Remember waiting for the results?

You filled out your turn sheet, dropped it off at the game shop (or hit send), and then waited. Days of it. Wondering whether your grand plan would work, whether your ally would keep his word, whether the neighbours had spotted the army on their border. Then the results came, and you tore them open. That was the magic of the old play-by-mail and play-by-email (PBEM) games.

Struggle of Empires brings that feeling back as a nation-building strategy video game for today. Every player writes their orders. Then the turn runs for everyone at once: harvests come in, plague creeps along the trade roads, envoys whisper, and armies collide. And then your realm's own newspaper lands, with what you won, what you lost, and what everyone else has been up to.

From tribe to empire

You start with a handful of villages and a name. Where you end up is up to you.

Grow

Turn a handful of villages into a realm of dozens of provinces, each with its own people, faith, wealth and grudges.

Discover

Find your way through the ages, from the first ploughed fields to railways, or to the philosophers' schools.

III

March

Move armies and fleets across a living map, and read the full report of every battle, won or lost.

Rule

Answer your estates' petitions, name your heirs, ride out plague, famine and revolt, and raise great works that outlast you.

Scheme

Write letters, sign treaties, trade, spy and betray. The other rulers are real people: your best friend in spring may be marching on your capital by autumn.

Explore

Send expeditions into the dangerous corners of the world and see who comes back.

Three worlds to rule

Fantasy

Eight peoples, from humans and dwarves to orcs and the riftborn. Magic and arcane schools, rifts and dungeons, heroes and legends.

Brass Century

1750 to 1870: the Age of Reason to steam, railways, iron and the telegraph. Tick A-historical and the ages turn strange: Tesla coils, power grids and anti-gravity Aethercraft.

Real World

From 5000 BCE through the Stone, Bronze and Iron Ages to the Classical world, with real peoples and historic faiths. More ages are coming.

Play your way

The classic way: turn-based strategy with deadlines, and a turn a day or a turn a week. All the anticipation, none of the postage.

At your own pace: asynchronous multiplayer, so everyone sends orders when it suits them; or run the turn the moment everyone is ready, or play in real time.

Your table: play alone against computer realms, with friends, or with strangers on servers all over the world.

Going on holiday? A caretaker runs your realm until you're back.

Anywhere: in the game client or any web browser.

Be the Game Master

Every great play-by-mail game had a Game Master: the hero who typed up the results at midnight. Here the game does the paperwork, so a GM is optional. But if you've always wanted to run your own game, now you can.

Host on your own PC, or run an always-on server, and share it online without touching your router.

Rule from on high with the GM console: grant, adjust, pause and announce.

Rewrite the rules in the content editor: units, buildings, discoveries, peoples, faiths and events.

Paint your own worlds in the World Forge, then share your rulesets as packages.

Early Access

Struggle of Empires is in Early Access and updated often, every release with full notes. The core game is here and playable today; the rest of the Real World ages, new worlds and plenty of polish are on the way. Come and help shape it.

Join a gameComing soon to Steam

To my father-in-law, Cleve, who introduced me to the world of PBEMs and tactical war games!

This is what I'm trying to bring to you all: the forgotten thrill, the devastating defeats, the nostalgia of bygone days.

The play-by-email strategy game of empires