I am puzzled by Ara Colon History Untold’s priorities. At its heart are a couple of interesting ideas undermined by its own determination to put the wrong thing on centre stage. Make a rich and elaborate resource management game with an unorthodox research system, but then spend so much time on a simultaneous turn system and detailed animations that you’re left with a cumbersome interface and lifeless AI, and you too might wind up making Ara.
There’s an almost great game here, but it’s all neglected and bruised from being shoved into the packaging of a lacklustre 4X.