Dominions 3
More nations and armies to control. Great!
More nations and armies to learn the counters to. Good grief!
Press release and link to the patch can be found at Shrapnel Games.
New lands to proselytize
May 3rd, 2007 by Troy Goodfellow · Shrapnel
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Napoleon’s Ambition
May 3rd, 2007 by Troy Goodfellow · Paradox
Paradox has announced an expansion for Europa Universalis III. This August, Napoleon’s Ambition will move the clock up to 1820.
This announcement is interesting for a couple of reasons. First, throughout development of the core game, Paradox and its legions of fans maintained that expanding the timeline into the wars of Napoleon was a mistake in EU2, since the Renaissance political/military system could not capture the energy and transformative effect of the French Revolution. Stopping the game at 1792 made more sense.
Second, the upcoming expansion will put back a game mechanic that had been thrown aside in favor of greater sandbox play. History is back.
For those gamers looking for an even stronger historical experience, this option is the one. In addition to hundreds of new events, players will be able to see their rulers, leaders and advisors appear on the accurate historical dates.
When customers asked for this option back in November, they were told it was impossible. Now we know that impossible means “we haven’t figured it out yet.” I look forward to this change.
The most important change in the long run, though, will be the trade management. The ability to more tightly control trade in your empire will add an extra streak of meanness to multiplayer games.
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Plugging a developer blog
May 2nd, 2007 by Troy Goodfellow · Blogs, Imperium
Just thought I’d post a link to Michael Akinde’s developer blog for the still-in-planning stages Imperium: Rise of Rome. I love developer blogs when they provide some insight into how they see game design.
Michael has, so far, laid out the basics of his political system and just added a bit comparing Age of Napoleon to Empires in Arms, two board games with similar themes but very different approaches to the period in question.
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Great Moments in Wargame Reviews
May 2nd, 2007 by Troy Goodfellow · Wargames
From Steve Butts’ IGN review of For Liberty!:
While it’s historically accurate that few Revolutionary battles achieved a clear decision, we found it a bit anti-climactic to have a 20,000 man battle decided with only a few hundred casualties on each side. Trying to actually eliminate an enemy unit is next to impossible. Instead, you’ll find yourself attacking them again and again in successive turns until their morale is completely shattered. Accurate it may be, but fun it ain’t.
Sorry all the history got in the way of your slaughter. The fact that Washington’s army couldn’t be pinned down and destroyed in a battle was one of the reasons we have an America today. Though only a few decades away from Napoleon’s ability to turn decisive battles into a forced peace, 18th century wars were full of inconclusive sparring until someone went broke or got penned in. Remember that the deciding battle of the war was a siege, not field combat.
On the plus side, Butts’ does call for wargamers to stop apologizing for poor graphics.
The individual unit and tile assets are serviceable but leave a lot to be desired. Effects are very sparse. The smoke effect from bombarding a fortified town is particularly bad. Beyond that the interface displays the information you need but feels far too cluttered as a result.
Note, grognards. He’s not calling for photorealism. He’s looking for clarity. And who can argue against that?
The fact that IGN reviewed this game at all is a big step, in my opinion.
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Commander: Europe at War Preview
April 30th, 2007 by Troy Goodfellow · Preview, Wargames, WW2
Greg Costikyan has posted a comparative preview of Slitherine’s upcoming WW2 grand strategy game, Commander: Europe at War. Greg analyzes some of the design decisions in Europe at War in light of other attempts to model the conflict.
It’s a brief essay on the mechanics of various games and how they mirror either good design or good history, but I can’t make too much of his conclusions without trying Europe at War. I like Hearts of Iron better than he does, but that shouldn’t be too surprising.
(To prevent the comment section from turning into a Don Imus discussion, I’ll refrain from spending too much time on Greg’s unfortunate (if thematically appropriate) use of the word “Nips”. Besides, everyone knows that the word “perfidious” has to be followed by “Albion”.)
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Who buys these?
April 27th, 2007 by Troy Goodfellow · Industry
It looks like we’ll be getting a novelization of Command and Conquer 3. I’m sure it will be as full of literary goodness as the novelizations of Baldur’s Gate, Halo and Warcraft. If it approaches the almost readable Alpha Centauri novels, it will be a freaking miracle.
This week’s Games for Windows podcast has a long segment on game novelizations. Apparently publishers just send those to GFW HQ no questions asked. Questions like “Do you want this crap?” The GFW crew and Penny Arcade both make the obvious joke about novelized games.
What isn’t so funny is that people apparently buy this crap. I’m generally not one to attack another person’s tastes in books, film or TV – the line between high and low culture moves a lot through the ages – but no one in their right mind can expect this to be either a compelling read or a useful companion to the game itself.
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