Cyborgwars

Cyborgwars is a strategic game in which four warring cybernetic empires each call upon a human leader to take control and become the supreme leader. This game is the managing an economy, resource allocated type. The resources, in this case, are the robots themselves.

The empires are based on a hierarchy of robots: breeders, farmers, workers, and, at the bottom, soldiers. Each robot type may be freely converted to a lower type (for example, a breeder to a farmer), but not the reverse.

The breeders manufacture more breeders; farmers raise crops for rations; workers make armaments; and soldiers defend the realm (or attack other realms). Food production depends on the number of farmers and acreage of land held. Random disasters can damage crops, stored rations, and weapons. Spies may be dispatched to, perhaps, learn the strategic situation in the other empires.

The program is loaded in two parts to allow selection of a secret password for each human player. Each player is required to enter the password at each turn. The program is all text output with no graphic displays. Several copies of a form for recording strategic data are provided.

The senior author played the solitaire version with the computer playing the other three opponents. It takes careful planning and some luck to win. The computer does not cheat, but, after you get thoroughly stomped the first few times, you get the feeling that there is a conspiracy by the computer controlled players to attack only you. This could easily lead to paranoia.

The junior author play-tested the game with several friends who are all experienced fantasy role-playing gamers (i.e., D & D’ers under age 15). They are used to cooperating in game play, unlike the usual winner-take-all demands of most games, Cyborgwars allows the game to end amicably with the largest regime being the “winner” if a sufficient number of turns has passed with no military action occurring.

We consider this a good strategic game. It does not depend upon reaction time or hand-eye coordination. Although it takes a long time to play, it is fun.