Paradox Interactive is very well known for their series, such as Mount and Blade and Europa Universalis; but they are also know for their strategy games with steep learning curves, learning cliffs if you wish. Supreme Ruler Cold War is no exception to this. Right from the start you aren’t even given the option of taking a quick tutorial, you’re dropped into post-World War 2 USA, Russia, or whichever country (out of over 200) you wish to play as during sandbox mode.

Without a doubt, Supreme Ruler Cold War has some of the deepest gameplay in a Grand Strategy Game I’ve seen in ages. The only issue is that much was sacrificed in order to obtain this depth. It’s very easy to see this in Supreme Ruler’s graphics, which seem like they’re pulled out of the SNES era of gaming. The graphics do little in the way of hindering strategy, but they break the overall feel of the game by reminding you of other, much shinier titles, such as Total War: Shogun 2. This is disappointing because Supreme Ruler is a strategy game for the strategist.

Unlike the Total War series, or even most strategy games, Supreme Ruler isn’t focused on the combat aspect of strategy while maintaining a bare bones economical and diplomatic simulation; with Supreme Ruler, the situation is reversed. You can pretty much say that Supreme Ruler’s combat is somewhat basic, while it’s economical and diplomatic aspects are very in depth. For example, when dealing with your country’s economic status, you have to be aware of how much of a resource is being produced, how much is being spent, and what you’re doing with the excess; how much of it is selling, what’s the demand for it, what’s the price for it, etc. Now, keep in mind that you have to do this for every resource in general, whether it be agriculture, electricity, weapons, whatever! Each resource is maintained independently.