You can get food by building a mill and telling some peasant folk to start farming or by building some fishing boats. Wood and stone are used for building the various structures your town will need, iron and coal keep your military units in ammo, gold is useful for just about everything and food stops your people from starving to death - handy that. Obviously, to do this you need to gather resources.

Your objectives vary from mission to mission, but usually go something along the lines of build a base, establish a decent economy and kick foreign ass. You are an esteemed military commander from whatever European power the campaign features.

Fortunately (for me), Cossacks is an example of the latter type of historical strategy. Granted, neither of these games are anything like the relatively fast-paced rompings of the likes of Red Alert or Ground Control, but they are significantly less banal. Mention the words 'historical strategy' to many people and if they don't get away in time to 'stop their granny eating the cat' or some such excuse, they'll fall asleep faster than if you placed a chloroform-soaked rag over their mouth it's a weapon so effective it could be used to stop advancing armies.īut it's also a phrase that's often misleading because while it can conjure up images of the anorak-wearing population spending day after day calculating action points and firing modes, it also covers the likes of the fiendishly addictive Age of Empires and the Settlers series.

Cossacks european wars steam review