Eufloria (formerly Dyson)
 

http://www.dyson-game.com/
http://www.dyson-game.com/img/Eufloria_440_256.jpg

Originally known as Dyson (inspired by Dyson Trees and Astrochicken, both theories proposed by theoretical physicist Freeman Dyson), Eufloria is a simple RTS-ish game where you colonise asteroids in space by planting trees. The tree's leaves then fall off to become your game units. The graphics are totally sweet and the atmosphere has a wonderful vibe.


The games' Steam page is here. It's released in a day and a half, but if you pre-order it before then you get 25% off.

There's also an old, freeware version on the game's website that is apparently not representative of the final game, but should give an idea of what it's about.

I've been trying to find this for ages. It seems they have been deliberately evading me.

There's now a demo and a facebook Page, managed by the developers.

Got it at last. Took me a while thanks to the convolutedness of Steam.

I tried that free one on the website.

I think I'd like it better if the asteroids looked like asteroids and the background was space-y-er.

Played through some of the demo. I liked it, except that the enemies can jump to any asteroid they want even if it's outside their space. Will the final version be for the PC and PS3? I wants that black background stage.

I'm enjoying the greater ease of selection and sending, plus the attacking the flowers instead of just the base of each tree. First few introductory stages down.

I can't get passed 4. It's just so damn big and half the time some super-powerful race attacks my home asteroid before I even have a chance to colonize.

Of the demo, you mean? Yeah, I'm not sure I ever completed either of the last two stages in the demo. The trouble is the AI suddenly cottons onto the idea of swarming. By the hundreds. Sometimes well over a thousand.

I was so hoping that someone would bring back the phrase "cottons to". I'm mighty partial to it.

Yes! I was sitting there like "but...but, but I thought I was the only one here who had the capacity to use such a cheap yet effective strategy!"

OANST, you seem to have devolved.

Devolved is not a word, not in anyones dictionary and fuck wikipedia if it disagrees with me.

I am what I am.

Yes. All of the above.

It took me a while to work it out. For one thing, every time you play the level is going to be different, so don't be disheartened. The tactics that worked for me where to explore heavily in the beginning stages, only growing trees on asteroids with really strong parameters. Once you have a few good asteroids, sit still and grow your army up a bit. Try to get one corner of the gamespace to yourself, with well-defended border planets. And keep an eye on how the enemies are moving; when they swarm towards one of your asteroids, send a swarm of your own to attack their undefended home.

Right. I finally got passed it. Like you said, I took advantage of the better planets. As my space grew bigger, I sort of developed a route of allocating leaves from the few good planets I had to the front lines. I didn't want pick up the shit leaves too, so I would just make them go to an adjacent planet, which really works out well because those stocked up planets on the fringe would be well-defended should any enemies get there, and because I kept conveying more and more leaves around my space, eventually nearly all my planets were well defended and I had enough leaves to steadily increase my space without leaving anything in a vulnerable position. Like if my planets at the front line each had fifty leaves, I would make two of them send out twenty, so I would still have a good arsenal and not leave anything undefended.

In the full game, it's much easier to order leaves to any location within your empire - you don't need to jump from planet to planet. Also, you can select certain leaves on a planet for specific skills.