| Author | Review |
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GlorixJim
191,717
TA Score for this game: 1,820
Posted on 17 February 11 at 09:59, Edited on 18 February 11 at 08:17 |
This review has 10 positive votes and 1 negative vote. Please log in to vote. |
I picked up this game expecting something like Rome: Total War on PC.
Maybe that is what went wrong, because my overall experience with this game is a bit of a disappointment.
Structure
The game's structure is straightforward and good. PLay the -good!- tutorial, pick France or England and get cracking on the campaign.
The map of France is the command center, from there you pick a campaign battle or one of the side missions. After each battle there's a -good!- results page and you'll be back in your Army Camp.
The way your army is represented in the Army Camp is quite clever. You will command a maximum of 16 units, and you can run through their vital stats very quickly. On the battlefield there's just a not enough unit info for my taste, but knowing your army well enough solves that problem.
Gameplay
In the first battles you will be fighting a few peasants, but your own army isn't all that powerful either. Yet! So by defeating a few peasants, you get the chance to build up your army and advance into the next campaign battle.
Each battle that you win will reward you with some money, your units get some skill points for their kills. Use the money for new units, weapons or shields.
The skill points are used for the unit itself, you can select bonuses for attack and defense points.
Battles can also give you Battle Cards. You can use these cards during battle (duh..) to change a few stats for a unit. It will give them more (or less for enemies) power, toughness, speed, defense against cavalry, or make them more/less panic prone. There's one card that weakens ALL your enemies (Starvation) which is really overpowered.
However, there is NO clue as to what kind of enemy your army will be up against. There is NO clue what your objectives are. So getting into the campaign battles is somewhat of a guess- you can not know if you're evenly matched with your enemy.
If you win a campaign battle, you'll get new side missions. And they *can* be tough. I've read about people that advanced in the English campaign missions (battle 13 and further) but then got stuck in side missions that were too hard and a next campaign battle that was also too hard. And if you can't win any battles, your army does not get more skill points or money and.. you're stuck.
Fighting the battles on the battlefield has a good, easy to use control system. Having 'only' 16 units also means that you can keep all units in check. There's no feature to group your units together (like, all archers in a group, all infantry in another), that's something I missed.
You can set waypoints or create a route for your units to walk, but if you want to end that route with an attack, you can only hope that the enemy hasn't moved.. there's very little intelligent action for units that have been sent off in this way.
The battlefields have a good size, and on smaller maps you get to use a limited number of units for your army.
The AI is a bit disappointing, it all seems very scripted and NOT intelligent at all.
The effect of your actions on the battlefield is obvious. Depending on how you set your units aggressiveness, they will either respond to enemies, or just stand there. When you maneuver your units and have them flank the enemy, the enemy soldiers are shocked.
All concepts are there, and yet... Things seem a little unbalanced. When you stuff your army with 7 or 8 Longbow archer units, they will defeat 80% of all enemies. Cavalry is very vulnerable and in this game their effect is very limited. Your General is a complete coward and will run as soon as the roar of battle is heard.
For a strategy game, there's just... so little strategy involved. I have tried easy, normal and hard difficulties, but none of these modes really capture the feel of a strategic game.
Multiplayer
Online Multiplayer is DEAD. I boosted for the online achievements and from what I saw, it seems you can build an online army for yourself that grows and grows with each victory? Would not be good, but I can't really say much about it.
Graphics
The graphics seem very outdated. The zoom function on the battlefield gives a detailed view of your fighting soldiers, but it's a poor sight. I can tell there has been serious effort put into it; when a unit is flanked, their soldiers fight on all the sides where enemies are. You can see blood spills and gushes (sort of...) but there is no sense of reality for some reason.
The cut scene movies are okay, but the storyline (if there was anyone during a hundred years of war...) was completely unclear to me.
Sound
The background music in the menu is good, medieval-ish and unobtrusive. During the battles, every command you give is followed by a 'yes sir' or 'oui monsieur' in about 4 variations, it's a bit of a pain.
But the swords clashing, the horses galopping, battle screams and roars.. sounds great!
1000G
Getting the full 1000G on this game is easy, but takes time. You cannot just play the 16 English and 10 French campaign missions and be done with it, you'll actually have to take the time to build up an army. Even on easy difficulty, this will take a few hours for each campaign. The achievements for level 10 knights/archers/cavalry come during the campaigns, the 'win battles with only knights/archers/cavalry units can be done in 15 minutes each.
The online MP is dead and getting a boosting partner is the only way to get them. Takes about 30 mins for 2 players to get them both the 4 MP achievements.
Conclusion
This game should have been published in 2007 and it might have been less of a disappointment. The AI is not challenging enough, strategy is not a major part of the gameplay and the graphics are not up to todays standards.
For people that like strategy games in general, this one is just okay. If you're not into this genre, don't buy it.
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