Favorite "Indie" Games

[Makinus]

One online strategy title that i like is "Shattered Galaxy" and it can be played for free, the difference from the free and the paid version is just a 10% penalty in XP for the free version and you cant vote in faction elections, but it is a very fun game, with a lot of tactical combat and the XP penalty is very small...

Another fun game that i got recently is "Light of Altair", very fun space colony sim with some combat thrown in... it has a lengthly campaign (i didn´t finish it yet) but there are talks in the developer forums that they will be adding skirmish/sandbox play in a upcoming patch...

[Illuminated One]

Well, I don't think it was an indie game but as it's old and either free or very cheap and someone mentioned it in the other thread I'll recommend Imperialism 2.
It basically encompasses military conquest, diplomacy, industrialization and trade, with the focus on the latter two. But don't worry this doesn't mean some stupid building of things to build more things to build more things - the economy is complex and well designed enough that you'll be constantly struggling to manage all the interlocking elements (cargo fleet, infrastructure, mines, farms, workforce).
Similarily your military and diplomatic strategy will have to be integrated with your eco strategy. If your expecting your workers to demand sugar or strike later you'll have to gain control of sugar - if you do this through military power, diplomacy or trade is up to you. Don't forget to factor in that fjord near your cap when making that decision, though.
Oh, and the AI is very good, it can do naval invasions actually...

The only flaw imo is that the battles are not really the best (and not even playable in MP).

[RegnorVex]

Originally Posted by Illuminated One

I'll recommend Imperialism 2.
The only flaw imo is that the battles are not really the best (and not even playable in MP).

That, and the instant teleporting of troops. But it's still one of my all-time favorites.

[RegnorVex]

And by the way, I just finished playing a few games of Laser Squad Nemesis with my wife. It's as fun now as it was then. Even more so now, probably, with the introduction of 2 new races since I last played. And they've added a web interface to handle the email component. You just click on the web buttons to process and send files, no fiddling with attachments.

[Stretch]

Nexus war eh? Does that mean that that's Agema from Team Laser Explosion?! It's Bang/Dethnutz/I'm an engineer... small world eh?

Regarding independent games, Mount&Blade is a great medieval mounted/army combat game with an active modding community. It's been in development for years and keeps getting better. Demo lets you get to level 6 before having to buy.

Transcendence is a completely free action space roguelike developed by a single (awesome) person who has added tons of modding support over the various iterations. It's basically a finished game, although he'd like to add some extra content on the end and frequently adds new content to what's already out there. There's an active modding community there, too (check out the enhanced weapons mod if you try it, definitely worth a download).

I second Weird Worlds: Adventures in Infinite Space as a great game. I love the fact that it really does only take 10-30 minutes to play through a game once you get the hang of it. It's like candy.