Darwinia (PC) - Let's Play 1001 Games - Episode 730
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I'm Gaming Jay: Youtube gamer, let's player, fan of retro games, and determined optimist... Join me in this series while I try out EACH of the video games in the book 1001 VIDEO GAMES YOU MUST PLAY BEFORE YOU DIE, before I die. The game review for each game will focus on the question of whether you MUST play this game before you die. But to be honest, the game review parts are just for fun, and are not meant to be definitive, in depth reviews; this series is more about the YouTube gamer journey itself. From Mario games to the Halo series, from arcade games to Commodore 64, PC games to the NES and Sega Genesis, Playstation to the Xbox, let's play those classic retro games that we grew up with, have fond memories of, or heard of but never got a chance to try! And with that said, the game review for today is...
Darwinia
from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darwinia_(video_game)
Darwinia is a 2005 real-time tactics and real-time strategy video game for Microsoft Windows, Mac OS X and Linux. It is the second game developed by Introversion Software, and is set within a computer environment that simulates artificial intelligence. It received favourable reviews and won three awards at the 2006 Independent Games Festival. A multiplayer sequel, Multiwinia, was released for Windows in 2008. Darwinia and Multiwinia were released together as Darwinia+ for the Xbox 360 in 2010.
Darwinia was inspired by the theme of the first Indie Game Jam, where a group of programmers experimented with generating tens of thousands of sprites on screen at once. Introversion began prototyping a war game with more units on screen than had ever been done at that point. After months of iteration and development, this coalesced into the gameplay for Darwinia.[3]
The initial beta testing of Darwinia began on 27 August 2004, and the beta testing of the full game started on 26 November, the same year. A demo level of Darwinia was released 3 months later on 21 January, and can be downloaded from the Darwinia website. Darwinia was released in Europe on 4 March 2005 (the U.S. version followed on 12 June 2006), while the Macintosh version was released 30 March 2005 by publisher Ambrosia Software. A patch was released on 28 April 2005 for Microsoft Windows, bringing the version to 1.2. New features included an improved unit selection system, as well as numerous modding updates including the ability to create custom strings. Another patch (version 1.3) was released in September 2005, which includes the option (enabled by default) of clicking icons or using keyboard shortcuts to create units instead of using the gesture system. A new demo, using features of the above-mentioned version 1.3 patch and an entirely new level "Launchpad" not in the full game, was released in September 2005.
Darwinia was released on Steam on 14 December 2005.[1] This helped solve some of Introversion's distribution problems, and allowed for localized versions to be developed; a German translation was included with the Steam release.[4] A new patch was released on 10 March 2006 bringing the version up to 1.42 and adding difficulty settings ranging from 1 to 10. Higher difficulties increase the number, speed, and health of monsters. It also increases the speed of the player's own units.[5] eGames-owned Cinemaware on 4 April 2006 issued a press release announcing they would bring Darwinia to US markets in June 2006. Beta testing signups for version 1.5.x started on 15 December 2006.[6] A Windows Vista exclusive version of Darwinia with extra eye candy and 3 additional levels was released on 31 January 2007. Version 1.5.1.1 patch released on 18 June 2007, providing support for DirectX 9c, including extra eye candy and the "Launchpad" level.
In 2010 in context of a Bundle sale the source code of the game was made available for purchase under a non-open-source license.[7]
On April 18th, 2022, the remastered version of Darwinia was released via an update for Steam and GOG releases to celebrate its "10000th anniversary".[8] The remaster includes updated graphics, numerous bugfixes, support of surround sound up to 7.1 and the Steam integration, native support of Steam Deck included.