Flash of Steel header image 4

Entries Tagged as 'Ancients'

Unexpected Pleasure

March 20th, 2009 · 2 Comments · Ancients, City Builder

A while back I called into question the quality of the upcoming Tropico 3 because its developer, Haemimont Games, had never really entertained me with one of their games. So I have to eat a little crow and say that their new Roman city builder, Grand Ages: Rome, is a minor delight. It’s not perfect […]

[Read more →]

Tags:

Vae Victis Developer Diary

October 7th, 2008 · 2 Comments · Ancients, Paradox, Preview

Paradox has published their first developer diary for the upcoming expansion for Europa Universalis: Rome. Time for a little fisking. One of the most glaring omissions in EU: Rome was the lack of the Senate – after all, the game covers the golden age of the Roman Republic. Vae Victis will feature the Senate with […]

[Read more →]

Tags:

A Question of Leadership

September 2nd, 2008 · 6 Comments · Ancients, Design, Imperium

War is a human endeavor, and the quality of the humans in charge matters. The challenge for game designers has been how to separate the impact of the leader from the quality of the troops under him. What is Patton’s value added to a well trained armor division? How much of Prussia’s power was based […]

[Read more →]

Tags:

Under the Hood

August 27th, 2008 · 1 Comment · Ancients, Design, Imperium

Michael Akinde, developer of the still not finished Imperium – Rise of Rome, has started blogging about some of the design details of the combat model in his game. The starter post can be found here, and his thoughts on how to reflect troop types and tactics here. From the second post: The scouting factor […]

[Read more →]

Tags:

Great War Nations: Sparta Review

June 16th, 2008 · 1 Comment · Ancients, Gameshark, Review, RTS

We have an early competitor for the worst strategy game of the year. World Forge is going to keep making games. They released the Mongol themed Golden Horde in Europe earlier this year and it will certainly land with a thump on our shores at some point in time. And they are working on a […]

[Read more →]

Tags:

No King But Caesar – An Epilogue

April 30th, 2008 · 20 Comments · Ancients, Design, Feature:Anc

I wish I had time to dwell on all the dud Roman themed games that have passed in front of me. The half finished Pax Romana and Great Invasions, the laughable Legions, the boring Hannibal: Master of the Beast, Haemimont’s Roman city builders, Haemimont’s RTSes. Most of these games aren’t very interesting as reflections on […]

[Read more →]

Tags: