SuperPower update

DreamCatcher and Quebec-based game developer GolemLabs came to San Francisco recently to show off SuperPower, their upcoming turn-based strategy game. The game is set in the late 1990s, and it lets players assume control of one of 140 different real-world countries and oversee its economic, political, and military organizations.

GolemLabs' ambitious goal is to realistically simulate the economic, political, and military interactions of the entire world. To do this, the developers have imported the data from the 1997 UN census and a huge military database featuring more than 4,000 real-world units. Players select the country they want to control, how long of a game they want to play, and the goal they want to achieve. The game's difficulty is based on the combination of these factors--playing as the United States with a manageable goal like staying in power for one year may be easy, but playing as a small underdeveloped nation with the goal of world domination in five years may be all but impossible. One interesting feature of the game is the country selector, which will suggest several countries for players to control based on their preferences for military- and economic-style games.

To make the task of world simulation more manageable, each turn in the game represents one week, and actions are simultaneously resolved each turn by the computer. Players can issue orders to their military forces, build additional units and bases, make trade agreements with other countries, and manage several other elements of their country. The game even includes an option to engage in a full-scale nuclear war.

The game is currently in closed beta testing and is scheduled for release this spring. At this point it looks fairly complete, but we'll have to spend more time with it before we can see if it will achieve its ambitious goals. While no multiplayer mode is planned for this version, the developers will consider adding it to a future version of the game. For more information, take a look at our previous coverage of the game.