After waking up somewhat early, I sat down and tried Defcon by "the last of the bedroom coders" Introversion Software. The game’s premise and visuals are fascinating: an RTS about global thermonuclear warfare, with a graphical style borrowed from tactical displays (as seen in movies like the inspirational Wargames).

After a simple and clear tutorial, you can start freeform games in a multiplayer-oriented fashion. There are no campaign or missions, but you can make games versus AI. A timer pushes through 5 distinct defcon phases which represent unit deployment, movement, initial engagements and finally full-scale nuclear launches against cities and military targets. The game’s speed can be increased in a very intuitive manner to push through periods of non-activity. Final scores are determined by civilian casualties, since it is pretty much impossible to completely eliminate an enemy.

The learning curve is steep because of the game’s truly strategic nature: deployment decisions in the beginning can severely affect the final outcome. This will likely put off many people wanting a more direct and "twitchy" experience, but the more patient strategy fans should love the need to consider ranges, timing, intel, and the need to balance military / civilian targets and offense / defense forces.

With such a limited set of units and features, Introversion has done an excellent job creating a deep game where every decision counts.