Megalomania is a text based strategy game and is completely browser based on an hourly tick/update, the game is persistent with no set round and is meant to be played over months so is quite slow so that you only need to visit once every day or so.

Since we started in 2005 the game has grown to be an in-depth nation sim combined with a space exportation game and is constantly being updated with new features and improvements.

When you join you get to choose a planet to create your country on, you then get to guide your country through from the Stone Age to Space Age and eventually out into space to colonise new worlds.

The main features of megalomania are: 

1. An active community with a busy forum and many established groups (clans) that can be joined.

2. 7 Ages to progress through each with their own unique technologies to research, staring with the Stone Age and ending with the Space Age.

3. Advanced war system with 100s of military units to buy and the option to design your own.

4. Players can cooperate by creating or joining groups, these are an important part of the game a they allow a group of countries to work together for their cause and defend each other.

5. Trade resources, technology, arms and more with other countries on your planet.

6. Mine, manufacture and trade the seven resources food, wood, metal, oil, gold, uranium and antimatter.

7. 5 Different types of planets that you can inhabit each with its own unique research, special weapons and space ships.

8. Construct several different space ships to explore space, battle enemies, build and supply colonies on other planets.

9. A massive galaxy with over 2000 star systems containing over 80,000 planets, moons and asteroids to discover.

10. Rounds have been replaced by a galaxy, this means that the planet you start on will eventually be destroyed and you will have to colonise new planets to survive.

Getting Started Guide

Welcome to Megalomania! During your time here, you will command a country using Military, Diplomacy and Trade to become a powerful empire or, should ill fate befall you, a small smudge on the boot of an enemy. This guide has been written to ensure that this doesn't happen.

I: Joining

Registering your username should be relatively straight-forward so I won't go into details. However, your most important decision starts now. You need to choose a planet for your country to reside in.

Not all planets are the same; in fact they are all relatively different. By navigating to the 'Worlds' page on the left side menu, you can view a list of planets that can be started on.

However, some planets are not open or have been closed for various reasons. Still, you can look around each planet and its stats.

It is always worth starting on a planet with high food as food is a very valuable resource to a starting player. Metal and Uranium also play a big part later on in the game. It is recommended to find a planet with high values of these resources, though of course this is not always possible.

Newer planets are a better choice for new players because you to start at the first ages this means you are more gradually introduced to the game and no one else had a head start, there are also newbie planets that don't allow experienced players to join these are identified by a "(N)" on the list.

Now you have chosen your planet you need to lay the foundations of your country. You must enter a name for your country and capital city and you're set!

II: The Menu

On the left you have your basic menu tabs, these are 'Game', 'World', 'Country', 'Diplomacy', 'Military' and 'Trade' once one is clicked it will open a sub menu containing the pages under that category.

As the game progresses you will unlock two other tabs; 'Space' and 'Intelligence'. The 'Space' tab is unlocked when any space related technology is researched. The 'intelligence' tab is unlocked when 'Spying' is researched.

III: Game

The Game tab is very simple. It contains the 'Home' page which must be clicked on for your country to update. You will only gain income from taxes (which will be explained later) by going here.

Scrolling to the left is a short list of information about your country on the top of every page. The name of your country, how much money you currently have and same goes for your Land, Metal, Gold, Oil, Wood, Uranium, Antimatter, Antimatter and Food.

You also have some rankings for players and groups. How your country compares as the 'biggest' (The amount of land you have compared to other countries on the planet), how rich it is (In terms of how high your country's average income is compared to others), how populated it is compared to others and its military prowess compared to other country's. Each hour, your country will automatically update. Note that you don't need to check each hour, your income and resources will accumulate for each hour while you away.

The M.I.N. (Megalomania Interactive News) tab is the news for the whole game, things like new planets, stars and important game news are posted here. Countries and groups can also post messages and announcements  here, these have to be confirmed by our staff before they are displayed.

You will also find the community points tab here, this page displays information about community points that are rewarded for contributing to the megalomania community by posting on the forum and referring new members. These points can be exchanged for things like resources, experimental space ships, custom military units and an extra colony.

IV: World

Now in the World tab, on the Countries page you can look at the countries that inhabit your world, these can be sorted by land area, money, population and country or ruler name. The Groups page shows which are the richest 'Normal' Groups, Military Groups and Trade groups.

Here, you can also view the list of known worlds, wars that are taking place and the world news which will give a brief rundown of important happenings. Such as a nuclear strike against another country, the planet progressing into new ages and wars.

The records tab shows the best countries and groups in several categories, the top 5 biggest and best monuments can also be checked here. If you follow the world history link you can view how the total population, land, countries, military and wars have changed over the planets history.

V: Country

Next on the list you have the 'Country' tab; the most important of them all. It contains Agriculture, your country's info, cities, jobs, monuments, countries news, people and tax. Later on, you will also gain another page to control mining and power.

Agriculture is farming. It governs how much food your country has, how much it needs and how much is made. Each country is given a random Soil number which determines how much food is made, this can be raised/lowered by gaining lands of varying soil and lowered by nuclear winters caused by nuclear war.

The Farming Technology number represents the improvements gained from technology and it can be raised by competing Farming research (i.e. Plough, Cattle Breeding). You can also gain food from fishing, you can only fish from cities that have a harbour or port. Beware that global fish stocks are limited and over fishing could cause them to run out.

Wood is also within the Agriculture page; simply state how much wood you want to cut during your update and it will continue until tree resources are depleted. Trees will replenish themselves automatically and can also be gained through gaining land in wars. The amount you can cut is increased through technology.

Cities gives a brief over view of your countries cities and how they are doing and allows you to build monuments to attract tourists and show your power, the price of a monument goes up by how tall/big it is. Its important to keep your cities repaired and its transport links upgraded as this will help improve you countries over all economy.

The information page shows how much resources your country has, these are either mined or made through agriculture. An important part of this page is your Reserves, these are your country's raw materials that are ready to use.

There are also deposits, your country can only mine when there are deposits to mine. So if a resource in your deposits drops to 0, you can't mine any more of that resource.