They Are Billions 
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Modding Game RulesNov 11, 2020 - Community AnnouncementsHello everyone! We have been working for a while on improving and expanding the They Are Billions level editor. The first big update, available right now in the new version V1.1, allows to modify the rules of the game. You can now modify all the parameters of the units, buildings and enemies in your custom levels. Every time we make this kind of modifications we have to be very careful because it can affect both the original game and the hundreds of levels that the community has created, any change must guarantee full compatibility with everything that already exists. The modification of the rules is carried out by means of a function "ApplyRules ()" that can be used in any script of the game such as events, hordes, when activating objects or entering zones, at the beginning of the game,... Some random examples: When you release a neutral soldier cornered by zombies, he reveals a technology that increases the attack of your units by 50%. A new Titan is made available at a higher cost but with a doubled range shooting effect. From the Command Center you can access a market to purchase unit and building upgrades. A new type of random scenario with its own rules in which the infected are extremely active and nervous. You will be able to create your own random survivals with your own rules. We have updated the level editor guide on Steam that explains all the parameters and syntax with examples of this new functionality. And that's all for now. We are looking forward to playing the new scenarios created by the Community with their own rules. See you soon!The best strategy games on PCNov 6, 2020 - Rock, Paper, Shotgun Looking back at it now, 2020 doesn’t feel like a banner year for strategy games, but that doesn’t mean there haven’t been a few gems. The list below – gathered by a panel of experts and regularly updated – contains games from as recently as 12 months ago alongside classics from as far back as 28 years ago. They’re all games we think you could play and love right now. (more…) The best building games on PCAug 25, 2020 - Rock, Paper, Shotgun ‘Building’ is a pretty broad theme. There are a lot of games where you build things, after all, and they can be very different. Helpfully, then, I’ve split this list of the 20 best building games on PC into four sections, each covering a sub-category of this big, messy genre. (more…) The best strategy games on PCJan 29, 2020 - Rock, Paper, Shotgun For a time it looked as though strategy games had sunk into a kind of deathly malaise, unsure which territory to claim next and which ones it should leave well and truly alone. Fast forward to 2020, though, and strategy games have never looked healthier, which is why we’ve compiled this best strategy games list of all time. Whether you want to conquer the depths of space, wage historical warfare or hulk around in big mechanical robots, there’s a strategy game for you below. (more…) Best PC games of 2019Jan 6, 2020 - Rock, Paper, Shotgun2019 was a great year for PC games – aren’t they all? – but you might not yet know what the very best PC games of 2019 were. Let us help you. (more…) Happy Holidays!Dec 22, 2019 - Community AnnouncementsThere is always time for a celebration amongst friends, even for those who keep us safe from the zombie apocalypse. Who would have thought that cooking was one of the Sniper's skills! Happy Holidays and happy New Year from Numantian Games to all the They Are Billions community! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/28988182/6bccc95249922dbac18e1da63c86d00066ed7146.jpgThe New Empire Campaign available for XBOX One and PlayStation 4, and more!Dec 4, 2019 - Community AnnouncementsGreetings! Great news! The Campaign mode of They Are Billions is finally available for consoles for free. To play it just let the game update automatically. It’s been almost six months of hard work. We know that some players were upset because this mode was not available for consoles at the same time as it did for PC, but it required all that time to port and adapt the game to consoles. Some games are developed at the same time for PCs and consoles because they basically work the same way, but for They Are Billions the interface and handling are drastically different. In addition, it’s been necessary to modify entire systems such as physics and text rendering, so it would work at proper speed on consoles. We’re very happy with the final result. The game is handled in an agile way and we didn’t have to change any of the content (number of zombies, difficulty ...), so that the console version is 100% equal to the PC one. And above all, we are very happy to have contributed to enrich the ecosystem of console games with an RTS as challenging as this one. Future development We believe that They Are Billions is already a fairly round and complete game. With the campaign mode, the survival mode, and the custom levels of the users, TAB offers many hours of play. In fact, according to statistics, each player plays more than 52 hours on average. And of course, we are looking at how to expand the universe of They Are Billions. We are considering many options. We want to continue improving the editor so that content creators have many more options and can create more complex levels. We’re also considering to extend the original game with a new campaign available as a separate DLC. However, deeper changes in the game would require a complete new development, which would already be They Are Billions 2. In a new development we could include new factions that can be played in different ways, cooperative multiplayer and versus modes, and a new Survival mode with many more options. What do you players think? What new features would you like to find in a new They Are Billions? Looking forward to your feedback.Get up to 90% off in GOG's Back to School saleSep 3, 2019 - EurogamerStationary, uniforms, maybe a new laptop - that's what we'd usually expect to see in a Back to School sale. Not for GOG, though. Instead, the cheeky focus is on parents who now have some extra time on their hands to game again. And there are some serious timesinks available for cheap in the GOG Back to School sale. Massive RPGs, engrossing sims and gripping stories are all well represented, with savings of up to 90 per cent up for grabs. Of course, as we're dealing with CD Projekt here, you can find the entire Witcher series on sale. If you're still yet to play the latest entry, you can get The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt - Game of the Year Edition for 10.49. This complete version of the game comes with all previously released DLC. That's both the Hearts of Stone and the Blood and Wine expansions, as well as over a dozen smaller content packs. Read more The best games of 2019 so farJul 10, 2019 - Rock, Paper, Shotgun Summer. The heat age. Scorch season. Spring’s hangover. It’s the mid-point of the year and you know what that means. No, not “mojito time”, Geoff, put those away. It’s time we told you what the best games of the year are so far. There are quite a lot of them. Just look how many videogames have escaped from their developers in the past six months and are now running amok through the blistering streets, getting stuck in the melting tarmac, like ants in jam. It’s unsanitary. So allow us to round up these unruly games and trap them in a handy list. Here are our favourite sword swingers and space ‘splorers so far this year (and a couple of DLCs for good measure). Okay, Geoff, now bring the mojitos. (more…) They are Billions, now available on PS4 and XBOX One!Jul 5, 2019 - Community AnnouncementsGreetings! We are very happy to announce that They Are Billions is available for XBOX One (right now) and PS4 on 9th July. The time has come for console players to also enjoy this RTS. Although for the moment it’s only available in the Survival mode, we will also bring the Campaign mode to this console in the near future. An RTS in consoles? Indeed, there are not many RTS games in consoles. This genre is mostly exclusive to PC because its game mechanics make it essential to use a mouse and keyboard. But at Numantian Games we have accepted the challenge. First of all because we truly believe that console players can also enjoy this exceptional game genre that we like so much. Second, They Are Billions within the RTS has also created its own sub-genre, a new style that has managed to bring many players who had never before played this type of games, and have enjoyed it as much as the more veterans players. In the porting we have tried to be 100% loyal to the PC version. We want the game experience to be the same. Along with Blitworks, our porting partner, a huge effort has been made to achieve a game speed equivalent to the PC, as this game uses CPUs and multicore super intensive. Few games can boast of handling 30K units in real time, each with fully independent AI. We also had to work to adapt the game handling to the console interface and we have implemented two play modes: Gamepad In this mode, the cursor and the camera can be moved with the analog joysticks. We have also enabled many shortcuts for the most typical actions that greatly improve the speed of handling. They Are Billions was always conceived as a game where strategy comes first (over player's performance) and that's why you can pause, so you can take your time and decide your strategies and tactics. This allows that in consoles, even if it is a little more uncomfortable handling with gamepad, the player establishes the preferred pace of play. Mouse and Keyboard The new consoles allow you to use any normal USB or Bluetooth mouse or keyboard and, of course, they are both supported by They Are Billions. In this case the gaming experience is exactly the same as in the PC version. Even you can perfectly play with mouse while using the gamepad for shortcuts. And that's all for now. If you have console gamer friends you can tell them that: "The zombie apocalypse, has arrived!" And if anyone is curious to see how has been the development on consoles here you can see our friends from Blitworks in action: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dvhOg6iRFJY See you soon!Wondering the total number of zombies killed by all TAB players?Jul 2, 2019 - Community Announcementshttps://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/28988182/d91c942fac96f9e18da896891368a0a89c8189a7.jpg Spoiler: Developers are scared .... more in V. 1.0.10 ... Greetings! It's almost incredible that we didn’t think of this before... TAB has always stored in a Steam variable the total number of zombies killed by each player, in order to unlock the Infected Killer achievements. So, now those values are added to another global Steam variable that contains the sum of all the zombies killed by the entire Steam community. Since version 1.0.8 this information is being uploaded to the server. So only players who have opened TAB in that version or higher have been accounted for. From now on all the zombies killed are counted regardless of whether you have won or lost, or whether it is a Survival, a Custom Level or a Campaign mission. Until now only Survival wins were accounted for, meaning that the actual number of killed zombies is much larger than the one shown in the game. Ready? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Be patient!... . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/28988182/10aa5a8b93a0fe5352972f61a65cddc9a8d71c06.jpg 44 BILLIONS!!! , Wow! It is 6 times the World population! At first we thought there was some kind of error or that Steam was not processing the totals correctly. But no, all is right and it makes sense. TAB already has more than one million players and, according to Steam, the average playing time per player is 45 hours. Surely the real number is much bigger but still, 44 billion zombies killed must surely be some world record… will there be any category in the Guinness Book for this? The title of the game is no longer a hyperbole and has become, literally and empirically, true: "They Are Billions ..., yes, 44 actually. And rising!" In the new version V.1.0.10 you can see the world zombie counter. The counter is updated in real time as players get rid of more and more zombies. Move the pointer over the number and you will see what your contribution to the total has been. How far will it go? https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/28988182/7ff271f0cfdfa70867ba1dae994e8a95f0fc2410.jpg As you can see, one of the testers has contributed with more than 6 million. Definitely ready for a possible and imminent zombie apocalypse in real life! In the new version 1.0.10 we continue fixing issues and improve several things. More info in the Changes Log Version. Come on everyone! What are you waiting for? We have to reach 100 Billions this summer! See you soon!New Version 1.0.8: Improvements and New FeaturesJun 24, 2019 - Community AnnouncementsGreetings! We continue working to improve the game and, our number one priority, to fix all the bugs and issues. Since the release They Are Billions has between 15,000 and 20,000 simultaneous players, and has been played for more than 2 million hours in the last week. Amazing! A billion thanks to all players! Something pending to include for future versions is the counter for the total number of zombies killed by all TAB players, updated in real time on the game's menu screen. That could be very, very interesting :) Now, let us run you through everything you can find in the new version, of course, we’ll continue listening to all your feedback: Issues when saving or reloading Games We have detected that Steam Cloud was interfering with the game recording and the user's progress, so we have disabled it. As the game state is huge, They Are Billions uses file compression and it seems that Steam Cloud can affect the recording process when it synchronizes. All the TAB user data (saves, settings, custom levels, screenshots ...) can be found in My Documents\My Games\They Are Billions, in case you need to move them to another computer. New Option to Save a backup of the Campaign From the game menu within the Dashboard of the campaign you’ll find a new option to record the current state of the campaign in a new slot. You can continue when you want using the Continue option in the main menu. (This is not available inside a mission, just in the campaign dashboard). We have implemented it for two reasons: First and foremost, we do not want anyone to lose the progress of the campaign. In such a long game losing the advances due to an error or a disk problem can be a disaster. This will also allow you to perform tests with the technology tree or try different levels of difficulty... in short, experimenting a bit more with the game. In addition this new option will work very well together with the following new feature… Replay Completed Missions https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/28988182/a4ea2aec56bfe0791d5cb87f3b32e3fc1d5cba35.jpg Now you can play missions that you have already completed, as many times as you want in the difficulty level you want. This functionality is just for fun, it will not affect any aspect of your campaign, nor the victory points or the defeats counter. Bonus Objects on Tactical Missions It seems that this mechanism is the one that has caused the most concern to the players and after analyzing the issue among the team we think we already know why. This mechanic was designed to encourage exploration and reward progress little by little. We love when the hero opens a door, react to the situation, kills the enemies and then explore the room’s content, finding useful objects or research points, it is a good way to constantly reward the progress of the mission. The testers knew that these bonuses are optional, so they explored the fortress, met the objectives and finished the mission, usually with 70-90% of the...Wot I Think: They Are BillionsJun 24, 2019 - Rock, Paper, Shotgun Developer: Numantian Games Publisher: Numantian Games Release: Out now On: Windows From: Steam, Humble, Official Site Price: 24/$30/ 25 Occasionally, when I pause They Are Billions and zoom out on my tightly packed, grid-based steampunk settlement, I think about how the tiny families in the centre could have just as easily lived their entire lives without ever seeing a single zombie. There s little in the way of a fixed story or characters in this survival strategy, either in its separate challenge maps or ambitious, flawed campaign. But there is a constant mood of melancholy, darkening the air like industrial smog; the uneasy feeling humanity died out a long time ago. As the saying goeth, you either watch your settlement get munched to bits by zombies, or you live long enough to continue colonising hell to extend the borders of a grim dystopia. Jolly good, then. (more…) They Are Billions lowers campaign difficulty following "intense" launch weekJun 23, 2019 - EurogamerA new patch coming to survival real-time strategy game (RTS), They Are Billions, will lower the difficulty and remove some time limits following fan feedback of its newly launched campaign mode. The complaints have seen the game drop from its overall rank of Very Positive to Mixed, prompting developer Numanitan Games to state: "We have to say that we are saddened to see that many players with hundreds of hours of play in Survival mode have written very negative reviews for the launch of the Campaign." "The launch week is becoming really intense. We never thought that version 1.0 would generate so much interest, opinions and feedback," the developer said by way of a recent Steam update. "That's a sign that They Are Billions is becoming a very popular game and, as such, generates intense debate. Read more They Are Billions campaign patch alters difficulty, time limitsJun 22, 2019 - PC GamerSurvival RTS They Are Billions came out of Early Access recently with a full campaign mode to supplement its existing survival mode. It received a rough reaction on Steam's user reviews, with recent reviews dropping from Very Positive to Mixed. Developer Numantian have responded to the feedback with the first of many updates. The difficulty of the first few missions has been lowered, and the default mode is now Accessible rather than Challenging to encourage new players to start there and work their way up. Time limit objectives, which resulted in a game over for not hitting a population goal within a set time, have been removed from some missions and relaxed in others. Other changes include adjustments to the tech tree, and in hero missions the objects you hunt for will now flash intermittently to make them easier to find. These are all improvements to the campaign mode, with Numantian saying the next major update will address survival mode. New Version 1.0.5: Campaign ImprovementsJun 20, 2019 - Community AnnouncementsGreetings! The launch week is becoming really intense. We never thought that version 1.0 would generate so much interest, opinions and feedback. That’s a sign that They Are Billions is becoming a very popular game and, as such, generates intense debate. First of all, thank you very much to all the constructive feedback that helps us to improve the game and to correct mistakes. Thank you very much for taking the time. You know that our team is always open to everything you want to say to us. During the development of the Campaign we had a few dozens very different testers playing the campaign from start to finish using very different strategies, and always in Challenging difficulty. Although we’ve worked hard to achieve the best quality, making it as challenging and with the widest range of strategic possibilities, with hundreds of thousands of people, playing the game there are many aspects that may require adjustments and improvements. That’s what we are here for, to improve it and give you the best possible experience. We have to say that we are saddened to see that many players with hundreds of hours of play in Survival mode have written very negative reviews for the launch of the Campaign. We understand that there are people who prefer to play Survival and are not interested in the campaign, and prefer that development efforts be directed only to the Survival. That is totally legitimate, and we are delighted to hear that feedback and we will take it into account. But we've done an update with new free content, which we promised from the first day of the Early Access. And we’ve even improved the Survival with two new maps and the wandering Mutants. So, we ask for your patience as the advances in the development will come in order. The next big update will be for the Survival, but we are working on one thing at a time. Campaign improvements V.1.0.5 Here are the most important improvements: Difficulty in General https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/28988182/bb2ebc7a7896add97b143df8c22b517f286a097e.png Here we made a mistake when leaving the Challenging mode as the default difficulty level. In addition, many players haven’t noticed the small screen of difficulty level that appears on the Missions screen and are not aware that you can change the level of difficulty at any time. Improvement 1: Now the default mode is Accessible, which maintains a good level of challenge and is more progressive than the Challenging. Also, now when playing the first mission you will see the difficulty window explaining this functionality. Improvement 2: The general difficulty of the first missions has been lowered a bit so that it is something more accessible, especially for first-time players Time Limit in Misiones Some missions have a time limit because the challenge lies in getting a colony of certain characteristics within that time frame. It seems that this limit has taken many people by surprise or is simply too short for less expe...They Are Billions leaves Early Access and gets a big campaignJun 19, 2019 - PC GamerSurvival strategy romp They Are Billions has left Early Access, unleashing the zombie horde and giving players a meaty 48-mission campaign to fight through. Check out the New Empire campaign trailer above. They Are Billions splices city building with tower defence in an RTS besieged by the undead. You'll need to collect and manage precious resources, plonk down buildings, recruit soldiers and build fortifications, all so you can survive the next wave of hungry cadavers. And while there are incalculable monsters waiting outside the city, it only takes one of them to start an infection that can rapidly transform your sanctuary into a lively graveyard. With the introduction of the campaign, there are now two ways to play. The survival mode gives you a random map and a time you have to survive for, while the undead smash down your walls. The campaign mode, meanwhile, tasks you with expanding the New Empire by building colonies all over the world and protecting them with the Imperial Army. Across the 48 missions, you'll get 90 techs that will you evolve your colonies, and you'll be able to learn about the origins of the infection. I've not played since the first days of Early Access, where I thought it was a promising, stressful RTS. It can be exhausting, trying to keep back the tide of corpses, especially when you have to be so diligent while only a few zombies need to slip past your defences to cause chaos. There are always fires to put out and it's constantly escalating. I kept coming back after each failure, though, updating my fortification designs and thinking up new ideas to hold back the tide. They're great zombies, too. Each of them is an individual, but when they spot a snack or hear something interesting, they'll quickly start to gather, eventually becoming a rotting mass that takes up most of the screen. The game can support up to 20,000 units. They Are Billions is out now on Steam and the Humble Store for £21.59/$26.99. They Are Billions adds story campaign and leaves early accessJun 19, 2019 - Rock, Paper, Shotgun Numerically hyperbolic survival-strategy They Are Billions has added a campaign mode, so we can finally find out why all these nice pale shambly folk are so hungry all the time. The New Empire, as the singleplayer story is called, looks to double down on the latent colonialist fantasies already inherent in steampunk, allowing you to ride your big imperial choo choo across the map and settle you some locations. The update also marks the end of eighteen months in early access, bringing the game to version 1.0. Look upon this trailer, ye mighty, and go “oh, cool, zombies ‘n’ stuff.” (more…) The New Empire and V.1.0 Available Now!Jun 18, 2019 - Community Announcementshttps://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/28988182/f178ee1deeb6a669b629f2dfb83c279e01f79ab1.jpg At last, They Are Billions reaches version 1.0. We are leaving the Early Access and the great Campaign, The New Empire, will be available for all players. The Campaign: The New Empire. Lead the campaign under the orders of Quintus Crane, ruler of the New Empire, and reconquer the lands devastated by the infected. 48 missions with more than 60 hours of gameplay. Build fortified colonies to survive in infected territories Destroy the swarms of infected with the Imperial Army. Make your colonies evolve with more than 90 available technologies. Explore the ancient human fortresses with your Hero. Discover the story behind the apocalypse... how did the pandemic start? New Maps for the Survival Mode Don’t forget the new available maps for the Survival mode. You can see this update for more info. New DLC Soundtrack & Artbook https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/28988182/09fed05c2ff9c2ed17d7cf30db4c28b74e72477b.png Along with the Campaign we will also launch a DLC that will contain the 22 themes of TAB soundtrack at the highest quality, and the digital book “The Art of They Are Billions”, for those of you curious about the sketches and illustrations of the most important elements of the game. In the game main menu "More" you can find an option "Collector's Edition". Click there to open the content folder with these extra rewards. Hope you like them! Of course the soundtrack can be player via the Steam Music Player. Bugs & Feedback The V.1.0 is the most stable, lots of issues have been solved and the performance is much better than in the old version. Also it has countless of improvements in all fronts. Although we have tested the campaign to the fullest, we will be ready to quickly fix any bugs or solve any problem after the launch. As you know, in this section of the forum you can report any issues you have with the game. Please, be patient, we promise to solve everything as fast as possible, as we have always done. A BIG THANKS! Thanks a lot for your support and feedback during the Early Access time. You have made They Are Billions possible as it stands today, and for that we will always be grateful. We really hope you’ll enjoy the Campaign. That’s all for now, we don’t want to take much more of your time. Please go ahead and submerge yourselves in the New Empire Campaign. Just a friendly advice, don’t forget to eat and drink every few hours! (sleeping is optional)☺ See you on the other side of the Campaign!Now Available on Steam - They Are Billions, 10% off!Jun 18, 2019 - Product ReleaseThey Are Billions is Now Available on Steam and is 10% off!* They Are Billions is a Steampunk strategy game set on a post-apocalyptic planet. Build and defend colonies to survive against the billions of the infected that seek to annihilate the few remaining living humans. Can humanity survive after the zombie apocalypse? *Offer ends June 25 at 10AM Pacific Time
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