Mind worms, sea pirates, and Lady Deirdre humping the Planet: Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri

...oh yeah, and Brian Reynolds designed it, mostly.

This game is a certified classic; I just re-installed it again and marveled how much they put into it, even adding narrative bits to the technology update screens.

They seriously need to update the game, for no other reason than how much more integrated planetary information systems have become over the last decade.

Also, it'd be cool if it was a lot less brown, but whatevs.

You can still buy the game for cheaps, and it's out for PC, Mac, and Linux.

http://www.technofile.com/images/alpha-centauri_box.jpg

I have a brother who can beat it on the highest difficulty with ease. Me, I can never figure out what all the SF terms correspond to.