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[Aerogen]

Hi everybody. So, I was wondering, are there any other games out there that are anything at all like LCS? I mean strategy/tactical/rpg games where you can assembly a bunch guerrilla squads and order them to go about killing people and causing general mayhem in a urban setting.

[Kay12]

One that's somewhat similar in that it's an undercover political activism game is an oldish DOS game called Central Intelligence. You control a small team of CIA agents, and your purpose is to incite the population to overthrow the communist-symphatizer government of Sao Madrigal, a fictional South American island nation. The UI is a pain, though, and thus I never played it that much.

Read more on Abandonia. The review includes a download, but that's technically illegal for most games there, most likely including this one.

[Reelyanoob]

If you don't mind running an emulator there's an old 1980's Amstrad text game called "Holdfast" which is really worth a look, each day you make decisions about the village of "Holdfast", in an attempt to bring down the evil government of "Dictatoria".

You don't have characters like LCS etc, but it's quite challenging to beat it (it's do-able though), you need to balance civil dis-obediance with gaining various levels of support, while not pushing too hard, as the government can decide to arrest everyone. It's not a long game, but it's one where you will definitely have to restart many times in order to ascertain the best strategy.

http://www.cpcgamereviews.com/h/index5.html

Very brief review:

Holdfast
(Kuma, 1984)
There is a border crisis in the land of Dictatoria, and while the country's defence budget has increased dramatically, the village of Holdfast is still waiting for a school and a clinic to be built. The villagers have had enough and the seeds of protest have been sown. In each stage of the campaign, you are required to make decisions which affect both the villagers' and the government's determination, and to win, you have to reduce the government's determination to less than 50%. It's entirely text-based, but boy, is it fun! You'll fail the first few times, but you may well complete the game before too long. Until that happens, you'll probably love it.

If you want it, search for it, or I can email it to you if you can't find it. You'll have to download an Amstrad CPC emulator too.

---

Not many games exactly like you ask for but I'd suggest playing, if you haven't already: X-Com (number 3 is set in a city, have only played 1 and 2 myself though), Covert Action, Syndicate

[Reelyanoob]

Hey I kinda remembered that the game "Holdfast" was originally written in BASIC, aaaaand I've managed to extract the original source code! I might just have the time to port this to run native in Linux and Windows. Re-written in C of course.

[Kay12]

Hey I kinda remembered that the game "Holdfast" was originally written in BASIC, aaaaand I've managed to extract the original source code! I might just have the time to port this to run native in Linux and Windows. Re-written in C of course.

Release the new source under the GPL and we've got a nice sister project for LCS

[Carlos Gustavos]

Xcom Apocalypse has the strategy/tactical/rpg with squads fighting in an urban setting. You're not supposed to kill people (aliens are the enemy) and cause general mayhem, but the game allows you to do so.

[Kay12]

I just ran a Google search on "terrorism simulation". No interesting hits, most were counterterrorism.

Also, I think I just got my name on a couple more secret police watchlists!

[gimlet]

SORT of along those lines is
- Solidarnosc 1991 game by California Dreams
- Republic the Revolution -  rpg/strategy game with super-ambitious design that got scaled back into something that didn't quite fit together, but still had a lot of interesting ideas.

[Servant Corps]

- Republic the Revolution -  rpg/strategy game with super-ambitious design that got scaled back into something that didn't quite fit together, but still had a lot of interesting ideas.

Go ahead and read this LP, so you don't have to play the game yourself.

[Starver]

Less mayhem, but definitely strategic, Republic: The Revolution might hit the spot.

Going back a bit, with more mayhem possible, there's.... <Starver pauses writing post for almost one full hour while waiting for his vague memory for names to catch up with his vivid memory for the imagery>   Syndicate!   (Phew, that took some mental back-index searching.)


Oh, and I must have missed that Gimlet (and, now Servant Corps...) had already mentioned RtR, even though that post must have been the last one there when I started this post.  Sorry.  Was already trying to get the name of the other, so probably distracted...

[Reelyanoob]

Republic: Revolution is pretty fun, but not much action, seconding this game.

@Starver: I already mentioned Syndicate (briefly) you should've 'mentally' read this thread for a reminder *boom-tish*

Gangsters: Organized Crime is sort of similar to Republic and LCS too:

The hoods have many different attributes such as intelligence, fists, knives, etc. which make them suitable for different missions. A hood with high knife skill and low fists skill may inadvertently kill someone he was merely sent to beat up, for instance. Hoods can be promoted to lieutenant, which gives them the ability to lead teams of hoods. It is also possible to hire a lawyer and an accountant. There are different automobiles and weapons that can be purchased to aid in carrying out missions.

---

Another one:


Just Cause is a nice "overthrow the government" game wit a huge world, but done more GTA III style

[Servant Corps]

I have a copy of "A Force More Powerful", which is essentially a "non-violent regime change" simulator. It's supposed to "train" people into becoming nonviolent revolutionaries, and some of the funding of this game comes from the United States. In this game, violence is bad, bad, bad, because you're not skilled enough to do it properly, and the government will use any excuse they can get to suppress your cause...so a major part of the game is trying to disciplined your movement and prevent them from going out of control and wrecking stuff. The premise of the might be interesting, but I never really got the hang of the gameplay.

(One thing I do like though is the details. Despots can either be pragmatic people willing to compromise, or crazy kleptocrats. People may be more willing to join your cause because you compromised on your political platform. You can determine how your group make decisions: you can have your movement be autocratic, meaning you conduct actions faster, or you can have it be consensus-democratic, meaning that your group is more motivated to do what you tell them to do. Etc. But since I never actually played the game fully, I can't really comment if those details really matter or not.)

The game is no longer being sold, but since abandonware is still illegal, it's probably not a good idea for me to upload it. You could probably find a copy of this game floating on the Internet somewhere. The sequel, People Power, exist if you want to purchase it.

[Kay12]

Oh yeah, then there's Mastermind: World Conqueror (Play at XGen studios). You're a supervillain, and you must conquer (or destroy? whatever) the world. It features general mayhem and balancing between non-stop terrorism, defence and fundraising.

The game also inspired (or was inspired by? similar nonetheless) a commercial game called Evil Genius.

[Reelyanoob]

Evil Genius was by the Dungeon Keeper guy btw (who also created the Populous, Black & White and Fable series), Peter Molyneux.

So, he already had the "dig a base, play the bad guy" theme in Dungeon Keeper. Evil Genius just sets it in a James Bond type universe rather than D&D type universe. It was probably just the most obvious logical way to make a "modern" Dungeon Keeper.

[KaelGotDwarves]

Also, Syndicate.

No mention of this amazing old game? pssssf.

Think cyberpunk cyborg terrorists in dystopian capitalism land.