Stunning 9/10 strategy game is now just $2

Our favorite strategy game from Steam Next Fest has just smashed its Kickstarter goal - a little over a week after it launched. 

Cyberpunk 2077, especially since the launch of Phantom Liberty, has one of the most vibrant and vivid visual styles in gaming. You take all that – the neon lights, the chunky guns, the endless miles of wires and cables – and strap it to the close-quarters, tactics-driven strategy of Firaxis’ iconic XCOM 2, and then add a dash of Payday 3, and its focus on robberies and heists, and this is the result. If you want a beautiful new Steam strategy sim, centered on stealth and cerebral planning, this is for you.

Age of Empires II Definitive Edition just gets bigger and better with each coming announcement from Forgotten Empires. The game already has various DLC to choose from, ranging from the Dynasties of India to the Return of Rome, but continues to impress with more. We’re now getting yet another expansion dubbed The Mountain Royals, which will bring us from the vast waters of Lake Van to the snowy peaks of the Caucasus Mountains.

Steam Next Fest was an excellent opportunity for players to learn about the most exciting and interesting upcoming PC games. However, one game that stood out even among the standouts to become the one of the most-played games from Steam Next Fest was a remaster of a cult favorite strategy game poised to make a solid comeback. Stronghold: Definitive Edition revitalizes the original 2001 game's strategic take on building a kingdom in Medieval Britain circa 1066. Coming from original developer Firefly Studios, the Definitive Edition aims to recapture the scope and story of the original but with some added flair.

For those not familiar with Lollipop Chainsaw, here's the launch trailer from 2012. It's really something.

This is a good time for the strategy genre. Cities Skylines 2. Crusader Kings. Total War Pharaoh. Ahead of Civilization 7 – and also newcomers like Ara History Untold and Millennia – one of PC gaming’s greatest genres seemingly keeps getting bigger and better. But we can’t forget the games that made all this possible in the first place, the pioneering, classic strategy sims that helped transform the act of pointing and clicking into some of the greatest experiences we’ve ever had on PC. If you want to celebrate the best the genre has to offer, or have a blast while waiting on the big hits of the near future, one of the best strategy games ever is now available for less than $1.

Civilization 6 is the benchmark for expansive, sprawling, and highly detailed strategy sims. You take its in-depth systems and attention to detail and combine them with the survival-based, often grueling aesthetic and style of Frostpunk, then maybe throw in a bit of Cities Skylines 2 and its focus on developing complex urban centers with a real sense of life. If that sounds like a mix for success – and if you want something else to look forward to, as well as Firaxis’ upcoming Civilization 7 – then Synergy, a new strategy-based city builder coming soon to Steam is precisely the game you’re after.

I'm a known strategy-game turtler, which means that I'll spend as much time shooting arrows off the top of a great big stone wall as games like Age of Empires 4 will let me. That habit made me a big fan of 2017's They Are Billions, which condensed the RTS experience into a huge horde-defense mode, and now it's turned me towards Cataclismo, which might have the most promise of anything I've played so far in Steam Next Fest.

Between Cities Skylines 2, Crusader Kings, Europa Universalis, and the upcoming Millennia, Paradox has a lot of reasons to be a happy publisher right now. But it’s not all good news. Lamplighters League, the XCOM-style, turn-based strategy game that recently launched on PC and Game Pass, has made a significant loss, with Paradox’s CEO admitting that response to the game has been “a big disappointment.”

The FIFA franchise may have only just been rebranded as EA Sports FC 24 but it's already expanding with a turn-based strategy game coming to mobile called EA Sports FC Tactical.

Cities Skylines 2. Total War: Pharaoh. The upcoming Civilization 7. It’s a great time right now for strategy fans, with even the likes of Ara History Untold and Millennia from Paradox arriving soon to shake up the mix. But the ‘90s were a great time for the genre, too, thanks to Command and Conquer, Theme Hospital, the classic Age of Empires, and of course, Gangsters, one of the greatest and most unique strategy sims ever that you can get right now for less than the price of a Starbucks.

Cheaper gaming laptop deals are usually reserved for previous generation RTX 3050 and RTX 3060 machines, however Dell has done one better this week. In response to Amazon's own Prime Day gaming laptop deals, the brand has slashed the price of one of its cheapest rigs - and at the center of all of it sits an RTX 4050 graphics card.