The recent history of real-time strategy has been more dark age than golden era, but there have been a few bright spots over the last decade. One of those is Northgard, a Viking-themed RTS that was released in 2018. Built on traditional strategy foundations, Northgard added novel ideas like game-altering weather systems and a region-based expansion system.
The result is one of the best strategy games of the last decade. “While the inspiration is clear, it would be a disservice to imply that it’s mainly trading in nostalgia,” Fraser Brown wrote in his Northgard review, awarding it a score of 84%. “This Viking saga builds on the history-themed RTS romps of the ’90s, but it’s not beholden to them.”
Chiefly, the Definitive Edition combines the base game with the Cross of Vidar expansion, which introduces a new campaign where you must guide your Viking Clan through new lands in a post Ragnarök world. On top of this, the Definitive Edition includes three DLC clans to play as. These are the guerilla specialists The Clan of the Snake, the brutal warlords The Clan of the Dragon, who use slavery and human sacrifice to control a population of rebellious thralls, and The Clan of the Horse, which revolves heavily around its two warchiefs, Brok and Eitria.
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As for new stuff, the Definitive Edition primarily introduces a new Valhalla-themed biome for your Vikings to colonise. But it also rolls out several existing biomes previously exclusive to Northgard’s Bifröst mode (a wave-based conquest mode that takes place across multiple realms) across other game modes. Finally, it reworks the game’s shop and adds a digital artbook and art gallery.
The expansions and extras included in the Definitive Edition will be folded into Northgard as a free update to existing players. For those who don’t own Northgard and are considering a purchase, Shiro Games is currently offering the Definitive Edition at a 60% discount, bringing the price down from the new RRP of $35 (£29.50) to $14 (£11.80). The discount ends on December 18.
Northgard isn’t the only RTS to receive a major update this week. On Tuesday, Command & Conquer successor Tempest Rising added game-changing superweapons to every faction in the game. That includes the newly playable Veti faction, which developer Slipgate Ironworks is testing in a public beta for the next two weeks.
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