Empire Earth 2 vs Northgard
Empire Earth 2
Empire Earth 2 lets you dive back again into the embrace of a timeless real-time strategy gameplay where this time around, you get to lead great nations and take part in the greatest historical battles known to mankind. Like the previous game though, you'll get to advanced through the ages, allowing you to experience both ancient warfare right up to a futuristic version. You can also decide to dominate others with your military might or via diplomatic techniques. This game even includes its expansion, Empire Earth II: The Art of Supremacy.Empire Earth 2 may not be as perfect an RTS as its original, but many would say that it's still a much decent game than Empire Earth 3, which is exactly when the franchise was shuttered for good. If you love Empire Earth, this is a pretty decent game to buy.
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.