Deadlock: Planetary Conquest - Review of a Classic 90’s Turn Based Strategy Game for Mac & PC

Seven alien races compete on the face of the newly discovered planet Gallius IV, to build the most successful colony in this superb and somewhat underrated turn based strategy title from 1996. Boasting complex strategic gameplay, a very fleshed out backstory, and fully voiced assistants.
YesterYear’s Mac Games reviews what makes Deadlock: Planetary Conquest unique from the many other strategy titles from it's era, and unboxes a factory sealed example of the Macintosh port from MacSoft.
Anyone wanting to buy this game digitally to play on a modern computer should head to gog.com to get it there, where its frequently on sale for a couple of quid. Its also available on Steam but this one has been broken since launch and wont run, so seriously, avoid that.
www.gog.com/ga...

[@brucefelger4015]

This game had the BEST demo game i've ever played. 40 turns, nine squares. it could be beaten, but it wasn't a gimme, at all

[@phydeaux6380]

To this day, I the lines, "Ouch, my clavicle!" , "Spoon!" , and "Just strudel" still pop in my head.

[@RaptorShadow]

This game was my childhood obsession. I read the colonist guidebook cover to cover so many times. I used to go out in the back-yard and act out my own Deadlock stories to myself.

[@ttrenchmiranda]

I wish they'd remaster this game! Love it

[@kingrex1931]

you can select circular queue and the building will continuously build the same units. Pretty easy to do and is on the screen right in front of you. The notifications are descriptive enough, it tells you in which territory the factory/airport/shipyard/missile silo is idle. How much more descriptive does it need to be? There is an events tab at the top of the page that shows the past turns events in a list that is sorted out by type of event. It's the one that looks like a newspaper. The notifications aren't too much to go through as you can quickly click through them, but there is this way around doing so.

[@Aquascape_Dreaming]

Lol, I had no idea this was even an available option. Thanks for pointing this out.

[@AriWeismanchester]

Used to play this game all the time when I was 6-7yrs old. Daaaayum the nostalgia

[@MagicTurtle643]

I remember playing this (poorly) as a kid while my older brothers excelled at it. The Uva Mosk were my favorite, but the Tarth were much easier to win with for obvious reasons.

[@Venatius]

Surprised I never heard of this. It looks pretty solid for the era! Thanks as always. I love this channel.

[@slowpokegarcia6342]

I remember playing this game so much on windows xp. My freaking childhood

[@bloodrunsclear]

'You have less strategy of a sleeping parnesium!'

[@matthewphillips8051]

Yay! It's so good seeing this game get recognition and praise. The game was so characterful it influenced how I've looked at game design for most of my life. YYsMG, if you find the factory-managing becomes a chore, are you not a fan of the Circular Queue button for production buildings then? I found them necessary once the economic ball was rolling, and I only needed to change up the strategy when building command and scout units.

[@YesterYearsMacGames]

Thats a good point, it never really occurred to me that option could help there, although I never used it on the off chance that it rinsed me of a particular resource that I might 'have needed for something else :P

[@Quiltfish]

Nostalgia! This game is the first memory I have of media really engrossing me in it's lore..

[@oliverthomas205]

been looking for this for about 20 years! thanks.

[@MagusSartori]

I loved Deadlock! And I to have gone back and replayed multiple times. One part that I loved is how well it distinguished the different races in their playstyle and flavor/tone. "Tarth cooks make best strudel. That's all, just strudel." v=j19mg4ci69A

[@mullerandy]

Excellent review! Deadlock is a very "esoteric" and "arcane" game, therefore its very hard to make a review for YT. This one however is outstanding.

[@alfcapili1952]

OMG I love this game. I can spend the whole night playing this.

[@quicksilvertongue3248]

One of the things I love most about this game is that it's a rare exception to the trope of humans being generalists, while all the aliens or fantasy creatures are specialists in various things. In this game, there is no generalist race, unless you count the Cyth (since their strength and their weakness are both the same and kind of unrelated to anything else). Humans are one of the specialist races, and our specialty is commerce and economy, which makes so much sense that I'm astonished I can't think of another SF property which uses this premise. The other races have more military strength, more population, more resources, more technology and so forth... but we have more money.

[@demon_otf_1803]

I always liked how humans had the berserk option. Like, other species might be bigger, smarter, or have crazy mind powers....but humans get SUPER mad. lol

[@douhwufwef5207]

thank you, trying to look at old mac games that I missed because I wasn't born.

[@drewcifer9701]

I used to play the SHIT out of this game as a kid - wow what a throwback thank you so much for making this!!!!

[@SeekerLancer]

I absolutely loved this game but it got almost completely passed by. I got it from a bargain bin back in the day and was shocked at how good it was. The factions are great and full of character and and it's so fun to just build up your colonies or become a military super-power depending on what mood you're in. Deadlock 2 adds some interesting bits to the water areas and the ability to form alliances but they made the UI even worse, it really is just a minor expansion rather than a true sequel.

[@beinhartwerner6675]

Nice job & great review MacDude. :-)

[@phlogios]

Used to play this LAN with 2-4 players on G3 Powerbooks and iBooks. The game left a big impression on me and my brother.

[@GoukenGassenarl]

One of the first games I've ever played, along with Magic Carpet and Eradicator. Damn what a nostalgia trip.

[@robertdanielpickard]

The Windows version is on GOG :)

[@Simoss13]

I used to spend alot of hours in summer break playing this game. It was great! Is there a modern equivalent that I can play?

[@kevanchong4082]

there's a bug-free playable version on GOG compatible with modern comps

[@gatorchomp3371]

and there is a copy on steam. though it is buggy and i cant always get it to work

[@johnycash99]

@@kevanchong4082 Kevan, I just somehow came across this video and my jaw dropped. I haven't played this game in about... 24 years. I used to play the demo relentlessly on my mothers mac. I'm going to buy this. Thank you so much, from the bottom of my heart!

[@ameridoberrios1896]

If i ever get back home again, that recruiter......

[@luispabonecheverria1610]

Oh wowo Ive been looking for this one for ages. Used to play it all the time.

[@johnycash99]

HOLY SHIT. I COMPLETELY FORGOT ABOUT THIS GAME I DON'T KNOW HOW I GOT HERE. BUT .... AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[@BatistaHarpu]

Absolutely loved Deadlock growing up. What are the odds you have had a chance to try out another old mac strategy game called Starbound II? It was one of the most impressive games from yesteryear along with deadlock, two wonderful games that consumed much of my youth.

[@YesterYearsMacGames]

That is a new one to me! Just looked it up, its definately somthing i'll need to try

[@LastNameTom]

From time to time I always hope that someone will remake this game but make the battles RTS so you control where everyone attacks and goes instead of just watching. It was so good!

[@Steelflight773]

So loved it as a kid and looking into getting it on Gog. I never had the chance to play with another person though. That would have been fun.

[@kevanchong4082]

this would be massive, imagine playing with 6 other human players, that is gonna be great

[@Vanessarbp]

lovely video! well done ;D ! Deadlock is lovely classic!

[@Threvlin]

I'd never heard of this one before. Might need to check out more, although I will admit the quality of life features "missing" when going back to strategy games of this age can be a tad off-putting.

[@KravRage]

I'd love to have an updated mobile version.

[@Arhatu]

I would love to buy a remake or a third game. Do you have any modern recommendations for exact same formula?

[@kaoshonen]

I just downloaded the game!

[@olafsiggurdson7483]

whereeee ?

[@kaoshonen]

@@olafsiggurdson7483 Macintosh Garden!

[@jczlcheeze]

Ooh still my first and best 4x game . Definitely faster pace than civ too doesn't take 6 days to play

[@jczlcheeze]

Cht cht swarm all the way!

[@DualBrainMTG]

What an excellent game

[@jayyarbrough4497]

Loved it.

[@sakigamijojo7716]

oh boy the frustrations i got from this game when i'm already hours deep into my conquest when suddenly your people start glowing red with disappointment. I just watch everything get destroyed cause i didn't know how to handle it lmao. but boy i did enjoy this game

[@kingrex1931]

Build culture centers. You should build them before morale becomes an issue. You can also lower taxes and limit the population in a territory.

[@Darkwizzrobe]

@@kingrex1931 or just play as the Cyth

[@kingrex1931]

@@Darkwizzrobe The workers you put in a cultural center are lost to the Cyth as every 5th Cyth worker sits at home doing nothing.

[@Darkwizzrobe]

@@kingrex1931 on the plus side they don't care if you tax them or starve them or even engage in scandals.

[@kingrex1931]

The Cyth pay a lower tax rate than the other races.

[@ShaneTyas]

the game was epic still on it with GOG from time to time, anyone know who the advisor voice was, she was hypnotic at 12 am :D

[@onomatopoeia7505]

When I need to relax, I always play the tutorial of Deadlock. Oolancs voice is somehow very comforting. I did some searching and found out it was Jan Carty Marsh who did her voice (found it via the Moby Games website).

[@ShaneTyas]

@@onomatopoeia7505found this the game manual too for a full voice over reference VOICE TALENT ChCh-t Christiane Crawford Cyth Julian Lopez-Morillas Human Colin Thomson Human Commander Alexander Van Frank Human Pilot Taunya Shiffer Maug Gary R. Voss Oolan Jan Carty Marsh ReíLu Alexander Van Frank Skirineen Brian A. Vouglas Tarth J. S. Gilbert Uva Mosk Baomi Butts-Bhanji

[@ShaneTyas]

@@onomatopoeia7505absolutely, thanks for the information, found some reference to the entire voice cast in the game manual VOICE TALENT ChCh-t Christiane Crawford Cyth Julian Lopez-Morillas Human Colin Thomson Human Commander Alexander Van Frank Human Pilot Taunya Shiffer Maug Gary R. Voss Oolan Jan Carty Marsh ReíLu Alexander Van Frank Skirineen Brian A. Vouglas Tarth J. S. Gilbert Uva Mosk Baomi Butts-Bhanji

[@jarydhutchins7385]

Does the multiplayer on GoG function properly? I remember having a lot of issues with deadlock 1/2 when trying to play it back in the 2000's

[@YesterYearsMacGames]

The Gog version's multiplayer code is highly unlikely to be any different to the original games, so it should be fairly easy to play multiplayer on a local network (I do that quite often), but much harder to get running over the internet

[@chalor182]

Son, be a colonist

[@thorstenrusch8652]

Hm... reminds me that i still have this game somwhere :D

[@DaviHvianna]

Joguei muito esse jogo !!! nostalgia total!

[@cristaoforasteiro6885]

Eu tbm ate uns 2 anos atras eu jogava uma versão editada em ingles Mas estou na esperança de alguma boa alma relançar essw jogo nas plataformas atuais

[@DaviHvianna]

@@cristaoforasteiro6885 seria ótimo em!!!

[@dino6080]

❤❤😎😎

[@berakfilip]

Windows 10?

[@kristophsams5036]

I liked this one but I preferred Enemy Nations. Same kind of concept but more of a world building game with some combat thrown in

[@seanm1800]

You are losing press ctrl alt delete

[@drivewaystar6485]

I loved this game so much

[@onomatopoeia7505]

Deadsong.wav

[@andrzejwysocki609]

see this has a bad rating on steam :\ so i just got dl 2