last official releases for the Atari ST after being discontinued in 1993 by Atari Corporation.
Xenocide is a scrolling shooter for the Apple IIGS written by Pangea Software and published by Micro Revelations in 1989. An IBM PC compatible port using VGA graphics was developed by Manley & Associates and published in 1990. The box cover credits Brian Greenstone as the game's creator on both versions. Xenocide was the first commercially published game from Greenstone's company, Panega Software.
