Excellent Apollo4X Article On Techraptor

A hearty thank you to Don Parsons of Techraptor.net for taking the time to consider our game, and write up a great preview of it.  Apollo4X is such a different flavor of 4X, we’ve been concerned if the media would “get it” or dismiss it as difficult to describe to an audience so used to the normal paradigm in place in the genre.  Happily, I can report that Don “gets it”.  Whew.

http://techraptor.net/content/green-apollo-4x-space-trading-strategy-game

Apollo 4x is the latest game to catch my eye in Greenlight and we’ll be discussing it today. It is, as its name suggests a 4x game but it is a very different 4x then the ones you are used to. Most 4x games tend to stay in the box established by Civilization back in 1991. Some will experiment a bit outside the box of basics – pushing a bit here or a bit there with a new idea or two. In the end most games work with the box, manipulating it but still referencing and using the box heavily.

Apollo 4x doesn’t bother looking at the box for more than a few seconds to help jot down some very basic notes and then tosses out most of it. You aren’t going to be using tiles here, using tech trees, or be making food, industry, science, and such that you normally are. Instead Apollo 4x draws inspiration from sources historical, and in other game genres. The first, is that it draws on the idea of the East India Company of a trading company coming to rule between a dominance of trade and private armies in much of India. The second is tycoon games, though unlike those Apollo 4x isn’t focused on the small details of each building.

…there are a lot of ideas in Apollo 4x, even if it plays simpler then the way I’m describing it. There are a lot of patterns to it and rhythm that develops as you get used to it, allowing you to think more on some areas as you are adjusted.

The game isn’t necessarily for everyone, as it plays quite differently from the typical 4x game. It is heavily economic focused with a different sort of combat system that I hope to figure out better as I learn it more.

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