Mega-Lo-Mania, a classic among strategy games, is apparently on its way back. Rainware, a small studio from Germany, is working on Tera Lo Mania, a spiritual successor, and currently seeks funding via Kickstarter.
Tera Lo Mania doesn’t just draw inspiration from the Amiga classic Mega-Lo-Mania. Based on the tech demo from the developer’s page, it is essentially the same game. Albeit with a new engine and a graphical update, plus the promise of more features to come.
A Classic Returns
Originally released in 1991, the idea behind Mega-Lo-Mania was simple: four gods fight for control over various island-like territories. The twist: everything happened in real time, and to succeed, resource gathering, research, expansion, and conquest need to managed simultaneously.
What sounds pretty basic today was rather innovative in a time after Populous but before Dune II. Nevertheless, Mega-Lo-Mania never received an expansion or sequel, only plenty of ports. With Tera Lo Mania, that is supposedly about to change.
Pretty Much The Same
Tera Lo Mania faces a couple of challenges, Kickstarter success aside. It sticks close to its Mega-Lo-Mania roots. So close, in fact, that one needs to ask why we even need it – especially with Gigalomania, another remake, being freely available.
The Kickstarter page does not elaborate on that beyond hints at expanding the game laterally with custom skins and more research techs. The most interesting new feature is probably multiplayer, which is absent in the original. Of course this is all contingent on the current Mega-Lo-Mania IP holder, Electronic Arts, not shutting the whole thing down.
If everything goes as planned, Tera Lo Mania is scheduled for a Q1 2020 release on Windows, Linux, Mac, and possibly consoles.
