Steel Division: Normandy 44

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Steel Division: Normandy 44 takes its cues from Eugen Systems' exceptional Wargame series, combining the titular subgenre with loads of RTS goodness. Normandy 44 takes the action back to World War 2 and tears France apart with its gargantuan battles. It's got explosive real-time fights, but with mind-boggling scale and additional complexities ranging from suppression mechanics to morale and shock tactics.

The sequel, Steel Division 2, brings with it some improvements, but unfortunately the singleplayer experience isn't really up to snuff. In multiplayer, though, it's pretty great. And if the World War 2 setting isn't your cup of tea, the older Wargame series still represents some of the best of both RTS and wargaming, so they're absolutely worth taking for a spin.

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The conclusion to Creative Assembly's Warhammer trilogy is coming this year, and it looks like it's going to be massive. The series has been gearing up for a big confrontation with the forces of Chaos, so Total War: Warhammer 3 will give us a quartet of daemonic armies to fight with, and a pretty different battlefield: the Realm of Chaos. Kislev, Cathay and the Lands of the East will also be thrown into the mix, and Creative Assembly boasts that it will have an "unprecedented scale". Expect big monsters, and a campaign that's twice the size of Warhammer 2's Eye of the Vortex campaign.

Homeworld 3

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Deserts of Kharak was fantastic, which is why you'll find it above, but who hasn't yearned for a true Homeworld sequel? Blackbird Interactive's Homeworld 3 will have 3D combat with massive scale battles that let you control everything from tiny interceptors to massive motherships, just like you'd expect, as well as moving Homeworld's saga forward.

The studio still hasn't revealed much about the sequel, though its broad vision is to capture how the original games looked and played—something it even managed to do with Deserts of Kharak, despite being a ground-based RTS—but with "meaningful improvements." One example of the changes is how the ballistic system works. It's still a long way off, though, with launch not expected until 2022.

Humankind

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After years of working on its Endless series of games, the best of which you'll find on the list above, Amplitude has now turned its attention to a historical-themed 4X game. Humankind is Amplitude's take on Civilization, featuring dynamic civilisations that are born from culture combos. You might start out playing as the Hittites in the first era, and then pick Romans later on, and then throw the Germans into the mix down the line. With new eras come new cultures that you can add to the melting pot, unlocking new culture-specific benefits.

It also expresses this through its cities, which grow throughout history, swallowing up the land around them. Some places will retain their historic attributes, like the older quarters of modern cities, while others areas will adapt as the eras progress. You'll be able to start building your civilisation later this year.