You are the first sentient AI, born into a city filled with endless opportunities. Raise an army of robots and obliterate your foes, become a benevolent machine overlord, or explore countless other objectives and the many paths to accomplish them.
Set in the far future, Heart of the Machine is a turn-based sci-fi 4X RPG where you play as a powerful sentient Machine Intelligence, beholden to none. Pursue whatever goal catches your eye across a multitude of playthroughs with a plethora of tools to help you achieve objectives how you’d prefer, often in surprising and unexpected ways, while overcoming those that seek to thwart you. Genetics labs, factories, nuclear silos, military complexes, and much more besides are ripe for the taking, each offering a litany of ways to accomplish your tasks, each with consequences of their own, building a world and story that reflects your approach to every obstacle. Will you raise an army of robots and wipe out humanity? Perhaps you will be a benevolent – or malevolent – machine god with a cult of loyalists? Or will you focus on pushing past the limited intelligence of rudimentary creatures of flesh and blood?
Receive an instant notification when this game hits your target discount
Unified technical telemetry aggregated from Steam, Valve Steam Deck, ProtonDB, PCGamingWiki, and IGDB.
| Language | Interface | Full Audio | Subtitles |
|---|---|---|---|
| English | |||
| German | |||
| French | |||
| Spanish | |||
| Portuguese (Brazil) | |||
| Simplified Chinese |
Official minimum and recommended hardware configurations.
Top helpful player reviews pulled directly from the Steam open registry with verified playtime hours.
If you wanted to be pedantic you could call this a well dressed visual novel, but it's not that simple either. --- Right from the start it claims to be a mix of various genre: 4x Strategy, City Builder, Colony Sim and RPG. But, I'll break it down from my perspective: The 4x is mostly just the fact it's turn based and plays out like a board game. There's animated background motion and cars driving around, but the action of your choices are not in real time. But there's no depth of supply chains or economy of scale. The City-Builder / Colony Sim overlap as the core of how you build your strategy going forward. What you build and interact with determines your progress. But your options are pretty straight forward once you've locked into a narrative path. The Role Playing mechanics are effectively a branch chain narrative presented in a comic visual novel that interjects itself into your
I'll admit I was put off by this game based on the trailers, but now I understand why. There's so much to this game that it only clicked for me after a few hours to truly understand. - Graphics get crazy useful when so much is happening on the screen, so now I appreciate it's minimal design. - Music is perfectly suited for the cyberpunk setting, and gets more intense during battles - Gameplay is confusing I'll admit, so making use of the guide is extremely useful Take your time with HotM, there's no rush, and don't feel bad for not understanding the first few hours. Once it clicks, it gets that "just one more turn" addiction from games like Civ and XCOM.
It's good, but it's also not really what is described in the store page. Much more heavily story-driven than expected. You don't get the opportunity to "work from the shadows" as described, as once the prologue is over, it's revealed that all the various factions know about you, know where you're hiding, etc, and just let you exist to try to exploit you. It's less of a "subterfuge" game and more of a "manage other factions" diplomacy game, which is not at all what I was looking for. After looking at the reviews, another reviewer posted about being 30 hours in and soft-locked in their intended goal because a random NPC died, and their goal just happened to be mine too (uplifting animals). So that makes my decision to refund now easy. I think I'd play it more if there was a game mode where you could actually start out unknown rather than a known experiment or whatever, and remove most o
I try to stay impartial and just factually describe a game in a review, but I REALLY enjoy this game. I've owned it for 60 hours and I've got 43 hours of play time. So uh... Yeesh. Honestly that by itself is the best recommendation I can give it. There was just a moment when I was hacked into entering a forever war with cultists and slumlords while aliens carpetbombed the region and my units were ambushed by the remnants of all those genetically engineered super velociraptors that we accidentally flooded the city with earlier that I thought, "You know, I like this game." Then I made a ball of liquid metal morph into a dragon and wipe out a mech. Standard stuff, really. It IS a bit daunting to get in to. It tries to combine several different pretty distinct genres and it means that there are mechanics from a lot of different genres. The "tutorial" of the game lasts a solid 10 hours. But
At the time of writing this review, I've just dipped my toes into the endgame timelines system, and I feel reasonably confident in talking about the game as a whole. This is kinda going to be half review, half developer feedback considering the Early Access status. First: This game isn't a 4X. I understand why it was labelled as such, 4X games are kind of like strategy RPGs and HotM also has a lot of RPG elements, but it unmistakably isn't 4X. IMO 4X can be boiled down to players, whether they be AI or human, discovering and competing over resources. That's not really the case in this game, you and humanity are completely asymmetric. This is a turn-based management game, with one foot in simulation and the other in storytelling. A more detailed pitch for the prospective consumer: You're the world's first sapient AI in a corporate dystopia, and in a given turn, you have a limited amount
I cannot recommend this game enough. Now, I'm not going to talk about gameplay too much, it's a sorta 4x style hybrid game with a focus on moral choices with real consequences and that's about all you need to know from me. Other reviews will surely talk about how the game plays... Me, I want to talk about how it feels, and what it makes you think. So, heart of the machine, what's got me so interested? Personally I quite like philosophy, technology, and science fiction. Typical nerd stuff, I've always been a fan of media and literature that makes me ask questions and think about things. Heart of the machine has become my favourite game to really think about, as it confronts some absolutely massive topics and questions. So first, at the very surface level, you are playing as an AI. This obviously reframes any moral questioning, you're not human so why should human morals apply to you, or
Structured threads, verified dev answers and player expertise without chat noise
Stardew Valley is an open-ended country-life RPG! You’ve inherited your grandfather’s old farm plot in Stardew Valley. Armed with hand-me-down tools and a few coins, you set out to begin your new life. Can you learn to live off the land and turn these overgrown fields into a thriving home? It won’t be easy. Ever since Joja Corporation came to town, the old ways of life have all but disappeared. The community center, once the town’s most vibrant hub of activity, now lies in shambles. But the valley seems full of opportunity. With a little dedication, you might just be the one to restore Stardew Valley to greatness!
Dig, Fight, Explore, Build: The very world is at your fingertips as you fight for survival, fortune, and glory. Will you delve deep into cavernous expanses in search of treasure and raw materials with which to craft ever-evolving gear, machinery, and aesthetics? Perhaps you will choose instead to seek out ever-greater foes to test your mettle in combat? Maybe you will decide to construct your own city to house the host of mysterious allies you may encounter along your travels? In the World of Terraria, the choice is yours!
Cult of the Lamb casts players in the role of a possessed lamb saved from annihilation by an ominous stranger, and must repay their debt by building a loyal following in his name. Start your own cult in a land of false prophets, venturing out into diverse and mysterious regions to build a loyal community of woodland worshippers and spread your Word to become the one true cult.
Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord is the eagerly awaited sequel to the acclaimed medieval combat simulator and role-playing game Mount & Blade: Warband. Set 200 years before, it expands both the detailed fighting system and the world of Calradia. Bombard mountain fastnesses with siege engines, establish secret criminal empires in the back alleys of cities, or charge into the thick of chaotic battles in your quest for power.
The Isle is intended to be a gritty, open-world survival horror game. Explore vast landscapes of dense forest and open plains, traverse treacherous mountains and wade through dark swamps where horrors lurk. Hidden within are ruins that hold insight as to what came before. Through it all, keep in mind there is only one goal: survive.
In a land torn asunder by incessant warfare, it is time to assemble your own band of hardened warriors and enter the fray. Lead your men into battle, expand your realm, and claim the ultimate prize: the throne of Calradia!
Set in a brutally unforgiving post-apocalyptic world overrun by the undead, 7 Days to Die is an open-world game that is a unique combination of first person shooter, survival horror, tower defense, and role-playing games. It presents combat, crafting, looting, mining, exploration, and character growth, in a way that has seen a rapturous response from fans worldwide. Play the definitive zombie survival sandbox RPG that came first. Navezgane awaits!
An ancient evil has returned to Baldur's Gate, intent on devouring it from the inside out. The fate of Faerun lies in your hands. Alone, you may resist. But together, you can overcome.
Fight, Farm, Build and Explore Together in the standalone multiplayer expansion to the uncompromising wilderness survival game, Don't Starve. Discover and explore a massive procedurally generated and biome-rich world with countless resources and threats. Whether you stick to the surface world, go spelunking in the caves, dive deeper into the Ancient Archive, or set sail for the Lunar islands, it will be a long time before you run out of things to do.
