I just pulled a game off a Steam sale that seems like it'd be a hit over here: Massive Chalice, by DoubleFine. If I had to describe it in a sentence, it would be "This is if Game of Thrones took place on Discworld, with XCOM gameplay."
You have a kingdom under attack by mysterious magical forces, and you build up heroes to fight for the kingdom by marrying other heroes together to found great houses. The descendants of each house inherit traits (and classes) from their parents. And the game time scale is much longer than a lifetime. So, unlike XCOM where you get attached to a single soldier, in this game you get attached to and invest in a whole bloodline. I'm really enjoying that mechanic. My current star family is House Flammable, and my current strategic issue is to found a new bloodline that will give me a sorely needed supply of caber-tossing troops.
(Discworld, remember?)
I'm not very far in, but the combination of silliness, epic setting, and tabletop mechanics seems like a thing people here would enjoy.
The concept sounds really cool, but the reviews on Steam aren't super encouraging for long-term play. Let us know how it turns out; it's one of those games I really want to be good.
"To such simple minds, my advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic!"
Okay, so, I'm about 100 game years in, which is one third of the way to the end. I am really enjoying the game, but it's not perfect.
I just founded my fourth major house. My kingdom now consists of House Flammable, specializing in Hunters (stealthy archers); House Kravos, alchemists (grenadiers); House Lerico, caberjacks (melee brawlers); and the newest is House Ness, more caberjacks. I've lost one full province to the corruption, but it was a sacrifice to keep the rest of the kingdom relatively clean, like South America often is in XCOM. There have been a number of game events so far, and I have to say, the tone of this game often has me laughing and choosing actions for the silliness rather than anything else. I ordered a hero to try to catch a passenger ostrich, only to have a province get mad at me because they consider the bird sacred!
I've been successful at leveling up my heroes. It's interesting how they only gain about the same amount of experience per battle, and on their own the best hero might advance from level 1 to level 4 during their lifespan. But I'm now starting with some level 5 guys, thanks to the benefit of appointing a high-XP trainer, who grants all trainees experience between tactical battles. That's a natural way to see higher-level stuff as the game progresses.
I'm also starting to notice that the individual houses have developed some character of their own. The Kravoses have tons of babies - they practically have representatives in the households of every other keep, and they're always in my battlefield troops. The Flammables are kind of mavericks, mostly average but with a few standouts. When their founding regent died, he left his 60-year-old widow to go on to have a great second wind. She fought two battles and went on to become the founding Standard (the trainer).
What I think this game lacks is that it doesn't throw itself fully into the idea that you should get attached to the houses and the house politics. Heroes only live to see about two or three battles, so you can't get too attached. I remember some of the early ones, but by now they are running together. What I'd love to see is to have each house accrue a history that you can view and that affects things in the game world. For example, the game tells me that Flammable and Kravos are having a feud. But the only effect is that when members of those families who have the "feud" personality are in battle together, their accuracy is reduced. I'd rather hear songs about how Kravos sucks when I click on the Flammable keep, or have a Flammable hero suddenly disappear between battles. They could have done a lot more to give the houses in-game personalities.
Anyway, I'm generally the kind of guy to imagine those details, so it doesn't feel like a huge wasted potential to me. Overall I like the game. I'm interested to see how it moves along plot-wise now that I've established a strong strategic position.