7th Legion

7th Legion is a 1997 science-fiction real-time strategy game developed by Vision Software in collaboration with Epic MegaGames and published by MicroProse, released for Windows in September 1997. It is a game with one idea the 1990s RTS shelf did not have — battle cards that you play mid-fight like spells — and a reception that split down the middle: GameSpot gave it 41%, GameRankings averages 54.5%, MobyGames’ critic average sits at 61%, and PC Gaming World gave it 9.5/10. Nearly thirty years on, it survives as a $1 GOG and Steam curiosity with a small, loyal following and a Mixed user rating.

Technical Specifications

The Chosen Come Home

Overpopulation and resource exhaustion have wrecked Earth’s ecosystem. Governments evacuate much of humanity aboard colony ships; those left behind survive in the ruins and organise into seven Legions. Centuries later, the seventh generation of the Chosen returns from the stars to reclaim the planet — and finds the 7th Legion waiting. It is a class-war premise (the evacuated elite against the commoners who stayed) played as two separate campaigns, one per faction, so you see both sides of the same invasion.

Money, Cards, and a Very Odd Economy

The structure is familiar: build a base, construct structures and war machines, recruit infantry, and destroy the enemy. The differences are the point. There are no raw materials to harvest — money earned from destroying enemy units is the main source of funds, so the game pushes you into the fight rather than letting you boom behind walls. On top of that sit more than fifty Battle Cards, drawn at random and played to damage enemy troops, make mechanical units malfunction, or pay out extra cash, plus power-up boxes on the map granting invisibility or stronger units. The result is an RTS with a card layer on top, and with the swingy, luck-dependent matches that come with it.

Why the Reviews Split

Contemporary critics disagreed more than usual. Supporters praised the graphics, the card mechanic, and the aggressive economy; detractors — GameSpot gave it 41% and Game Revolution a D+ — saw a game up against Command & Conquer and Total Annihilation, which launched the same month, and coming off worse. The GOG user reviews (2.9/5) repeat the same complaints today — pathfinding, unit responsiveness, and AI — while still crediting the art and the cards. It is a game worth a look as a historical oddity, rather than as a lost classic.

Not the WoW, ESO, or Star Wars 7th Legion

The search term is crowded. The 7th Legion reputation faction in World of Warcraft (Battle for Azeroth), the Seventh Legion of The Elder Scrolls Online, the clone-trooper 7th Legion in Star Wars, the VII Legion of Warhammer 40,000, and the Roman Legio VII Claudia and Gemina are all different things. This card covers the 1997 PC strategy game by Vision Software and Epic MegaGames only.

Epic MegaGames, and the Port That Never Was

The credit that makes the game a trivia favourite is Epic MegaGames — the company that became Epic Games and, a year later, shipped Unreal. According to Wikipedia, Nintendo planned to help Epic port 7th Legion to the Nintendo 64; the port was never released.

Where to Play It Today

7th Legion is sold DRM-free on GOG ($5.99, often $0.89 on sale; English, German, and Italian) and on Steam ($6.99, often around $1, also part of the Retro Action Collection bundle). The digital release is Windows-only, runs on modern systems, and is single-player only — the online and LAN modes from the 1997 CD were removed in the 2014 re-release. At a dollar, it is a cheap way to see what a card-driven RTS looked like in 1997; just expect rough pathfinding.