It does not appear we can send messages to other members of the forum and some of you I am curious to read what other games you play(besides MMO's) to help give me ideals on things to satisfy my gamer needs until Hegemony Rome comes out. Ive tried a lot and have over 100 games on Steam with only 2% I actually play.

Ive tried a lot and have over 100 games on Steam with only 2% I actually play.

yeah me too.
I was hesitant to reply to this thread, hesitant to promote other games on Longbows forum, but as there are many, many of us hanging around waiting for Rome to be released i suppose a thread here helping to keep us visiting the site, and helping to keep us a community while waiting wont do any harm, i hope Longbow don't mind.

As for my answer: If you're asking for anything similar to Hegemony then i cant help u. there's nothing that fills that gap that i am aware of. However there are 2 games that i play on a daily basis that i would highly recommend people to try.
Battleforge
http://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/battleforge/user-reviews
This has an unfairly low user-rating based on the free-to-play model. in 3 years of playing this game i have spent less than the price of a AAA title and for that have had thousands and thousands of hours (no exaggeration) of blood-pumping excitement in the 1v1 PvP.

Natural Selection 2
http://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/natural-selection-2/user-reviews

I am hopelessly addicted to crusader kings. I to have a huge steam library with only a few games I play, mostly due dissapointments or publisher packs. but the game I have the most hours on is hegemony, europa universalis, rome total war and crusader kings. Try some of the mods on CK2, the lux invicta mod has a few rome and greek empire successor states you can play to try and recreate the empire of alexander or ceaser

Crusader Kings 2 and other paradox games are very good.

But since we are in an indie forum I think some indie games are ready for some mentioning. Unfortunately none of these are similar to Hegemony or even real war games as such. However I am sure we all have a wider variety of tastes than just killing stuff and taking slaves (right guys....?).

First on my list is Kerbal Space Program. It is a game about making a space program for some little green guys. Build a rocket (or a spaceplane) in a handy little editor that is vaguely similar to the Spore creature creator. Then launch it, and probably watch the little guys die unless you remembered to put a parachute on it. It has a fairly realistic physics simulator without being too HARDCORE. Plus, it has a demo that only limits the scale of the solar system and the number of parts and concurrent launches you can do.....pretty good as far as demo's go.

Number 2 is Kenshi. One of the first 10 games to be greenlit on steam, still in heavy alpha but the newest patch has implemented the beginnings of many of the major non-combat elements promised such as decent bases, shops and production chains. Demo exists and it limits you to 2 guys in your squad and stops skills from advancing past a certain cap. Worth the bandwidth at least to try.

Number 3, UnrealWorld. Survival roguelike-esque survival simulator set in iron-age finland. Start out as some random dude with a knife; don't die. Also, the latest patch as of 3 or 4 days ago introduced a fully free version that is being funded by donations as a test of the new funding system. How can you pass up free? Especially when it was about $30 previously.

At the very least try checking these things out. You have very little to lose and all have demos of some sort.

As a couple others have already stated Paradox games are freaking awesome, not as good as Hegemony but close! It's especially cool that they have games that cover different periods of time and they all play differently and are quite unique. Combat leaves something to be desired but that's not the point of most of their games anyway. Other than that (I know you said no MMO's but here's one anyway) lord of the rings online is really an amazing game, especially if you're a fan of middle-earth! Other than that, The Witcher games, Skyrim, and uh...that one series with Allister...dragons...I can't think of it. Oh older Civilization games are fun too, Civ 5 was a huge let down but 4 is great!

thnx your suggestions does show how Hegemony gold stands out in its own. There is really nothing that can come close therefore i give kudos to Longbow games for a great game. I occupy my time with Towns for now........a game i can do a few moves and go afk...rinse repeat. Yes, i am a lazy gamer.

1.: X3 - Terran Conflict. A game that focuses both military tactics and huge possibilities in trading and making money. The probably best thing about it: If you're a beginner, you can make some money slowly, if you're a professional X gamer, you can get the money faster. The trading part is quite foolproof and the fighting part is quite dangerous if you haven't bought a capital ship yet. Makes a good balance imho.

2.: Evil Genius. An (a little bit) comic-like and very funny game that lets you build your secret evil base on a remote island and send out your servants to achieve mission objectives and finally your most ambitious goal: The domination of the whole world. Has also got a good learning curve on normal while not becoming too easy while the game advances.

Here are some strategy games that I didn't see anyone mention and that I'm currently playing
- Birth of Rome: (Just got this one the other day, so can't give a honest opinion yet, but so far fun)
- Takeda 3: shogun tw style game, but with a little more
- Romance of the Three Kingdoms (ROTK): 9-11 are really great as well as 6
- Nobunaga's Ambition Iron Triangle: this is a real time strategy game with a feel similar to the ROTK series
- The Great Battles series: I'm currently playing the Hannibal one, old school but fun
- Field of Glory Ancients: a miniature rule based game, but very fun. online matches as well

I've recently found a game that's gone into early release on steam called "Sir, you are being hunted". It's kind of an open world survival game like Don't Starve but it's first person and in this scenario you appear just to be evading and picking off hostile robots. I haven't played it myself yet, as my gaming rig has crapped out and I'm shopping for a much improved replacement, so I cannot recommend it from first hand experience. It looked interesting so I thought I'd share it here while we await Hegemony Rome in February.