Our story so far
If you’re reading this, you probably enjoy historical strategy games—I certainly do. Several years ago, my company, Stardock, recruited talented individuals from Firaxis and other studios, establishing two new companies; Mohawk Games and Oxide Games. We split key leadership from Sid Meier’s Civilization IV and V across both studios.
For a while, my day job involved running these companies alongside Stardock. For their first titles Oxide and Mohawk intentionally avoided historical strategy games to explore new directions. Oxide developed Ashes of the Singularity and Mohawk created Offworld Trading Company. Having brought over Jon Shafer (Civilization V) and Soren Johnson (Civilization IV) to Stardock, with Soren leading Mohawk, we chose not to tempt fate by immediately producing another historical title. However, both studios were eager to dive into historical strategy projects.
Eventually, running two studios became complicated when early builds of Old World (Mohawk) and Ara: History Untold (Oxide) appeared simultaneously in the same office space. My day typically began reviewing Ara, then I'd walk over to discuss and play Old World with Soren. To avoid any conflict of interest or perception of favoritism, I knew it was time to step back from directly managing both studios.
4X games in development
While Ara and Old World were in development, I was back at Stardock overseeing Sins of a Solar Empire II, Galactic Civilizations, and a (sadly) canceled historical strategy/simulation game. Occasionally, I'd check on Ara and Old World to see their progress.
Old World released first, blending elements of Crusader Kings and Civilization beautifully - it remains a fantastic game. Ara, meanwhile, was still under development, aiming to offer a fresh take on historical turn-based strategy. Creating a 1.0 version of any game is challenging. Every developer knows how hard it is to "finish" a game, with new ideas always tempting further exploration. Ara was full of intriguing concepts but hadn’t yet come together as a commercial game.
By early 2024, Microsoft and Oxide asked me to step in and help complete Ara. The game had impressive foundational elements and enormous potential but needed significant refocusing. Initially, Ara functioned more as an intricate social simulation—each character was fully simulated, with detailed lives affecting immigration, health, diet, and culture. It was impressive, but not what players expect from a turn-based 4X strategy game. Meeting player expectations is critical. No matter how innovative, games must align with player desires.
So, together with colleagues from Stardock, Oxide, and our partners at Xbox Game Studios, we dove in and reshaped Ara into a fully realized, turn-based strategy game in just a few months. This rapid development pace had consequences. Even now, screenshots circulating online depict a game significantly different from the final release. While systems like supply chains, crafting, and the Living World excelled, areas like warfare, diplomacy, and micromanagement needed attention.
Despite these challenges, finishing Ara: History Untold was among the most rewarding experiences of my career. The integration between Microsoft’s Xbox Game Studios, Oxide, and Stardock teams went beyond mere collaboration - it was seamless. Ultimately, Ara shipped to positive critical reviews and notably stable performance at launch - a rarity for modern games.
However, due to the late-stage gameplay refinements the game wasn’t ready to “show” its gameplay until just weeks before release, resulting in a quieter release. Nonetheless, Ara has cultivated a small but enthusiastic community of players.
The Path Forward
Historical strategy games uniquely benefit from ongoing development. The last game I designed, Galactic Civilizations II, still receives updates 20 years later. Stardock has a long-standing passion for supporting and nurturing gaming communities. Our cofounding of two dedicated strategy game studios demonstrates this commitment.
We continue to enjoy our great partnership with Microsoft. Collaborative brainstorming sessions between teams from Microsoft, Stardock, and Oxide have been incredibly fun, tackling everything from gameplay mechanics to visual improvements. With Ara’s future firmly rooted in direct community engagement and rapid iteration - something Stardock specializes in - it made sense to transition the day-to-day publishing responsibilities to Stardock.
What's next? Currently, we’re releasing v1.31, a minor maintenance update. Behind the scenes, substantial work on version 1.4 has been underway since January. This update addresses community priorities: Warfare enhancements, micromanagement improvements, AI refinements, and user experience upgrades. After 1.4, we’re targeting Ara’s first anniversary for version 2.0, essentially a comprehensive reimagining of the game. Version 2.0 will retain Ara’s strengths while fully realizing the vision of a turn-based 4X historical strategy game, aligning closely with the original goals before the game's development shifted toward a social simulation.
I look forward to sharing these updates and continuing this journey alongside our dedicated community.
Some screenshots of what's coming to v1.4:
Version 1.4 is going to introduce a new mode: Live Strategic Mode. This is where Living World elements like armies scale up as you zoom out to help players see what their units are doing and better visualize what they are doing.
Version 1.4 maps will have twice as many regions (at least) per map size as 1.3 does. This means more room to manuever and generally just more readable maps. The Earth map has been updated to support this.
Battles will be displayed on the map. You can still zoom in to get more detail but at a glance you'll see your armies battling it out. Battles, in general, are also going through a lot of iteration for v1.4.
Greater visual distinction between nations. Different nations units are somewhat unique looking. Here you can see Aztech units looking somewhat different from what you'd see from other units of the same class.
More details to come!
