In Infested Planet, Alex Vostrov is taking the basic gameplay dynamic he explored in his freeware Attack of the Paper Zombies and running with it. As in the previous game, you control a handful of space marines who must clear out a succession of spawn points that churn out huge numbers of opponents -- Zerg-like bugs here rather than the zombies of the previous game -- but Infested Planet has many improvements.
In Infested Planet, most levels are algorithmically generated rather than predrawn. There are several different weapons with which you may equip your marines, each with its own advantages and drawbacks; in addition, they can construct a number of defensive turrets, and use grenades to wipe out enemy structures. In early levels, the bugs have only one basic attacker, plus a defensive turret and eggs that can spawn more bugs, beyond those that bug bases create; later on, they can have a wider variety of building and unit types.
In later levels, when you take an enemy base, the bugs "mutate," suddenly gaining access to a new building or unit type -- and can sometimes "infest" human buildings, gaining the ability to use them. Early on, you have access only to a few of the weapons and buildings you can create, but each mission earns you cash with which you can unlock new capabilities; but later on, bug mutations can knock out one or more of your abilities.
In other words, there's a high degree of replayability here: the level changes from one session to the next; the capabilities of the bugs can vary, and change in mid-session; and you may find that something you rely on a lot, like flamethrowers, are suddenly unavailable.
Despite its realtime nature, Infested Planet makes you feel like you have to think about what you're doing and plan carefully, in the fashion of turn-based strategy games. And the complex ways in which your capabilities and the bugs' mutations interaction mean there's high variability in gameplay.
Infested Planet is in beta at present (available for purchase, with the completed game delivered when finished), but quite a polished game already, and quite an impressive achievement for a one-man team.
Wouldn't mind a narrativist
Wouldn't mind a narrativist minded reverse of this situation. Where a mere five strangers appear on your planet and start wiping out your species, killing your children en masse. Actually, it'd be better if it was a four man squad...one has plague abilities, one has famine abilities, one war abilities and the final one, death abilities.
It wouldn't be about survival. Your species would always die at the end of the game. It'd be about choosing how you die.
Anyway, on the randomness thing, I used to be all over that in years past but now - can't pure randomness simply obscure gameplay? In some, maybe the randomness itself simply determines whether you win or not, making the gameplay itself a busy work. In others, perhaps the level is really engaging and interesting even if you lose...but will be gone shortly. Further, perhaps your not getting better at the game but simply spamming new levels until a set up is easier for you to beat. I think random level games aught to give the option to save the level set up. Sometimes you might want to play a particular one again and again. I mean, if you enjoy the level set up - why set it up to only let you play that level only once, ever?