Empire (or Classic Empire) is a turn-based wargame with simple rules. The game was conceived by Walter Bright starting in 1971, based on various war movies and board games, notably Battle of Britain and Risk. The first version on a computer was released in 1977, and ported to many platforms in the 1970s and 80s. Several commercial versions were also released, often adding basic graphics to the originally text-based user interface. The basic gameplay is strongly reminiscent of several later games, notably Civilization.