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Shared Worlds : Nation Games
This article is about the subforum that opened in October 2011. For the game genre known as the nation(s) game, see here.
Nation Games is one of the three subfora of the Shared Worlds forum. Like Moderated Games, it is devoted to nation games, in which each player controls a country and determines its actions within an overall world.
The two subfora, despite dedicating themselves to similar pursuits, maintain distinct communities and exhibit substantial stylistic differences. For instance, Moderated Games generally represent in-game time as a contraction of real-life time, while Nation Games divide in-game time into turns which are advanced at moderator discretion.1)
The origins of Nation Games as distinct from Moderated Games can be traced to March 2009, when the Sandbox opened. Prior to that point, all nation games took place in the main Shared Worlds forum and, due to fear of drawing interest away from active games and killing them, were subject to strict limits on quantity. The Sandbox served as a home for, among others, the game ideas that exceeded those limits.
The Sandbox was abolished in October 2011 as part of a general redistribution of Shared Worlds. Nation Games was split off as its own subforum, and the main forum, which had maintained its structure and leadership with only gradual change, became Moderated Games.
In March 2015, the bulk of the Nation Games community, citing lack of software and administrative support from the AH.COM administration, decamped to a new forum on Sufficient Velocity. The only game to continue through the disruption was the long-running A Song of Ice and Fire Nation Game, but this has since died.
Since then, several new games have been run by Chaotic Brillance, Dragos Cel Mare, FPSlover, Ankh Von Hapsburg, The_Last_Plantagenet, Usilli and theDisciple all to moderate success. The most successful was the long running Vae Victis III, later renamed Divide et Impera, which lasted for a considerable part of 2016.
On 25OCT2016 Shared Worlds was reorganized, with all sub-forums (Nation Games, Moderated Games, Map Games) re-combined into the general Shared Worlds forum and the implementation of the genre-tag system. Complaints by notable NG players led to administrative action against some members, resulting in a number of users departing for SV or threatening to do so.
However since this “second migration” Nation Games has been partially repopulated with new and some returning players. By 2017 the Nation Games community had fully adopted an democratic (poll) system for selecting new games, with a semi-formal rule that only two games be run at one time (although this “rule” is not enforced by administration and has been challenged and broken at times).
From amongst those new players emerged the first “Chancellor” of the Nation Games community, jankmaster98. In his time as Chancellor, he has overseen the game proposal election system, created the NG community discord, and started the NG community podcast.
NG Discussion and Election Thread: Nation Games Proposal and Discussion Thread
Discord Channel: Royal Alternate History NG Server (if link expired, request invite in NG discussion thread)
Current Games
Recent Games
Below is a sample of some of the recent games which have had successful runs.
Stag's Wrath - A Robert's Rebellion Nation Game By Rex Romae
Century of Lights By Karolus Rex
Historical Games
There are perhaps a thousand games which might arguably qualify as “Nation Games” that have been run on Alternate History since the site was established, and approximately 500 nation games have been run since the original establishment of a distinct community of Nation Games in 2011. The following is very small sample of games which are notable for their length of play, volume of content, the investment from the players and mods, or simply for being memorable. Note that this is not intended to be exhaustive nor quantifiable, but is merely a short list of games that the editor of this page is able to recall from nearly a decades worth of games.
Fallen: A Balkanized US Nation Game: Set primarily in a future dystopian United States, which had collapsed into civil war due to mysterious events in 2020. The setting was originally created Inquisition (then WiiGuy) and the game co-modded with Bob the Great beginning from 17 Nov 2011. Inquisition later retired from the mod team but remained as a player for most of it's length as California. The game was then modded by Bob the Great and FgenLuke until the end of the game nearly two years later in 10 Nov 2013. The Game won the Turtledove awards for Best Continuing Nation Game and then Best Alternate History Game in 2013 (category later renamed Best Overall Shared Worlds)
Glories of Eden: A Scramble for Africa NG 14 Sep 2017 to 12 Dec 2017
Le drapeau sur Haut, The Story of the Five Way Cold War By Kaiser K. 25 Sep 2013 to 13 Nov 2013.
A Song of Ice and Fire By Gurroruo. Run from 15 Dec 2013
Divide et Imperia Run from 26 May 2016 to 29 Oct 2016.
Diplomacy and Domination: A Timeskip Nation Game 29 May 2012 to 25 Jul 2012
Echoes of Imperium 11 Jun 2017 to 27 Aug 2017
The Greatest Game & The Greatest Game: The Spring of Nations This two part series was the winner of the 2015 Turtledove Award for Best Overall Shared Worlds
