They Are Billions

 PC
User Score
6.9

Mixed or average reviews- based on 164 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 92 out of 164
  2. Mixed: 41 out of 164
  3. Negative: 31 out of 164

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  1. Sqirch
    Jun 25, 2019
    5
    They Are Billions is a game with a wonderful concept, beautiful sounds and music, the graphics have this cartoonish look and are a pleasure to see, the gameplay is enjoyable. At this moment, there are three modes to play: Campaign, Survival and Custom games, the latter I didn’t explore it yet but from what’ve researched is actually the most interesting mode.
    Campaign was just released and    They Are Billions is a game with a wonderful concept, beautiful sounds and music, the graphics have this cartoonish look and are a pleasure to see, the gameplay is enjoyable. At this moment, there are three modes to play: Campaign, Survival and Custom games, the latter I didn’t explore it yet but from what’ve researched is actually the most interesting mode.
    Campaign was just released and is being improved after the initial backlash, both Campaign & Survival mode are Ironman, which means you can’t manually save/load while playing, you can lose extremely easily on this game, all you need is a lone zombie to go your tents and you’re finished, and after that you’ll have to start again from scratch. On Survival, the maps are also randomly generated so many times you’ll restart because the Starting Position is bad. You also have a number of different map types, only one is unlocked and you unlock map type by map type by finishing the earlier one with the necessary Score Factor (number zombies & days until the final wave), most of the content is gated.

    This game is good for those who love the challenge but also have the patience & time to invest, I never finished the 1st map type of Survival and I even read on forums people taking as much as 100 hours of game time to do it. It really depends on if you think this’ll be okay for you or not. The game can be extremely frustrating and feel like a waste of time.
    My last Survival map went like this – I was expanding well and having fun, then the announcer said “a wave is coming from the North”, so I prepared for that and sent my troops there but the wave came from the East instead, which is different from North on my book, and as soon they got in, it was a game over. While I had fun, it ended up feeling like a waste of my time, because my time is limited and I don’t have enough to invest on this game until the pay-off becomes good. When I invest time & money on a product, there has to be a pay-off to justify the investment.
    I believe tutorials and even Skirmish mode where you could play specific maps and all map types with the ability to Save/Load would help, and having two Campaign modes where one was Ironman and the other wasn’t would be good and more inclusive instead of being exclusive.

    In conclusion, this game is good for those who are hardcore and have time to invest, for the rest of the gamers demographic it might not be so good, at least at the moment. I’ll still keep an eye for it because I truly love the concept.

    5/10    … Expand
  2. denwer
    Apr 8, 2020
    5
    I totally agree with the Vasot, at the first glance game looks OK, but there are only 3 types of missions ( "hero", "kill swarm(zombies)" and "build colony"). Your colony almost always located in the open area, which means that you can be attacked from 4 sides.
    "Build a colony" is the most disappointing mission type, where you should attract 600 colonists, for example (3rd mission), so    I totally agree with the Vasot, at the first glance game looks OK, but there are only 3 types of missions ( "hero", "kill swarm(zombies)" and "build colony"). Your colony almost always located in the open area, which means that you can be attacked from 4 sides.
    "Build a colony" is the most disappointing mission type, where you should attract 600 colonists, for example (3rd mission), so you should build about 60-80 houses and protect them from zombies, which is more boring and irritating, than challenging task.
    Also, I was got upset, that you open most of the units and buildings using research tree where you apply point which you got from completing the missions, accept from this research tree you have very limited variety units and building.
    Also, there is no classic save/load opportunity, you quit and the game remembers this moment and continues from it. You cannot restart the mission, which is a washout. I made a mistake in 1 mission (build a colony) and concentrate on houses for colonists and not army and zombies attacked from 3 sides and units are slow and sometimes stuck in buildings, so I almost loose, so I wish there were restart and quickly save and load options to change your strategy when you find mistakes in your planning.
    Also sometimes buildings explode for no reason, maybe it interesting mechanic for hard or nightmare difficulty, but at normal difficulty (which I played) it also irritates a bit.

    All in all, the game has an interesting theme and some gameplay mechanics, but after playing 3-4 hours I cannot call it enjoyable. I waited that it would be like Frostpunk, interesting and challenging, but about zombies, but this game has more boring and irritating moments, than challenging.
    Maybe I missed something, but I cannot recommend this game at the current state.    … Expand
  3. nilsy
    Sep 24, 2019
    5
    Frustrating game, its basically a very hard tower defense game.
    My biggest grip is that if you invest lot of effort and time the payback is not large enough and the game felt "fiddly" which is a nightmare with snowball effects.
  4. Almoststan
    Feb 6, 2020
    7
    A fun and aesthetically pleasing game that can easily give you hours of entertainment, but for me its campaign kind of lacks a certain something. Its difficulty curve too, seems way off. The early game, especially for newcomers will feel very brutal, as the condition for victory seem way too steep early game, in particular some unnecessary time constraints on missions, and very highA fun and aesthetically pleasing game that can easily give you hours of entertainment, but for me its campaign kind of lacks a certain something. Its difficulty curve too, seems way off. The early game, especially for newcomers will feel very brutal, as the condition for victory seem way too steep early game, in particular some unnecessary time constraints on missions, and very high population counts if you have yet to research cottages. Speaking off, some research buildings are absolutely necessary, like aforementioned housing, to complete certain missions. Other research items will make the game an absolute cakewalk, in particular the farms, thermal plants and wasp turrets. Once those get built about 80% of all future missions are a cakewalk.… Expand
  5. Thilus
    Nov 18, 2019
    5
    The game's main problem is that it is absolutely unforgiving. If anything goes down (and it takes just one zombie to overtake your whole colony, mind you!), you can retire the mission and start again. And the missions take hours sometimes. One wrong move, and you're done. And that's on "normal" difficulty. I mean, there are lower difficulty levels, but for some reason Easy is very easy,The game's main problem is that it is absolutely unforgiving. If anything goes down (and it takes just one zombie to overtake your whole colony, mind you!), you can retire the mission and start again. And the missions take hours sometimes. One wrong move, and you're done. And that's on "normal" difficulty. I mean, there are lower difficulty levels, but for some reason Easy is very easy, while Normal is very hard. That's just bad balance. The game has a lot of potential, but it's badly executed. I don't want to spend time on game that's going to punish me for little mistakes or some hasty decision when I'm playing on Normal. Sorry, move over game.… Expand
  6. Wiebe
    Feb 26, 2020
    6
    Fun to play at first, great concept, but gets tedious and repetitive after a while, single player campaign was also bad.
  7. hoanns
    Jun 5, 2020
    5
    Kinda repetitive, but cool setting. Kinda repetitive, but cool setting .....
  8. SubaqueousDream
    Jun 19, 2020
    7
    A solid game with great replayability but the annoying voice lines from units are extremely repetitive.
  9. cmfrip
    Jul 28, 2020
    6
    The game is crude, badly designed at times and certainly throws punishment at you . However the actual game dynamics do work and of course with all good puzzle games, winning after a long effort is worth it - it can be quite rewarding.

    It sure is nice developing the knowledge to manipulate the game in your favour - but it is an RTS city-builder - so this comes with the genre and it    The game is crude, badly designed at times and certainly throws punishment at you . However the actual game dynamics do work and of course with all good puzzle games, winning after a long effort is worth it - it can be quite rewarding.

    It sure is nice developing the knowledge to manipulate the game in your favour - but it is an RTS city-builder - so this comes with the genre and it succeeds in being good at that. In this way, it can be quite addictive. If it did not have it's flaws I would give it 7/10 – so I will give it 6/10 – it is a good game if it's not flummoxing you! Its better than Dungeons 3 for sure!

    So if you like Sim/strategy/Tower defence/Puzzle games or you are a sadist, then you should get this when its at a decent price. £25 is too much for a game that is taking Warcraft 3 and adding to mechanics (Dota did it, but that was 20 years ago) especially since I would opine key features are missing or it is just so buggy. I would pay £10-15; it is worth that for sure. This is on my wishlist therefore(I played on a game pass).

    There are several mission types, but the base-building one is it's forte because the way combat is, it's missable (given units behave like on C&C or warcraft); They sit there firing and that's it. The variation seems welcome though.

    Steam punk and zombies are well traversed themes, and to bind them together is not an indication of creativity, rather a cede to get footfall, and although there is creativity there, I am not amazed by it.

    Most audio I turned off though - Did not like the battle chatter or the music. The music is OK for the theme, romantic Orchestral type music you would listen to whilst hob-nobbin' with the rich technocrats of a steam punk era.

    About it's perceived flaws:
    -The worst sin this game commits is making you play without saving; You get one automated save game every five minutes, which is not long enough to stop anything in this game. This is one of the most miserable aspects of the game. Play for 2 hours, catastrophe occurs. Do it again. Absolute misery. Thankfully there is a mission forfeit option....
    -The game design requires you keep your settlement closed tight and all areas cleared: The problem with that is that the dynamics do not allow for mistakes. A single zombie getting into your settlement will result in absolute catastrophe and often enough this little problem is best solved by being observant - i.e. you going back and forth between places to ensure the z's do not get to where they should not be - this can get taxing very quickly.
    -This is compounded by the announcer not being specific sometimes - or changing lines so you are not quite sure what the problem is.
    -Camera seeking to locations where the disturbance takes place often requires an extra 5-30 seconds to find the offender(no indicator-you need to find them manually). However, Z's at the best of times do not look much less than citizens, infact citizens when hobbling home after a long day, seem to shamble.(I would too after a hard day's toiling!).
    -The resource monitors indicators also are tucked into the bottom right hand corner, and really could have been presented in a different way... I often stare at this and come away with nothing.
    -Did I mention about the building UI? i.e. not describing fellow building resource usage so you have to guess (1 of many bugs nuances)
    -Additionally to that, you cant overlap a building's coverage – This can be very frustrating -especially when alarms are going off , or you need to do your 1 minute patrol.
    -AI can be dumb so it will sit there and not shoot anything, so they need hand holding ALL the time!
    -path-finding AI can also cause you problems i.e. walking through z-wilderness instead of a settlement...
    -Adding to this, the way the walls work can block thoroughfare, but don't tell you(untill all hell breaks lose and an army walks round, rather across a gate)
    ***This list gets longer...***

    Its not too bad! Restarting a 2 hour game, however, really is :/    … Expand
  10. GurmpyCoolCat
    Sep 15, 2019
    7
    Great concept and fun gameplay. This game is more difficult than others that I have played of this genre. I would say each solo match is just so very long. They need a faster speed option for advancing time. You will kill a whole lot zombies!!
  11. MaximumGaming
    Aug 7, 2022
    6
    I think the developers dropped the ball big time, the campaign missions are very bland, there are no interesting characters or set pieces.

    The hero missions are a bore, you walk your hero around a large complex and slowly shot things. where's the interesting dialog or interactions? The hero is underutilised the points you put into him are simple things like higher attack or health, why    I think the developers dropped the ball big time, the campaign missions are very bland, there are no interesting characters or set pieces.

    The hero missions are a bore, you walk your hero around a large complex and slowly shot things. where's the interesting dialog or interactions? The hero is underutilised the points you put into him are simple things like higher attack or health, why can't you give him abilities that help your army or make him semi powerful by himself to encourage reply. He doesn't even join your army.

    The swarm missions are dull, we could of been given different objectives with a small force etc.

    Games like Starcraft 2, warcraft, spellforce, command & conquer deliver a much more immersive story which this game sadly lacks.

    To sum up the campaign disappoints in every way possible, it's only worth buying for the survival mode.    … Expand
  12. RealPlayer666
    Dec 20, 2020
    6
    Strong 6 score. There is too many completely rubbish technology's in game, it's almost impossible to play at many different way (RTS suppose to have that option), and you can bite you enemies (this is strategy game not arcade). However nice graphics, high difficult level and many options.
  13. kerkdeller
    Jan 8, 2023
    7
    Im not too well versed in strategy games, but Im glad I found this as a more simplified RTS experience. Feels very reminiscent of Age Of Mythology. Can be frustrating to spend 1 hour + on a match only to fail and have to start all over again, but that's generally the gameplay loop of these games.

Awards & Rankings

68
#68 Most Discussed PC Game of 2019
53
#53 Most Shared PC Game of 2019

Critic Reviews

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Metascore
77

Generally favorable reviews - based on 12 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 9 out of 12
  2. Mixed: 3 out of 12
  3. Negative: 0 out of 12
  1. Games.cz
    Aug 19, 2019
    70
    Solid, but unbalanced mix of strategy genres. It suffers from several suspect design choices that all but destroy the tempo of the game, further exacerbated by a lacklustre story campaign.
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  2. Game Informer
    Jul 23, 2019
    80
    They Are Billions is an interesting mashup of classic RTS, tower defense, and survival that successfully conjures up that “one more game” feel, assuming you can persevere through countless defeats.
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  3. Wccftech
    Jul 15, 2019
    85
    They Are Billions offers an almost perfect gameplay loop, mixing tower-defence with city building and exploration, as you balance resource-management, defence and offense, all against your ever-impending doom at the hands of a world infested with the undead. The only downside to a game that looks and sounds great, offering a tense experience in a compelling setting, is a campaign that doesn't fully make-use of the gameplay loop perfected by Numantian Games, leaving the campaign feeling weak, compared to the survival mode, which is the real draw.
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