Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri (1999)

The name Sid Meier should be familiar to any fan of strategy. It's his name attached to the immensely popular Civilization series, as well as many great simulation games across the ages. While Civilization is grounded mostly in history, however, Alpha Centauri lets players take to the stars. In many ways, that's its strongest selling point. Without the constraints of real-life events, Alpha Centauri can tell its own story. There's a heavier focus on narrative here, combined with new, alien environments that introduce new mechanics. Crash landing on a possibly habitable planet, seven factions fight for its control, each with part of the wreckage to aid in its development. Choosing between any of those seven, you'll have to build your population and cultivate the tundra you live on. One of the game's core strengths is its terrain mechanics, your civilization impacting the way it develops, and alien flora hampering that process. It's a menacing, hard battle, sometimes providing a greater fight than your enemies. As a result, Alpha Centauri is one of the only Sid Meier games to have the feeling of a living, breathing planet. You can exterminate alien life or live in harmony with it, protect plants or cut them down. Whatever your choice, there's plenty of fun to be had.