Millennia: Altered Destinies

Millennia: Altered Destinies

Box art
Developer(s) Take 2 Interactive
Publisher(s) Take 2 Interactive
Platform(s) DOS
Release date(s) 1995
Genre(s) Strategy
Mode(s) Single-player

Millennia: Altered Destinies is a PC game created by Take 2 Interactive in 1995. It casts the player as a human freighter captain who finds himself transported to an alien ship. There, an alien calling himself a Hood gives the player a mission to save the Echelon galaxy which is about to be taken over by a malevolent race called the Microids. Apparently, the Milky Way is next should the player fail.

The only way to stop the Microids is to travel back 10,000 years in a specially-designed ship called XTM. It is equipped with everything the player will need to complete the mission. The player must then populate the Echelon galaxy with four indigenous races and ensure their development into powerful spacefaring civilizations.

The Hoods also state that this is not the first time they have tried to interfere with the timeline. To succeed, the player will have to fight off the previous attempts by the Hoods to alter the course of history.

Gameplay

The Microids are too powerful for the player to deal with directly. The only way is to pick four planets in the galaxy and colonise them with the four races the player is given. The player is given four "seeds" - morphs genetically engineered by the Hoods to guide the races and communicate with the player. Without a seed, the player cannot affect the target civilization. Each race (Reptoids, Slothoids, Entomons, and Piscines) get one seed. Their lifespan is at least 10,000 years old. The seeds will generally cooperate with the player, but are loyal to their respective races and aware that the player is not a god, so will not always. The player must guide the four races through various crises that would either destroy them or cause them to stagnate, so that they will eventually develop space travel and weapons able to defeat the Microids.

XTM is a completely self-sufficient craft equipped with an extensive historical database spanning 10,000 years which the player must use to "look ahead" on the consequences of temporal changes. The time periods are split up into centuries. Every time a "temporal storm" occurs (i.e. an event has been changed), the database is updated. XTM is not defenseless, it is equipped with a powerful energy cannon capable of fighting off entire fleets, and can be upgraded with technology provided by the four races once the player has shepherded them to a high enough technology level. While the player can lose in space combat, the ship's computer ANGUS will emergency jump to the safe haven of the planet Axis if XTM sustains too much damage, so the player will never be destroyed. ANGUS is also capable of translating the four races' languages into English and vice versa. Travelling through space and time and space combat require enormous amounts of energy, and the player must frequently refuel by sling shotting around gas giants.

Affecting History

There are 4 basic ways to alter history in Millennia:

One of the benefits of having a time machine is that if the player fails to change history, or makes it worse, he can usually return to the same time period and try again.

Goals

While these goals are not specified in the game, they are important stepping stones on the way to victory.

Victory

There are two requirements to achieve victory in Millennia.

Characters

Enemies

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the 3/22/2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.