As it stands, Secret Government is an interesting concept let down by a very boring gameplay loop. As a fan of grand strategy games, I look forward to seeing what it is done with the secret society concept as the game develops in Early Access. If the game stays as it is or the flaws pinpointed here are not addressed, however, I can’t honestly recommend it to anyone.

Shadow Empire has tons of personality, playing with science fiction, apocalypses, resource management, RPGs, and card games. But everything in Secret Government feels like a dry imitation of a dry Paradox game. Shadow Empire also reveals things as you play. You learn clever systems that interact with each other in interesting ways. But playing Secret Government never goes beyond the feeling of tweaking values in a spreadsheet without any innovative interactions or even meaningful systems. Numbers, all the way down, lined up in rows and columns with all the expected interactions, in a game that lets you do a lot of little things that don’t matter much in the hopes that eventually something’s going to happen that might matter a little. All the while, make sure you keep Ramiro Vazquez’ secrecy topped off.