It's been a good while since anyone has attempted a 4X space title. The exploration, expansion, exploitation, and extermination in a space empire were remembered best in Homeworld 2, back in 2003. It's been a long time since then, and with only a few mediocre space 4X strategy games to subsist off of, Legends of Pegasus is Kalypso's venture into this sub-genre of strategy games.  

Given a huge sprawling map of a solar system, players will be orbiting around planets in turn-based fashion, terraforming land, building mines, crop fields, and resource-building all while keeping their military power strong and protecting what colonies they've amassed. Legends of the Pegasus can be played in two single-player modes (campaign or skirmish / free play) and multiplayer. While there is an aim to get up to eight players a time in the multiplayer, nothing has been absolutely confirmed. Gamers will be able to choose three races: humans or two alien races: X'or or Arthrox. Each race has a general set of basic skills relating to the sort of fictional evolution the species has had within the world of Pegasus. Humans are more of the exploratory colonists type, while X'or and Arthrox are more aggressive species with special skills leaning to these types of play.

Most interesting, however, is the fleet-building and battle engine. Each ship is fully customizable; gamers will be able to place weapons and armor and other equipment during the modding phase and then watch their fully customizable ship launch with all the additions fully rendered on the models. Captains of the ships chatter in lively and personable fashion during battle, keeping you involved in battle updates and hearing how each battle is actually playing out. Even better, ships and captains that survive battles will level up while learning new abilities for each battle.

Although battles play out in real-time, there is also the ability to change them to run automatically, so the die-hard strategy resource manager type of gamer has very little to deal with on the RTS end of things, if they so choose. A strong tutorial mode will take players deep into complex gameplay elements, and a simple "drag-and-drop" interface makes Legends of the Pegasus' gameplay move efficiently. 

As you repopulate the universe with your race by garnering resources, building civilizations, and gaining military strength, any sci-fi fan will be lost in the immersive universe of Pegasus. With fully 3D battles, universe maps, and detailed planets which will shape and grow as they go through the terraforming stages to colonization, the ambience is spot-on. There is plenty of content, as research trees are quite massive and like any 4X strategy game, Legends of Pegasus will suck hours away at your life, consuming your sleep time as you struggle for dominance in the galaxy.

Three types of outcomes are highlighted in LoP: diplomacy (gaining political power and alliances across the board), complete economic control of the galaxy, and then, of course, pure and utter destruction and conquest. With a heavy focus on these three outcomes, gamers will have plenty of ways to strategize their eventual galaxy takeover. 

Whether you're a sci-fi fan or a gamer obsessed with research management, Legends of Pegasus seems to be shaping up as a game that will appeal to both those new to the genre willing to learn and those experienced gamers who have been playing these type of games since Master of Orion.

[View Legends of Pegasus images / screenshots +]
[Watch Legends of Pegasus videos / trailers +]
[View more Legends of Pegasus articles (news, previews, reviews) +]
[View Legends of Pegasus cheats / guides +]

User Comments (0)