Happened on this 1998 game by sheer chance and I'm really digging it! As far as I can tell it was never popular. It's a mixture of an RTS and a "god game" where one unit (your shaman) is very powerful & special (chess analogy: sort of like mixing the central role of the king & with the power of the queen).
Strong "tribal" vibes that were popular in the '90s (think Deep Forest music, the game Riven, etc). Very nostalgic for me as I was a kid at the time. I'm playing the PSX version, looks like the PC version was even better!
Has anyone ever heard of this "Populous" series? I'm curious to try other titles, and to try more in the "god game" genre (a genre I never even knew existed!). Any other "god games" worth checking out?
I played this. A great game. That era and Bullfrog in particular were incredible. Dungeon Keeper is one of the best games I played. Theme Hospital and Theme Park were great. It was the golden age of strategy games. Age of Empires 2, Heroes of Might and Magic 3. Red Alert games. Railroad Tycoon. I have no idea why this type of game became unpopular.
I strongly recommend Dungeon Keeper 1 (ideally gold with Deeper Dungeons add on) and Theme Hospital. Can get them on Gog.
As far as I can tell it was never popular.
:(
It came out in 1989 and was ported to every game system and microcomputer that was released in america and Japan for like the next 3 generations of hardware. It sold over 4 million copies. Its the game that gave peter molyneux a blank check to make whatever game he wanted for like three decades.
All these games will be lost in time... Like tears in rain...
One of my favorite games of all time. Always been sad that the god game genre really petered out. There's definitely a few modern examples but nothing thats really captured the feeling that pop3 had.
Definitely check out the black & white games, From Dust, WorldBox (which is more sandbox but still fun), RuinArch, and Reus(1 & 2)
Black and White was really fun for me as well for a time - it's basically a god simulation combined with a zoo game as you have to grow your avatar basically.
Loved populous back then, if I recall correctly I even liked two more than one!
I've been playing some hidden gem indie games from that era, too. Ever heard of "Super Mario World"? I've never seen anything like it.
i somehow had both populous and black n white when i was a child too young figure out how to play.
Magic Carpet (1994) was a really interesting take on the genre, also by Bullfrog. Imagine the god-sim mechanics of Populous combined with a 3D flight-sim/shooter and you get Magic Carpet.
I also just want to say that this game was actually very popular.
And I loved it! I was recently thinking of getting it to work on Linux to play again. It's a monumental classic.
