Sega have a rather flash trailer up for forthcoming PC RTS Empire: Total War, which includes a 6 February 2009 street date.

Empire, you may have guessed, is set against the backdrop of European imperialism and America’s fight for independence, and for those who haven’t been paying attention at the back, there’s a very good reason to keep an eye on it. It will be the first time one of Creative Assembly’s Total War titles has 3D, fully controllable naval combat. Previous incarnations of this aspect have been pits of auto-calculated frustration that the computer normally wins, no matter how many ships you pit against their lonesome galley, so this is quite a big step.

Busy time for Creative Assembly it seems, what with the announcement of the sci-fi flavoured console RTS Stormrise yesterday.

Source: Sega

Sega have announced Stormrise, a new console RTS for PS3 and Xbox 36o, is in development from The Creative Assembly – and it definitely isn’t is a C&C clone.

The hot potato here is something called verticality. The days of lording over the battlefield like some sort of God are apparently behind us, with Stormrise offering something more immersive – a 3D battlefield and a third-person perspective to enjoy it in. At the very least, Sega’s press release promises that we’ll be able to command units in the air, underground and over rooftops as well as on the ground.

Accordingly, there’s going to be a “simple yet effective” new control system, with the key being that you can still run the whole battle while leading a frontline squad. Apparently it will be “tailored specifically for consoles, which allows easy unit selection, rapid navigation and precise deployment.” Wait don’t all RTS titles promise that? Read more…

The steady flow of information about the units in the upcoming RTS, Halo Wars, is slowly beginning. Ensemble Studios have now revealed the Warthog and the Fire Base (above). Read more…

This happy asteroid is on my team now

This game is seriously tripped out when you zoom way in and watch the plants grow. “Is it growing? I think so. I can’t tell. Is it getting bigger? It might be,” and then the little fireworks go off.

The game Dyson, by Alex May, Rudolf Kremers, and Brian Grainger for TIGSource’s Procedural Generation Competition, is a slick and pretty, real-time strategy game about colonizing an asteroid belt. Although your minions look like fruit flies, they are actually tiny mining machines that attack the eggy looking rocks like a pack of winged sperm. Read more…

Towards the end of PC Gamer’s April issue, they teased us with a big lure– potentially being one of the lucky 2,000 to be able to beta test Football Manager! If that’s not exciting enough, how about next month’s cover story? Read more…

Indie developer Silverlode Interactive accosted me outside the press room at GDC to show me their new MMORTS (Massively Multiplayer Online Real-Time Strategy) game, SAGA. The game looks interesting enough, and given the fact that it’s essentially free, it very well may be worth your time. I checked out the beta yesterday, and I have to say that I have no idea what I’m doing. There seemed to be plenty of people who did, however, so maybe I just missed something.

Either way, SAGA has just entered open beta for the public, so you can give the game a shot for yourself. Full press release after you click the link at the end of this sentence… wait for it… okay, now! Read more…

Ken Kutaragi isn’t the only one with sweet dreams of Protoss on PS3

Starcraft 2, a PC sequel nearly ten years in the making, hasn’t been announced for any consoles. But that didn’t stop the wishful thinking of PSU, who hypothesize that the flexible Playstation Network, Bluetooth keyboard/mouse support, and required hard drive make the PS3 the best choice for porting Starcraft 2 to the console side. Read more…

In the upcoming issue of GFW Magazine, Gas Powered games (Dungeon Siege, Supreme Commander) revealed their new IP, Demigod. Interestingly enough, their new outing was in part inspired by a fan-made map for Warcraft III, Defense of the Ancients. Read more…