Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory

Enemy Territory is a free multiplayer FPS set during WWII. It was originally planned to be released as a commercial expansion pack to the popular FPS Return to Castle Wolfenstein and later as a standalone game. However, due to problems with the single-player aspect, the multiplayer portion was released on May 29, 2003 as a freeware standalone game. In early 2004 the source code for the game logic (not the game engine) was released to the benefit of its modding community. The game uses a modified RTCW engine, itself being a modified Quake III: Team Arena engine (which has been open-source since 2005).
Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory is an online multi-player game, where the players interact with each other over a network in two teams (Allies and Axis) to defend or destroy mission objectives. The game is playable over the Internet or a Local Area Network. Like many online games, cheating and exploit communities exist. To counter this, the game has support for PunkBuster, an anti-cheat solution.
There are six officially released maps (North Africa Campaign: Gold Rush, Siwa Oasis, and Seawall Battery; Europe Campaign: Rail Gun, Wurzburg Radar, and Fuel Dump), as well as hundreds of custom maps made by the internet community. On each map, the offense needs to complete a certain set of objectives within a limited amount of time. The defense needs to keep the offense from completing objectives until time runs out. Some objectives may be optional, and some objectives can be carried out by either team. These minor objectives assist the team completing them. Depending on Game Mode the action will continue on another map (Campaign Mode) or the same map (Objective Mode, Stopwatch Mode, Last Man Standing).
In all but the LMS mode, dead players respawn all at the same time, every X seconds. In the default maps - assuming that the server settings aren't changing it - Allies spawn every 20 seconds and the Axis every 30 seconds, the only exception being Rail Gun where both have a 20 second spawn. With default settings, you can see the spawn timer in the right side of the screen. Experienced players should watch the timer all the time - dying to a 1 second spawn practically means losing your position (and a life, if the server has the rarely used Limited Lives feature enabled) and resetting your health and ammo, while a 30 second spawn can be deadly if there are only a few players. A good tactic is to find out the spawn time of your enemy, for example looking at the mission timer, and time your attacks so that every dead opponent will have to wait a full time spawn. Players can gain experience in three skills: Battle Sense, Light Weapons, and a skill determined by their current class. Certain class skill benefits remain with the player even if they change classes. Benefits from general skills are available regardless of class. Once a player has accrued enough experience points in a particular skill, the skill is automatically advanced to the next level, providing the player with a new ability or advantage. There are four attainable levels in each skill, awarded at 20, 50, 90 and 140 experience points.

Magic: The Gathering Online

Magic: The Gathering Online (MTGO) or Magic Online is a direct video game adaptation of Magic: The Gathering, utilizing the concept of a virtual economy in order to preserve the collectible aspect of the card game. It is played through an Internet service operated by Wizards of the Coast, which went "live" in June 2002. Users can play the game or trade cards with other users. It is only officially available for the Microsoft Windows operating system.
As of February 2007, Magic Online has over 300,000 registered accounts; however this does not represent the true number of players, since people are allowed to register multiple accounts. At different times during the day and night, Magic Online hosts on average 2,000-4,000 simultaneously logged in accounts; according to the developers, there is a hard limit of 4,400 players in version 2.5.
According to Wizards of the Coast, Magic Online is "somewhere between 30% to 50% of the total Magic business."
Magic Online is played as an electronic analogue to the physical card game. Digitized artwork reproduces the look of a card game, while users click on cards to play them on a virtual tabletop. Each game is hosted by the server, which applies a rules engine to enforce proper play. The logic for handling card interactions is provided by Perl scripts. Though the rules set as a whole is largely accurate and works well enough for production, it occasionally suffers from bugs. Similarly, built-in engine limitations frequently impose clumsy user interface characteristics such as having to click away a large number of pop-up windows that can be generated by certain cards. This is one of the issues being addressed by the revamped version 3 software.
Players are free to setup or join games of their choice. In addition, official events such as leagues, drafts and tournaments take place according to a regular schedule. Entering events requires an investment of sealed packs and/or event tickets, but winners are also rewarded with additional product. Some players equate this to gambling.

Sins of a Solar Empire

If you have ever wished that your favorite turn based/4X strategy game had elements of a real time game or vice versa then Sins of a Solar Empire could be the game you're looking for. Ironclad Games has masterfully built a grand strategy game that has all the depth and empire building elements of a traditional 4X style game which plays out in real time.
Just to set the record straight, Sins of a Solar Empire is not a traditional turn based strategy game. All of the empire building, research, exploration, and combat plays out in real time. However, it is paced in such a way that enables you to manage both your empire building operations and combat that keeps the game moving with out sacrificing the level of detail you would like to micro manage your empire.
In each game of Sins of a Solar Empire you'll start with a single planet, one shipyard and some money which you'll use to construct and expand your empire. Nearby asteroids can be used to harvest resources and act as outpost while scout and colony ships can be sent out in search of new planets to colonize. The size of a particular game depends on the scenario selected at the start. There are nearly two dozen different scenarios to choose from; the selection screen gives some basic information on each such as the number of stars, planets, maximum number of players and what game type the map/scenario is best suited for. It's worth noting that game can get quite long, even the smallest maps can take hours on end to conquer.
Conducting research is the way you'll be able to advance and expand your civilization. Ship upgrades, new technology and advanced infrastructure are all acquired from doing research. In Sins of a Solar Empire research is broken down into 4 main groups; combat research, civic research, fleet logistics, and artifacts. The combat and civic research trees are unique for each faction and split into three sub-categories, these allow you to research new ships, ship upgrades, weapons, economy and more. Fleet logistics allows you to research advanced training that enables you to support more ships and larger fleets. Finally the artifacts branch of research is for researching rare technologies that can be discovered on expeditions to new planets. Although each of the game's three factions has a unique technology tree, they are all very well balanced so that there's not one superior to another. However, even in some medium length games you may find yourself exhausting the tech tree well before the game is over, this contributes to slowing the game down and making it mostly combat oriented and one dimensional.
Sins of a Solar Empire is an epic strategy game that can keep you up late at night. It does a great job of blending different aspects of all strategy game genres. The game does lack a single player campaign but single and multiplayer campaigns play out so well it's not really missed. The excellent game play, interface, and graphics all combine to make Sins of a Solar Empire one of the top strategy games and an all around excellent PC game.