ARES-1 Colony Command
Colony sims usually teach you to build. "ARES-1 Colony Command" teaches the opposite — to survive when there is nothing to build from. You land with five people, six buildings and one rule: make it to sol 100.
Why it is not "another survival game"
There is no chaotic real-time pressure. Time moves only when you click — the "NEXT SOL" button advances the colony to the next Martian day. It changes everything: every sol is a separate decision, not a reaction to a blinking red panel.
Five resources — oxygen, food, water, power and morale — are not abstract bars. They are interlocked: a dust storm cuts solar output by 60%, so you burn stored energy; quarantining the greenhouse eats 20% of food but keeps the harvest alive. Any resource hitting zero ends the run.
Events with no right answer
Each sol may bring a situation with two or three options. A solar flare: shelter the crew (lose power) or ignore it (hurt people). A fungal outbreak: quarantine (−20 food) or study it (−10 food, +50 science). The same choice yields different results on easy and brutal difficulty — the level changes not only resource drain speed but event damage too.
Upgrades that outlive a sol
Mission score is spent in the "UPGRADES" shop on permanent building improvements: airlock seal strength, ice drill yield, solar array capacity. It is the only cumulative progress — it does not carry between runs, but inside a run it shifts the pace by mid-game.
How to play ahead
The classic beginner mistake is hammering "NEXT SOL" without a plan. Check all five bars first: if morale is below 40%, the next sol may bring a crew conflict, and the only answer left will be "increase rations" — and rations eat food you do not have. Early on, keep morale through small wins: studying anomalies and collecting supply drops give the score that later pays for upgrades.
The second mistake is ignoring the shop. 200 saved points by sol 30 become "−25% oxygen consumption" — and that is 30 extra sols of colony life.
The third is always picking the safe option. Sometimes "study the fungus" beats "quarantine": science gives points, and points give upgrades.
Full resource and control reference — in the "How to play" block next to the game, in Russian and English.