Ancient War vs Northgard
Ancient War
Ancient War is a brand-new MMO RPG/strategy game that you can play for free directly on Facebook. In this game, you will need to choose one of 3 factions to join, namely Thebes, Athens or Sparta, before setting off to develop your city-state, recruit legendary heroes and their associated battalions, and take on your enemies.The gameplay here is pretty generic in many ways, but there are a couple features that stand out although they are not entirely unique. One such feature is the world map. Unlike many other games within the same genre, the world map feels a lot more real and alive as you can see the boundaries of each faction being drawn and re-drawn as players of the same faction work together to conquer other faction's city-states.
Another feature is the faction hierarchy. Each faction is governed by the players themselves and only the strongest players will be able to climb the ranks and assume one of the 4 important positions in the hierarchy. If you are the best of the lot, you can even be appointed King.
Ancient War isn't exactly a refreshingly unique browser MMO game, but it is not your run-of-the-mill game either. The gameplay is quite decent and the epic Greek-theme that it has may appeal to you as well.
Northgard
Northgard is a rather unique city-builder/strategy game that allows you to lead a group of Northmen to unknown new shores in hopes of making a life there. Like most city-building games, you'll need to help them set up a home, assign your Vikings to perform various roles, ensure there is enough food to feed the entire village, and amass a small army to help defend your territories from other hostile clans. The strategic aspects of the game may not be obvious at first but you'll quickly realize that new territories that you discover (you don't exactly need to conquer it for this to work) will present new strategic opportunities for your clan to expand or grow, be it new sources for food or a nice place to set up a new trading post. There are many victory conditions as well, so it's not always "kill or be killed" in this game.Northgard offers players a single player experience by playing with AIs with various personalities or with their friends online. However, many players have reported that the game does have a somewhat flawed AI-player relationship. Even if you're best buddies with an AI's clan through healthy trading relationships, their clan members will still attack your people, which frankly feels a lot like a betrayal. It'd be nice to have a tutorial as well.
That said though, Northgard is an impressive game especially if you enjoy a bit of city-builder/strategy game like Valhalla Hills.