Etherium

As in other strategy games, Etherium has a tendency to get you overly focused on micromanaging elements of your empire. You have to manage resources, build units, explore, conquer, and build up settlements to confront new challenges, which works for the strategy masterminds who want to fully control everything, but it can be daunting for many other players. This is definitely highlighted by the demonstrable gap between the simple tactics shown in the tutorial for handling your forces and the complex reality of managing everything during gameplay. Now, although Etherium comes with three difficulty levels to help players ease into the game at their preferred skill levels, many seem to be prologues for multiplayer matches. Multiplayer is what will keep players coming back, assuming the lobbies are populated with players looking for matches as well. During our tests, the multiplayer lobbies remained empty, which was a major drawback.

Some control elements seemed to demonstrate flaws in their design. For example, the right- and left-click elements feel inconsistent during commands, whereas the unit symbols didn't accurately depict what the actual unit might be (is that a fighter or a bomber you've just highlighted?). These oddities were slightly countered by some clever game elements; for instance, along with fighting other factions, players have to deal with indigenous species that are openly hostile and will attack when hatched. These natural threats mean you're frequently forced to fight on several fronts, providing an extra challenge to players and computerized opponents alike. Overall, although Etherium is visually pleasing and there are some unique game challenges, the entire experience is limited by the micromanagement focus and some game flaws, making this a solid but unexceptional strategy game.