Imperium Offtopicum, or IOT, is a type of forum game played on Civ Fanatics Forums. Imperium Offtopicum (abbreviated IOT, or less commonly IO) is a geopolitical simulation that spawned out of the Altered Maps thread in Off-Topic, when taillesskangaru invited forumers to rename a country after themselves in an effort to revive the thread after weeks of inactivity. It backfired spectacularly, with those who made claims beginning to act like they are actually leaders of their own country, annexing more land, signing treaties, insulting other posters' countries and declaring wars. The situation very quickly got out of hand (in fact, at one point Mecca was nuked) and vehement protests by non-participating OT-ers led to the exercise being moved to Forum Games, where such spammish content belongs