new ancients game + demo
BasKa
Bas
eddys...@hotmail.com
Downloaded the beta-demo last night and went through the first 2
tutorials.
Guys, you really need to take a look at this one. It’s really original
and has a great period look & feel about it.
Also : I don’t know about you but I treat every tutorial of a released
game out there with kid gloves because if you just move 1 millimeter
from the prescribed path the demo is either going to crash or start
doing other stuff than what it says in the manual. Not this one. If
you click on something or do something that you’re not supposed to do
at that point it’ll calmly explain what you did wrong and what you
need to do instead. Impressive. At some point it became a “see if I
can crash this tutorial” game and I couldn’t. Going to go through the
remaining tutorials as soon as I can.
There’s a couple of strategy guides as well, which give you the
context of the war you’re fighting and have tips and hints. Again :
impressive – way better than most released games and this is only a
beta !
Only quibbles I have with the game is that unlike armies, navies have
no banner for quick identification and you need to right-click them. I
guess that once you’re playing the game this is not a problem as there
are not many of them and not many sea zones anyway. And this touches
on what might become the only real problem with this game : the number
of areas is quite limited. This can lead to repetitive play but otoh
it can also mean that a really tough AI can be created. Minor
quibble : the person who designed the letter “g” in that font should
be taken out and shot. Put upright and be shot again. Minor in the
grand scheme of things but incredibly annoying to me :)
Greetz,
Eddy Sterckx
Giftzwerg
@m16g2000yqc.googlegroups.com>, eddys...@hotmail.com says...
> > Find it here:http://www.forcedmarchgames.com/
>
> Downloaded the beta-demo last night and went through the first 2
> tutorials.
>
> Guys, you really need to take a look at this one. It s really original
> and has a great period look & feel about it.
Good advice. I started with the tutorials and played around with it a
bit. Reminds me a bit of BIRTH OF AMERICA, what with the more or less
free-form creation of armies under specific commanders.
> Also : I don t know about you but I treat every tutorial of a released
> game out there with kid gloves because if you just move 1 millimeter
> from the prescribed path the demo is either going to crash or start
> doing other stuff than what it says in the manual. Not this one. If
> you click on something or do something that you re not supposed to do
> at that point it ll calmly explain what you did wrong and what you
> need to do instead. Impressive. At some point it became a see if I
> can crash this tutorial game and I couldn t. Going to go through the
> remaining tutorials as soon as I can.
Yeah. The whole thing has a lot of polish on it. Quite impressive, as
far as I've gone with it; it instantly picked up my screen resolution
and set itself accordingly - no insane "fixed 1024x768" res for these
guys. Clean graphics and lots of nice touches.
> There s a couple of strategy guides as well, which give you the
> context of the war you re fighting and have tips and hints. Again :
> impressive way better than most released games and this is only a
> beta !
Great point. A *lot* of designers could take a lesson, interface-wise,
from this kind of Young Turks (I'm looking at *you*, Frank Hunter...).
> Minor
> quibble : the person who designed the letter g in that font should
> be taken out and shot. Put upright and be shot again. Minor in the
> grand scheme of things but incredibly annoying to me :)
<laughs>
Ditto on the "g". I stared at the word "dragging" until my eyebrows
met; I felt like a first-grader struggling to sound out a particularly
tricky vocabulary word.
But, that said, I liked the inclusion of that weird font; another "nice
touch" in my book.
--
Giftzwerg
***
"I am less interested in passing out blame than I am in learning from
and correcting these mistakes to make us safer."
- President Barack Obama
"<laughter> I'll bet you are, particularly since you're to blame."
- Giftzwerg
BasKa
Bas
eddys...@hotmail.com
> Try the "Hannibal demo comment" in "contact" page ;-)
I will. Even the part about shooting the guy who invented that "g" :)
I just got back from a presentation of a new piece of software with an
UI and functionalities so Byzantine it would make Gandhi want to
clobber who ever came up with it.
Things like that make you really appreciate guys who get it right.
Greetz,
Eddy Sterckx
Giftzwerg
@e37g2000yqn.googlegroups.com>, cur...@hetnet.nl says...
> Try the "Hannibal demo comment" in "contact" page ;-)
Hope that isn't the default for a reason.
Clearly not, though. This seems pretty decent. As a beta / demo
product it shows more polish than far too many release packages.
Mike Kreuzer
news:MPG.25b8b3346f8785a398971c@localhost...
>> beta !
>
> Great point. A *lot* of designers could take a lesson, interface-wise,
> from this kind of Young Turks (I'm looking at *you*, Frank Hunter...).
>
>> Minor
>> quibble : the person who designed the letter "g" in that font should
>> be taken out and shot. Put upright and be shot again. Minor in the
>> grand scheme of things but incredibly annoying to me :)
>
> <laughs>
>
> Ditto on the "g". I stared at the word "dragging" until my eyebrows
> met; I felt like a first-grader struggling to sound out a particularly
> tricky vocabulary word.
>
> But, that said, I liked the inclusion of that weird font; another "nice
> touch" in my book.
>
> --
> Giftzwerg
> ***
> "I am less interested in passing out blame than I am in learning from
> and correcting these mistakes to make us safer."
> - President Barack Obama
> "<laughter> I'll bet you are, particularly since you're to blame."
> - Giftzwerg
I can't decide whether I like it or hate it. (The game, not the letter g, I
hate that.) The demo's certainly short enough to whet my appetite.
Regards,
Mike Kreuzer
www.mikekreuzer.com
eddys...@hotmail.com
> I can't decide whether I like it or hate it. (The game, not the letter g, I
> hate that.) The demo's certainly short enough to whet my appetite.
Hi,
Went through tutorials 3 to 7 of this and the general impression of
“slick & professional” remains.
However, a few problematic areas have surfaced :
Cities need name labels as do armies, fleets and areas. I know my
Italian geography pretty well, having spend a couple of holidays
touring around over there, but it remains a nuisance and kills
immersion if you have to hunt around for a particular city or area.
The battleboard : it’s too simple with every fight coming down to the
tactic of “put your heaviest hitting units in there + units which can
absorb losses” – that’s not how Hannibal treated his virtually
irreplaceable Carthaginian infantry. The battle portion of this game
is in dire need of tactical options beyond what the battle cards have
to offer. I’m talking terrain, orders, flanks, reserves, outflanking
etc here. And especially the naval squadrons should be allowed to
break-off combat at any time, even before the fight begins (with some
losses of course)
Talking about battle-cards : they really need some symbols to visually
indicate and differentiate them – and a simple scrolling list of all
those available would be better than the current overcomplicated free-
form placement.
What I like is that the game puts you in the shoes of the Hannibal in
his relation with the Carthaginian Senate – able to make suggestions
as to overall strategy and course, but not in the driving seat. It
remains to be seen if this relation is rather static or evolves
depending on the success of Hannibal in Italy.
Don’t get me wrong – I tend to focus on what I perceive as
shortcomings, but there’s much to like in this game : it’s got this
solid look & feel to it which makes it stand out, it’s got an
original, not overdone topic and I certainly look forward to the full
release – after all, once you start playing this you forget this all
to easily, but it’s still a beta.
Greetz,
Eddy Sterckx