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[Xvareon]

A friend of mine and I are looking for some kind of multiplayer game we can both play together on Windows, but we're coming up dry because of some complicating factors:

1) I have HughesNet satellite internet, which is laggy and has long delay times when playing a game, so I can't really do anything too fast, like shooters or RTS games (strategy games on the Spring engine like Zero-K seem to be an exception, for some reason; I can run them just fine. Or I could, until a weird error started freezing my game and kicking me out after 6 minutes each time).
2) My friend only has a 2.30ghz dual-core processor and about 3 gigs of RAM. Kinda weak when it comes to running any big games these days. By comparison, I have a 2.00ghz quad-core processor and 5 gigs of RAM.

So if anyone can think of any good turn-based game, or one that doesn't require really high reflexes and a fast broadband internet on my part (shooter games are right out), we would greatly appreciate any suggestions! Oh, and it should be immediately accessible, too; as in, readily downloadable from the internet, or playable as a flash game. Though if it's good enough, we might consider ordering it online and waiting for delivery if we like what we see.

(We've already tried Battle for Wesnoth, by the way. It didn't really work for me; not exciting enough.)

[Starver]

Something like Stars!, perhaps?

Play-By-Email mode can be run with an arbitrarily long latency.

Not sure about ease of download/availability, and I don't even know where my own box of it (bought in the '90s) even is, which would also include the two licence keys (i.e. for 'you and a friend'), but I mention it because it ticks a lot of your boxes and either you can find a current online-available version of it or something inspired by it/in the same vein, to suitably tickle your fancy.

[Cheeetar]

If you're okay with play by email stuff, you could try out Solium Infernum. There's a very neat gameplay diary here.

[sprinkled chariot]

Try dominions 4

[TheDarkStar]

Toribash would work well.

[Draxis]

THANCS is a good play-by-web game, where you design and build ships on a tactical map.  It's not that populated, but there's a game going on right now, so I'm sure you could find one.  It's free.

Seconding Stars! - it's a 4x game from 1995, with everything that implies, but it's old enough to still be deep and pretty intuitive.  You can download the older shareware versions form various places on the internet, and the newest version from the "Get Stars!" wiki page for a few dollars per person.

Freeciv and Freeorion are both also good for that, open-source clones of Civilization 2/3 and Masters of Orion, respectively.

[scrdest]

Battle for Wesnoth? Lightweight, free, runs on ALL THE SYSTEMS!, TBS with RPG elements (units level up). Fun, too.

[Arx]

Battle for Wesnoth? Lightweight, free, runs on ALL THE SYSTEMS!, TBS with RPG elements (units level up). Fun, too.

(We've already tried Battle for Wesnoth, by the way. It didn't really work for me; not exciting enough.)

You might want to cross-post this to the Recommend a Game thread in OG as well. There's a different crowd around there, in general, and you might get a few other suggestions.

[Xvareon]

If you're okay with play by email stuff, you could try out Solium Infernum. There's a very neat gameplay diary here.

I had a LOT of fun reading that gameplay diary. Thanks a ton! The idea of the legions of hell fighting over the throne of the underworld after the big bad leaves/dies is a novel one, at least to me, and I can see a lot of potential in something like that. It's hard for me to decide if I'd have more fun reading the diaries or playing the actual game, though; it does cost about $20, last I looked.

THANCS is a good play-by-web game, where you design and build ships on a tactical map.  It's not that populated, but there's a game going on right now, so I'm sure you could find one.  It's free.

Seconding Stars! - it's a 4x game from 1995, with everything that implies, but it's old enough to still be deep and pretty intuitive.  You can download the older shareware versions form various places on the internet, and the newest version from the "Get Stars!" wiki page for a few dollars per person.

Freeciv and Freeorion are both also good for that, open-source clones of Civilization 2/3 and Masters of Orion, respectively.

THANCS looks pretty sweet, actually. I haven't seen an honest ship-designing turn-based space combat game since Master of Orion, and that was just a "put X guns on X pre-set chassis" deal. I'm gonna try and download this game and get it running, and try my hand at it. Thanks a bunch!

You might want to cross-post this to the Recommend a Game thread in OG as well. There's a different crowd around there, in general, and you might get a few other suggestions.

Solid idea. Thanks! I'll give that a shot, too.

[Starver]

THANCS intrigues me.  Pity I can't get it to do anything with THANCS-perlgui.exe except get it to tell me that it's not a valid 32-bit application...

(Ironically, I use Perl natively a lot, on this machine.  Let's look at the source...  I'll need the OpenGL.pm module to run this, at least, it seems...  Then I'll Perl2Exe it myself.)

[Sergarr]

As usual, I recommend Heroes of Might and Magic series. 3rd and 4th one are especially good, so you might want to take a look at them first.

[Gigaz]

A friend of mine and I are looking for some kind of multiplayer game we can both play together on Windows, but we're coming up dry because of some complicating factors:

1) I have HughesNet satellite internet, which is laggy and has long delay times when playing a game, so I can't really do anything too fast, like shooters or RTS games (strategy games on the Spring engine like Zero-K seem to be an exception, for some reason; I can run them just fine. Or I could, until a weird error started freezing my game and kicking me out after 6 minutes each time).
2) My friend only has a 2.30ghz dual-core processor and about 3 gigs of RAM. Kinda weak when it comes to running any big games these days. By comparison, I have a 2.00ghz quad-core processor and 5 gigs of RAM.

So if anyone can think of any good turn-based game, or one that doesn't require really high reflexes and a fast broadband internet on my part (shooter games are right out), we would greatly appreciate any suggestions! Oh, and it should be immediately accessible, too; as in, readily downloadable from the internet, or playable as a flash game. Though if it's good enough, we might consider ordering it online and waiting for delivery if we like what we see.

(We've already tried Battle for Wesnoth, by the way. It didn't really work for me; not exciting enough.)

I suggest Civilization V. It supports at least two kinds of multiplayer where players make their turns one after the other both of which are relatively stable (Bugs occur but can usually be resolved by asking the community). The game is easily old enough for your friends hardware. It requires Steam and is then also downloadable (But of corse not freeware)

[scrdest]

As usual, I recommend Heroes of Might and Magic series. 3rd and 4th one are especially good, so you might want to take a look at them first.

Seconding. I've actually played a game of 7-players+AI hotseat FFA on a random map in HoMM 3 two weeks ago-ish, great fun.

[Flying Dice]

Here's another voice in support of Stars!

If you want something a bit more modernized and simplified, Neptune's Pride is a game in the same vein, except heavily simplified and browser-based, with build timers and fleet travel time measuring from hours to days.

[Literal]

I have a good time with some friends playing a play-by-web version of the Gameboy Advance game Advance Wars. Has a small but nice community, you can make your own maps, you'll have no trouble running it. Might not be your thing, but here's a link if you want to check it out.

http://awbw.amarriner.com/