Supreme Ruler 2020 review (PC)

As if life in the modern world wasn’t a depressing enough experience already, we now have Battlegoat Studios to thank for making it seem that much more futile with Supreme Ruler 2020.

Fortunately, this malaise doesn’t stem from the quality of the game but more from its terrifying plausibility.

There seems to be a growing consensus that at some point soon the oil is going to run out and we’ll all be screwed, so Supreme Ruler is set at the point where competition for this dwindling resource leaves us killing each other over what little is lef

It may seem difficult to believe, sitting warm and cosy in 2008, but, if Battlegoat are right, it won’t be many years before the world’s most powerful nations are waging unprovoked wars of aggression merely to secure their access to oil supplies. I know, I know – perish the very thought...

Supreme Ruler 2020 makes you the head of state of one of the regions into which this troubled future world has split, and the scope of the game is immediately impressive.

You can choose to play as any of over 250 factions, and between them these cover the entire globe. There are no ‘rebels’ in this game, filling up the space on the map – the whole world is playable and you can interact with everyone.

From the moment the game begins you are responsible for everything your chosen faction does. Every strategic, diplomatic and economic decision is yours to take, and the options available to you are recreated in the most painstaking (sometimes painful) detail.

The sheer depth and number of options is instantly overwhelming. With a thorough tutorial this might not have been a problem, but unfortunately those on offer leave you woefully unprepared for what awaits.

They do adequately explain the basic functioning of the game, but they are entirely text-based and non-interactive, which always makes the information harder to retain.

Add to this the fact that they barely scratch the surface of the game’s complexity and a high degree of bewilderment becomes inevitable.

You can appoint cabinet ministers to run your various departments of state and allow them to take most of the day-to-day decisions (basically enabling auto-management of parts of the game, which does make it a little easier to keep track of what’s going on) but there will still be frequent occasions where you aren’t sure what you really need to be doing.

Obviously this kind of difficulty in a game is relatively short-term, rather than permanent. There would certainly come a point where you finally understood it all, but given how much there is to take account of in Supreme Ruler, I have a feeling that point could be a long time coming.

This complexity makes the game difficult and inaccessible, but at the same time gives it extraordinary longevity and makes it ultimately more rewarding. Casual gamers are not going to find this title suitable, but that’s hardly a criticism as it wasn’t really designed for them in the first place.

So hardcore strategy fans should find Supreme Ruler appealing, but there are some elements that even they might find disappointing. Top of my own list of complaints is (as is so often the case) the combat.

To be honest there’s barely anything to it, which is bad enough in itself, but worse to my mind is the fact that you can’t really tell what’s going on. There doesn’t seem to be any simple indication as to WHY you win or lose a battle, and there’s little more frustrating than being defeated constantly and not being able to figure out a solution as you don’t know why you’re losing in the first place.

Maybe there is a screen somewhere that tells you what’s going on in a battle, but I wasn’t able to find it amongst the myriad options and the tutorials tell you nothing about the military aspect of the game at all. This is difficult to forgive in a game that revolves so heavily around warfare.

There are other niggles too. The first time I played the game it took less than six months before most of the North American factions were at war with each other. This in itself wasn’t a problem, but it did serve to highlight the lack of a screen or map filter that lets you easily see with whom you are at war and with whom you are allied.

Events moved so quickly and the declarations of war came so frequently that I soon lost track of who was fighting who. A simple summary screen or coloured map filter would solve this easily, but I could find nothing of the sort.

This leads me to another petty annoyance – the declarations of war themselves. I found myself being constantly asked by my allies to declare war on factions I was already at war with, and every time this happened the blasted map would re-centre on the faction in question. I didn’t appreciate so frequently having to scroll back to the location I wanted to view, so this quickly became tiresome.

Despite this, I like the map itself. Like many strategy games, Supreme Ruler may not be that graphically impressive, but the map looks and feels like the kind of detailed satellite imagery you can imagine real world leaders poring over. It may add little to the actual gameplay, but it definitely serves to make the whole experience more believable.

I’m conscious that I’ve dwelt on the negative to a degree here, so it’s probably worth mentioning that I do like this game. There are a number of things about Supreme Ruler that really irritated me, but none of them enough to put me off playing.

It’s a complex, intimidating, unforgiving and at times unhelpful game, but it’s also fantastically detailed, worryingly believable and (once you have the faintest idea what you’re doing) enjoyably involving.

It’s a shame that many of the most obvious shortcomings would seem to be so easily solvable, but if you can overlook them then Supreme Ruler will offer you an absorbing if depressing glimpse of a possible future.

This isn’t a game for the easily distracted or impatient among us (you know who you are!) but if you’re willing to invest the time and effort then Supreme Ruler 2020 is certainly worth a look.

7/10

Steven Rees