Master of Orion
Description official description
Master of Orion overlaps with Civilization insofar as you are the leader of one of several races. Technological advance, realm expansion and combat are all key elements. Where it differs is in being set in space.
The planet Orion itself is a lush, fertile planet with vast mineral resources. It is guarded by the Guardian - a powerful vessel which you have to defeat in order to plunder Orion's riches.
As you attempt to expand your empire, you will have to trade and steal technologies form rivals, again much like Civ. Your ships can be improved over the game, in terms of engine power, shields, cloaking devices and weapons, and different combinations of these can be integrated. Resource management is largely set using sliders, which reduces the amount of time spent on micro-management.
Groups +
Screenshots
Promos
Credits (DOS version)
43 People (29 developers, 14 thanks) · View all
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Reviews
Discussion
| Subject | User | Date |
|---|---|---|
| Help me get into this game | Mobygamesisreanimated (11072) | 2009-04-29 18:33:40 |
Trivia
Jerry Pournelle
Famous Sci-Fi novelist and long time technology columnist Jerry Pournelle frequently mention his appreciation for Master of Orion i his Chaos Manor columns. He's often stated its one of his all time favorite games.
References
When playing against the Meklars, one of the names for the leader (picked randomly from a pool in the NAMES.LBX file) is TX-1138. Likely a reference to George Lucas's movie THX-1138, which he himself has referred to in little in-jokes throughout the Star Wars movies.
Star Lords
Spaceward Ho!
Master of Orion borrows several game elements from Spaceward Ho!.
Awards
- Computer Gaming World
- June 1994 (Issue #119) – Strategy Game of the Year
- April 1996 (Issue #141) – Introduced into the Hall of Fame
- November 1996 (15th anniversary issue) - #33 in the “150 Best Games of All Time” list
- Game Bytes
- 1993 - Strategy Game of the Year
- GameStar (Germany)
- Issue 12/1999 - #64 in the "100 Most Important PC Games of the Nineties" ranking
- Gaming World
- 1993 - Premier Award Computing
- PC Gamer
- April 2000 - #37 in the "Readers All-Time Top 50" poll
- October 2001 - #31 in the "Top 60 Games of All Time" list (They go on to credit the game for the creation of the '4X' genre of strategy gaming ('explore, expand, exploit, and exterminate').)
- April 2005 - #44 in the "50 Best Games of All Time" list
- Pelit Magazine
- 1994 - Best PC Game
- Strategy Plus
- 1993 - Strategy Game of the Year
Information also contributed by Adam Baratz, Entorphane, Michael Palomino, PCGamer77, Scott Monster and Technocrat
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Related Sites +
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1oom
unofficial game engine recreation under GPLv2 - requires a copy of the Master of Orion (v1.3) LBX files. -
Fan-made Patch 1.40m
fan-made patch for Master of Orion (v1.3) -
Master of Orion on the Mac
An article on Low End Mac about the Macintosh version of the game. The writer describes his experiences originally running the game on his PCs when it was released and his attempts to enjoy the game on his Macs. The article effectively takes the form of a retrospective appreciation of the game, with an underlying point regarding the backwards compatibility of Apple's hardware (Jul. 1st, 2008).
Identifiers +
- MobyGames ID: 212
- Steam App: 410970
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Contributors to this Entry
Game added by Tomer Gabel.
Macintosh added by Terok Nor.
Additional contributors: Kalirion, Zeppin, Patrick Bregger, Plok, J D.
Game added August 13th, 1999. Last modified March 9th, 2023.