Out of those listed, I can recommend either Colonization or Frozen Synapse. Both are great games and are going to keep you occupied for a while.

Sorry typing and watching my kid at the same time :) could you elaborate on the game play a little more? Is there a demo?

Yes there is a demo > Click
The gameplay.... your charachter is a little boy lost his village trying to put it back together. The mechanics of the game are really good. You can use melee and range weapons destroing ur opponents.
Actually for me is hard to explain the complexety of the game. It's still an action RPG butt with beatiful story,music and vision in it.
Btw ...I can tell you one thing... The moment you end the demo you will gonna buy the game without even thinking for a moment about it... it's that good ;)

If you ever played the original Colonization it is basically a updated version of that, which is not a bad thing it is amazing. The main thing to focus on is your just people coming to the new world to settle down and eventually revolt from our king and fight against your home. It is kind of hard to not hate your king, but once you begin your war with him you wish you had not.. The never ending armies he sends your way is a pain.

I just find it fun in the end even though it is hard to explain why, but really if you like Civilization you will like this.

You should get SPAZ because it has pirates and zombies. Plus it's only 15 dollars.

Another poster said it, so I'll also say it: you seem to be a thinking man type of gamer. Out of those games I own Elemental War of Magic (precursor to Fallen Enchantress), Star Ruler, Nexon and Haegomonia. Haven't gotten around to playing Nexon or Haegemonia and have only played Star Ruler for a little bit. But Elemental is really fun. I know it got a really bad rap when it came out for how terribly buggy it was, they've fixed a lot of it and made it a very respectable game at this point . . . and Fallen Enchantress is supposed to improve on it in every way. I'm kind of broke right now, so I haven't preordered it yet, but I'd say go for Fallen Enchantress, or even the first Elemental when it goes on a sale or something.

I have played Frozen Synapse and thought it was really cool!
You should really try it if you like the idea, it reminds me of the old
Rainbow Six I used to play as a kid :)

You get a team of soldiers and a mission such as killing all the bad
guys in a room, protecting a hostage etc', then you have to plan your
next move by placing and moving the units, you can control where they
will walk, where they will look (better watch the enemy) and more!

Afte planing you can start the action, each time for couple of seconds
it's in phases untill you reach your goal or fail, very nicely done :)

I suppose that by "carriers at war", you mean the recent version, released by Matrix.

This is really a niche market game. The principle of the game is not unlike a tabletop naval wargame ( I mean, with small models that you move, dices and a thick booklet of rules ). The game takes care for the nasty bits ( no need to have played and enjoyed armada to play this, fortunately ). I played the original extensively ( I still have it, installed under Dosbox ), but found that the 2nd was both awfully expensive and more limited in scope.

Sengoku is the typical paradox game, It's not that different from EU Rome , except that the game is set in the XVIth century Japan. The game mechanic fits this place and time even better. But it has quite a steep learning curve. If you have ever played and liked one of the Europa Universalis Games, this is a sensible choice

Armada2526 is on sale on amazon right now for around 7 dollars if memory serves me right... Just saying...

Thanks for all the responses! This is going to be harder to choose than I thought :) I promise I will make up my mind by this weekend and pick a winner.

:D I guess you already have enough advices. I was going to vote for Frozen Synapse - it has got amazing stratgeic in-depth, slick presentation and AWESOME soundtrack. Overall it created that special mood of cold, troubled future one can find, for instance, in Ghost in the Shell. I am not sure whether this is what you are looking for, but hey - you already have tons of people in this thread. :) Congratulations with your bonus!

From that list i would recommend Thief Gold. A game from the missed Looking Glass Studios.
You play as Garret, a thief , in this first person stealh game. You have to enter places, move through the shadow to avoid being detected and take the "tresures" . A game with a great setting and sound.

You should try Jagged Alliance 2. I'm currently playing it again with the mod1.13 and the game just still amazes me. The dialogues are the best I ever seen in terms of sarcasm and you can do almost virtual anything inside the game. If you buy this I think you will be very happy with the amount of good I mean good hours of playing time you will spend on this game.

Thank you all for your recommendations! It was hard to make up my mind because I all of these games look really good. But the one I settled on was Crusaders Kings II. Hawk52 is the winner!

i haven't played anything from that list except frozen synapse.... and it bored me out of my mind. It's really not a game for everyone. (i know this doesn't count as a contest entry but i thought I'd still share my thoughts on it)