Overlord

Overlord is remembered as the dark fantasy strategy game where the player leads a villainous master and a swarm of minions through ruined lands. By our assessment, its big appeal is the tone: it lets the player feel like the boss of a messy little army, sending minions to smash, steal, and drag loot home. The catch is that the minions are always part of the joke and part of the problem, since managing them can be clumsy when the screen fills with too many of them. In play it mixes action, command, and slapstick damage control, so the fun often comes from steering chaos rather than avoiding it. Compared with straight action games, it is stranger and more playful; compared with pure strategy, it is looser and less exact. Overlord suits people who enjoy commanding a villainous horde, and it stays closer to dark comedy than to serious conquest.