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Empires of the Undergrowth
Command swarms of warriors at an unprecedented scale of warfare in this blend of RTS and base-building. Lead ant colonies against the many fearsome threats of the insect world, while building intricate nests, developing pheromone-based tactics, and evolving to meet growing dangers.
In short, Steam reviewers most often praise “Strategic, engaging core mechanics” (91 of 104 reviews) and “Excellent music and voice acting” (11); the most common complaint is “Campaign lacks extended content” (9). What reviewers agree on ↓
What players say
Steam review score and the most-helpful voices, which may include critical ones. Score via Steam as of 2026-09-27 · quoted reviews as of 2026-05-12.
What reviewers agree on
91 of the 104 reviews raise this.
“The game was Perfect until they ruined the UI Hud & they refuse to add an option to get the old one back. Gameplay was awesome & now it's headache inducing with all the buttons changed & the ant icons being overly…”
“Overall, it's a very enjoyable game. Enjoying both the RTS and base-building elements. On the downside, it's almost unplayable on my MacBook Air M4. First, the cursor is NOT aligned with the UI and I needed to…”
“This is one of my favorite games. When i was a little kid i would wait until school is over and right after i come home i would play this game until nightfall or in other terms the game is just that good and you should…”
11 of the 104 reviews raise this.
“Well.. if you ever wanted to learn about Ants and how they function with a fun twist, RTS colony sim? Then this is a game for you! Had a chill time with it, and can't say that its overly easy as well, cuz I had to…”
“one of the only epic ants game, and an epic narrator”
“A fresh, easy to learn smooth game. Impressive visually with fantastic music and strong voice acting. I've never wanted ants to win until now. The base building and rts elements are very straight forward--no experience…”
11 of the 104 reviews raise this.
“addicting and fun freeplay and story. We need more people posting content of this game. Not just any people people with lots of views and stuff. I Play this game everyday and so far theres nothing bad about it.”
“This game has to be a top 5 for me! I love the game, story, and levels. There's a lot of content with my only wish being more!”
“A fresh, easy to learn smooth game. Impressive visually with fantastic music and strong voice acting. I've never wanted ants to win until now. The base building and rts elements are very straight forward--no experience…”
9 of the 104 reviews raise this.
“Well.. if you ever wanted to learn about Ants and how they function with a fun twist, RTS colony sim? Then this is a game for you! Had a chill time with it, and can't say that its overly easy as well, cuz I had to…”
“This game has been in my backlog for a long time and I have been sitting on gold. It has a solid take on RTS mechanics that lends itself to the ant lover in me and my reflexes not being up to par for standard genre…”
“This is a fun game that is a big departure from my usual games. My favorite kind are medieval city builders so going in I wasn't to sure. But the tutorial was surprisingly simple and easy to get a hang of. Story mode…”
6 of the 104 reviews raise this.
“There's just something different, highly addictive, relaxing, and intense (all at once) in this title... It's definitely one of the most unique and well made RTS games I've ever played! Honestly, an awesome game well…”
“watched this game years ago when i dint have a pc recently bought worth every penny, great game and def worth the wait.”
“Fun concept, banging soundtrack, solid mechanics, varied challenges. Worth it all the way.”
9 of the 104 reviews raise this · 9 of them still recommend the game.
“AMAZING game. Replay has bean GREAT!!! I just wish there was more. Possibly a next chapter where the colony gets loose and has to learn to thrive and progress. But all in all, GREAT game. I LOVE IT!”
“Short campaign but the last few levels were fairly fun and challenging, I'll check out the hard mode at another time but overall worth it.”
“Fun and original game. I'm just a bit frustrated for now because of the lack of variation in the strategies you can use (I haven't discovered the whole game yet so maybe it gets better). I would like, for example, to be…”
6 of the 104 reviews raise this · 6 of them still recommend the game.
“It's an amazing game thats also educational. I wanted to leave this review after reading their latest news update about their DLC and about the new content they're releasing. Not only are they listening to their players…”
“This is the freshest, most interesting RTS I have played in years. If this had multiplayer I could see a lot of people having a lot of fun with this. So many different types of ants that play differently, the focus on…”
“Super fun strategy game, would be to cool to play with other players though too.”
5 of the 104 reviews raise this · 4 of them still recommend the game.
“3.5/10 gameplay loop is dull thought this would be like pikmin, one of my all time favorite games. nothing at all like that. - not much you can do with your ants. just build hoard and send hoard. - cant build any…”
“Overall, it's a very enjoyable game. Enjoying both the RTS and base-building elements. On the downside, it's almost unplayable on my MacBook Air M4. First, the cursor is NOT aligned with the UI and I needed to…”
“Very entertaining game. Very fun with the addition of remix mode. If you have any amount of interest in ants it is a crime not to buy this game. Could use a bit of work on the viewing though. Let us turn the camera!…”
4 of the 104 reviews raise this · 3 of them still recommend the game.
“3.5/10 gameplay loop is dull thought this would be like pikmin, one of my all time favorite games. nothing at all like that. - not much you can do with your ants. just build hoard and send hoard. - cant build any…”
“Overall, it's a very enjoyable game. Enjoying both the RTS and base-building elements. On the downside, it's almost unplayable on my MacBook Air M4. First, the cursor is NOT aligned with the UI and I needed to…”
“I find this really fun to play even if it's a 10 year old game now. It's single player and I enjoy that type of game most of all WITHOUT HAVING TO CONNECT TO THE INTERNET JUST TO PLAY IT. I wouldn't mind if there was…”
4 of the 104 reviews raise this · 1 of them still recommend the game.
“The game was Perfect until they ruined the UI Hud & they refuse to add an option to get the old one back. Gameplay was awesome & now it's headache inducing with all the buttons changed & the ant icons being overly…”
“Glad I bought this one on sale. If I was going to write a lesson on how not to design a user interface, this game would be my showcase. When there are so many other good games out there with properly thought-out and…”
“I was looking forward to this game, but the unresponsive nature of the UI really turned me off quick.”
Counted across 104 English reviews, sampled to match this game's 94.4% positive rating · as of 2026-05-12
“Who knew playing a ants would be so much fun?! I did i was one of the ant ppl in those covid facebook groups you know :ant goes to water, brings back droplet: or :ant found food 20 meters north tells fellow ants. Was i the only one?? P.S. As you can see im running on a 1660 and…”
— a player, Steam review · 36 hrs played“used to watch playthroughs of this and beg the gods for this game for christmas. do you guys think im the queens favorite little worker ant?”
— a player, Steam review · 7 hrs played“Empires of the Undergrowth is a hidden gem of a strategy game. This is an incredibly well thought out game that could not be more challenging. Your nest starts with just a few very weak but efficient workers, and you must strategically evade bigger predators to collect food and…”
— a player, Steam review · 142 hrs playedPlayer activity
Monthly average concurrent players. Live data self-collected from the Steam API · history through 2026-06 via SteamCharts.
Achievement stats
Global completion rates across all Steam players — a data view of how far people actually get. Source: Steam official stats · as of 2026-10-21.
Price tracking
US-region pricing (USD), sampled twice daily by our own tracker since 2026-07-11. Steam prices vary by region — always confirm your local price on Steam.
Regional prices at last sample, in local currency — Steam sets each region's price independently.
Cheapest → most expensive, converted to USD at ECB reference rates (2026-10-22). Relative comparison only.
Latest official news
Developer announcements via the Steam news API — links go to the original posts. More across all games on the news hub.
Patch Notes - Fixes for the SWAMPED! Update
Thank you to everyone who has been providing bug and crash reports since the release of the SWAMPED! update on Monday. We've gone through and fixed the most pressing issues and have made one or two sm
Save 75% on Empires of the Undergrowth
Empires of the Undergrowth is now 75% off during its Steam Midweek Deal! Command an ant colony and wage strategic battles in the insect kingdom. This ant-based RTS challenges you to build, defend, and
The SWAMPED! Update - New Swamp Map & Critters
We thought it was about time our swamp environment had a little TLC, so it's time to head back to the wetlands. Get utterly swamped in a new custom game map - Creek - and two new creatures, the rough
Optional Beta Update - Balance, Fixes & QoL Changes
We've updated the currently-running optional beta to v1.2.1.1.0.3. If you'd like to participate but haven't yet, the instructions on how to do so are in the previous beta post (the password is theswam
Optional Beta Invite - New Creatures, New Map, Setup Saving & Editing!
It's time for an optional beta! This time, we're giving a little bit of TLC to the swamp environment with two new swamp creatures - the rough green snake Opheodrys aestivus , and the adult form of the
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Screenshots
Official Steam store screenshots — click any shot to enlarge.
Facts & details
From the Steam store record, snapshot 2026-05-12.
| Genres | Simulation, Strategy |
| Player tags | Strategy · Simulation · City Builder · Colony Sim · Base-Building · Sandbox · Building · Management · Resource Management · 4X · Grand Strategy · Open World (SteamSpy community voting) |
| Features | Single-player · Steam Achievements · Full controller support · Steam Trading Cards · Steam Cloud · Family Sharing |
| Languages | English * , German, Simplified Chinese, Spanish - Spain, Russian, French, Czech, Dutch, Japanese, Korean, Polish, Italian, Hungarian, Traditional Chinese, Turkish, Ukrainian, Portuguese - Brazil * |
| Controller | Full support |
| Achievements | 186 |
| Official site | http://www.eotugame.com |
Minimum system requirements (PC)
Minimum: Requires a 64-bit processor and operating system OS: Windows® 10 (64-bit) Processor: Intel® Core™ i5-760 (quad-core) / AMD® Phenom™ II X4 965 (quad-core) Memory: 4 GB RAM Graphics: NVIDIA® GeForce® GT 440 (1 GB) / AMD® Radeon™ HD 6750 (1 GB) DirectX: Version 11 Storage: 5 GB available space