Shadow Empire on Steam - User reviews, Price & Information
Shadow Empire is a deep turn-based 4X wargame with a unique blend of military focus, procedurally generated content and role-playing features.
Shadow Empire is a strategy, simulation and 4x game
developed by VR Designs
and published by Slitherine Ltd..
Released on December 03rd 2020 is available in English only on Windows.
It has received 1,430 reviews of which 1,243 were positive and 187 were negative resulting in a rating of 8.3 out of 10. 😎
The game is currently priced at 38.99€ on Steam.
The Steam community has classified Shadow Empire into these genres:
System requirements
These are the minimum specifications needed to play the game. For the best experience, we recommend that you verify them.
Windows
- Requires a 64-bit processor and operating system
- OS *: Windows Windows 8, Windows 10
- Processor: 1.5 GHZ
- Memory: 2 GB RAM
- Graphics: 8MB video memory, 1280x768 or higher resolution
- DirectX: Version 9.0c
- Storage: 1 GB available space
- Sound Card: DirectX Compatible 9 Sound Card
User reviews & Ratings
Explore reviews from Steam users sharing their experiences and what they love about the game.
This is pretty much the only counter-pusher traditional war-game type game I've actually ever liked, and if you look around a bit, you'll find it's broadly considered to be the best game of it's type to currently exist. It does a pretty good job of telling you what it is right here on the store page, so I don't really need to. I do want to point out that the vast majority of negative reviews essentially state "reading is for dummies and the manual is too big. 0/10 because I couldn't figure anything out". Well yeah. Maybe there is a reason the manual is so large. I will also state I didn't read 90% of the manual and it has not matter one bit after my intitial game or two, across like 300 hours. You can absolutely figure the game out while being a stubborn idiot if you try hard enough. But you should probably just read the manual.
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Starting out this game will frustrate you. No question about it. Part of the problem is there isn't a huge population of players you can ask questions to. A helpful tip is to download the manual pdf file, and import it into something like chatgpt. As you play, ask it about the mechanics you're using. Explore the entire UI, half the struggle is knowing the tools available for you to use. There are also a few youtubers who cover the game. If you're somebody who just cannot read the manual, they will help you understand the core game mechanics. Once you actually take the time to learn the mechanics, it's as complex as you want it to be. Logistics becomes a fun little mini game, and even though this is a war simulator at its core, I find the long stretches of peace and empire management reminded me of games like Civ 4. I really hope this game gets a bigger audience. If you're frustrated with gaming becoming the same thing repackaged with nicer graphics and less features, this game will be a breath of fresh air.
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Unusual and bizarre game, has elements recognisable from traditional 4X games, Paradox titles, Civ and Total war, in a pseudo-scifi space colony future setting ala Rimworld. 8/10 Shadow Empire positions you as the head of state of a neo-industrial space colony after an apocalyptic galactic war that threw all of mankind back to the technology of the early 20th century. Partially though RNG and a bit through choice you can customise which planet you are on, from small planetoids to massive swap-planets with other intelligent aliens. Play is turn-based and the gameplay loop consists of managing the economy, bureaucracy and military of your nation every loop, dealing with factions, setting goals. Political and bureaucratic power is generated and spent as 'PP' and 'BP' points. 'PP' is used to execute 'stratagems', which are actions that effect your nation, zone, an individual unit or leader, as well as changing existing policy. 'BP' is the abstracted way of developing technology and economic/political development. Natural resources include food, water fuel, metals, energy, radioactive and rare earth metals, as well as special resources like high-tech machines and parts. A very interesting part of the game is how the economy and politics works. Unlike in other games, you are restricted by manpower needed to build and then operate buildings. It is not abstracted in any way, if you have 20k manpower then you can only operate within that limit. Additionally your nation has both a public (your state-owned mines, factories, farms) and private economy, (generates tax revenue) you must balance between those. Population growth comes slowly, from villages you acquire through expansion and certain events, so you are quite limited in some cases. This depends on how fractured your nation is (how many zones/states) and how you set up the game. Quite similar to Stellaris, your inner circle of cabinet appointees all come from different factions who can and will be a pain in the backside for political advantage and favours. You also have some internal non-government factions such as a major corporation, your militia, slavers, workers unions, a crime syndicate and a cult. Combat and logistics is very detailed, you can set up a full order-of-battle with independent or multi unit formations (battalion/regiment/division and brigade/corps/army based on size), you can transfer troops and equipment between them as well as set up ad-hoc battle groups with units from different formations. These must be supported by a logistics system that will supply food, fuel, munitions and reinforcements so they can move and fight. I have a few criticisms, first is that the game is the overall lack of polish, the graphics are of course stylised but they aren't really that pleasurable visually. There are numerous spelling and grammatical errors, and I don't think a lot of the tooltips and descriptions are that well thought out. Secondly, the in-game help available is quite limited, which isn't that bad because the people playing this game are pretty savy strategy wise but I'd say it limits who I'd recommend the game to. Overall I'd recommend to anyone who likes 4X games, the paradox suite of titles and colony sims i.e Rimworld.
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Players promised a deep game beneath the thick UI in their reviews, and the game delivered. I had to read the >300 page manual (more than once) and every item in the UI to understand what I was doing, and it was WORTH IT. Gradually this game revealed itself, and I was hooked. First thing you'll see is the planet generation, then the storytelling behind your civilization, then you're dropped into the map with all those UI items you can only slowly figure out... and as you play your first turns you'll then be hit by the detailed (REALLY DETAILED) logistics, all the positional wargame elements that made me feel I was playing a sci-fi version of Panzer General (that I craved), and simultaneously a planetary and societal simulation, complete with a self-driven private economy, that kept the war (and the end thereof) in-context and meaningful. Someone described this game as "Alpha Centauri-ish-ish", they were so right! The game has this faint aura of Alpha Centauri, a little bit of mystery, the meaningful customization of units, the alien planets, the ambitious simulation that goes deeper than any of its contemporary game in certain aspects. I love this game, I'll buy every DLC even if I don't play them. If you give this game your patience, it will reward you with gameplay you won't find anywhere else. Don't be intimidated by the price, remember you have 2 hours to refund, but 30 minutes in I already knew I wouldn't refund... and 5 hours in I knew I done goofed and would be a zombie the next day. I bought it just over a month ago and have already accrued near two hundred hours. This game is JOY. I RECOMMEND IT! :D
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This game is actually so fucking good. Don't be fooled by the appearance; Shadow Empire is so much more than your average complicated yet boring wargame. Obviously it's very complex. There's really no way to learn the game except to sit down with the manual and poke at the UI for a couple of hours until you've figured it out, but the complexity feels different to similar games in a way that's hard to describe. There's loads of stupid little detailed mechanics that are unintuitive and full of ideosyncracies, but the game is constructed such that it's easy to notice problems and learn how to fix them. It's clear that despite the game having an absurd level of simulationist details it is actually designed as a game first and not just for realism. Obviously you'll get past the complexity eventually, which just leaves you with the game. The 4X-ish framework built into a wargame full of detail leaves you with so much room to approach problems and develop your empire/military uniquely to fit the circumstances of the game. Or alternatively, it starts to feel like a proper oldschool grandstrat, full of little management details and satisfying blobbing, free of the RP trappings, event trees and mana of a modern Paradox game. Even the game's stupid amateurish visuals have such a consistent charm to them that gives the game more atmosphere than it has any right to have. Obviously the game is not for everyone, but the group of people it's for is much larger than it might appear looking at screenshots. If you're considering the game enough to read rambling reviews like this one, you should probably just give it a try.
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Last Updates| Steam data | 26 March 2025 08:08 |
|---|---|
| SteamSpy data | 27 March 2025 06:23 |
| Steam price | 03 April 2025 20:49 |
| Steam reviews | 02 April 2025 15:50 |
If you'd like to dive deeper into the details about Shadow Empire, we invite you to check out a few dedicated websites that offer extensive information and insights. These platforms provide valuable data, analysis, and user-generated reports to enhance your understanding of the game and its performance.
- SteamDB - A comprehensive database of everything on Steam about Shadow Empire
- SteamCharts - Analysis of Shadow Empire concurrent players on Steam
- ProtonDB - Crowdsourced reports on Linux and Steam Deck Shadow Empire compatibility
Online players
72
Developer
VR Designs
Publisher
Slitherine Ltd.
Release
03 Dec 2020
Platforms