IGN: Elemental: War Of Magic - Preview

[Omnirizon]

Originally Posted by Sombre

The main reason people give a crap is because stardock were supposed to be doing MoM2 essentially. But they aren't. They're just doing a soulless fantasy strat game, of which there are many.

It might be good, but judging by galciv - no soul.

no soul...

sombre you took the words out of my mouth. that perfectly describes my sentiments regarding most of what stardock has put out.

EDIT and on the what has soul/what is soul conversation:

alpha centauri: diversity in army units (not galciv's rock paper scissors). story associated with each faction, and with the game world in general which unfolded as game progressed. the cut scenes when gaining new technology were also very cute. (the galciv robot is completely and utterly stupid).

[Adept]

Originally Posted by Sombre

The main reason people give a crap is because stardock were supposed to be doing MoM2 essentially. But they aren't. They're just doing a soulless fantasy strat game, of which there are many.

It might be good, but judging by galciv - no soul.

Mindlessly judgemental of a game that is not nearly finished yet. Meh. What are you, some sort of reverse shill?

[AdmiralZhao]

I think a game with "soul" is a game for which it is prohibitively difficult to make a good AI.

Consider Dominions and FfH2. They're both great games, with a huge variety units, spells, effects, world spells, races, and flavor text. In particular, all of these little bits interact with each other in interesting and complex ways, and if you bring the wrong set of powers to a battle, you will be completely wiped out (e.g. a niefel giant vs light infantry, or a group of fire mages vs an unprepared niefel giant). Each race plays very differently, and it can feel like an entirely different game switching from EA Arco to LA Ermor, or from the Ljosalfar to the Infernals in FfH2.

Now consider Gal Civ. In terms of gameplay, races are only distinguished by the modifiers they get to certain operations (e.g. +20% missile attack, or +10% population growth). The technologies you can research change these modifiers slightly, and only rarely introduce actual new abilities. Combat barely changes through out the game, and the 3 different types of attacks might as well be labeled A, B, and C for all the color and unique properties that they have. So when you research the great new weapon at the end of the tech tree, your attack bonus for weapon A goes from 140% to 160%. Yay. This simplicity and boringness is nice though if you are trying to write an AI, since all you have to do is maximize the product of all the various modifiers. You don't have to worry about teleporting enslave squads and SC equipment and Horrors and miasma dominion and poison resistance and unrest causing rituals and so on.

If a game is filled with meaningful, interesting, and complex decisions, and the player constantly has to think, then I would say it has soul. If the player's decisions can be easily automated, then the game doesn't have soul.

[theenemy]

Originally Posted by AdmiralZhao

I think a game with "soul" is a game for which it is prohibitively difficult to make a good AI.

Consider Dominions and FfH2. They're both great games, with a huge variety units, spells, effects, world spells, races, and flavor text. In particular, all of these little bits interact with each other in interesting and complex ways, and if you bring the wrong set of powers to a battle, you will be completely wiped out (e.g. a niefel giant vs light infantry, or a group of fire mages vs an unprepared niefel giant). Each race plays very differently, and it can feel like an entirely different game switching from EA Arco to LA Ermor, or from the Ljosalfar to the Infernals in FfH2.

Now consider Gal Civ. In terms of gameplay, races are only distinguished by the modifiers they get to certain operations (e.g. +20% missile attack, or +10% population growth). The technologies you can research change these modifiers slightly, and only rarely introduce actual new abilities. Combat barely changes through out the game, and the 3 different types of attacks might as well be labeled A, B, and C for all the color and unique properties that they have. So when you research the great new weapon at the end of the tech tree, your attack bonus for weapon A goes from 140% to 160%. Yay. This simplicity and boringness is nice though if you are trying to write an AI, since all you have to do is maximize the product of all the various modifiers. You don't have to worry about teleporting enslave squads and SC equipment and Horrors and miasma dominion and poison resistance and unrest causing rituals and so on.

If a game is filled with meaningful, interesting, and complex decisions, and the player constantly has to think, then I would say it has soul. If the player's decisions can be easily automated, then the game doesn't have soul.

I second that. But I really, really hope that the game will have a decent AI.

By the way. A couple of nice vids:

EWM at PAX 2009 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hBRajOQuu6k

EWM "editor" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ICOjq...eature=related

EWM chat with the producer http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G7PZxL1wOgI

[sector24]

I'm vehemently against the whole 'pre-order' industry concept so I'm relying on you guys to thoroughly analyze the game before it comes out so I can decide whether it's worth buy or not next year. Have fun with the beta!

[romis]

Originally Posted by sector24

I'm vehemently against the whole 'pre-order' industry concept so I'm relying on you guys to thoroughly analyze the game before it comes out so I can decide whether it's worth buy or not next year. Have fun with the beta!

i too hope for periodic updates, at the very least so illwinter can steal the good ideas(statisticly they have to have one or two.) although i understand from the site, it will be a few months atleast before people are testing anything but the most basic components of the game.

[Kofiman]

Originally Posted by sector24

I'm vehemently against the whole 'pre-order' industry concept so I'm relying on you guys to thoroughly analyze the game before it comes out so I can decide whether it's worth buy or not next year. Have fun with the beta!

You don't get charged until there is something to play. I haven't been charged for my pre-order yet, and won't be, until the beta keys are issued and I register the one I get.

[Foodstamp]

Well, I respect your judgments on Elemental. I haven't had a chance to play it myself, but we all like Dominions, and so far according to the people who have played the game, Elemental is soulless and terrible, so I will just keep my money.

[Kofiman]

Hmm..

Most of the information is found in the dev journals, just off the main page.

http://www.elementalgame.com/journals.asp

Omnirizon, units should be pretty diverse. The unit model is that you manufacture equipment, and equip and train people to use that equipment, rather than having generic units or RPS. It should be quite a lot different from Dominions, but I can see some definite similarities to kitting up thugs.

Here's one of the dev journal entries related to that.

http://forums.elementalgame.com/329473

Doesn't sound very much like either Galciv, does it?

Here's another.

http://forums.elementalgame.com/354240

All I know is that I'm going to try my best to kick the @#$% out of it in the beta period. Some of you should do the same.. although it will definately not be the least bit fun until at least the next entry period, which my guess will be January.

Do what you like. Not everyone liked Galciv much.

[Ballbarian]

Originally Posted by Kofiman

Hmm..

The unit model is that you manufacture equipment, and equip and train people to use that equipment, rather than having generic units or RPS.

Thanks for the links Kofiman. I have not read the journals yet, but the quoted statement has grabbed my interest by the throat. I have been toying around with an idea for a TBS with this very feature and would love to see it done right. Will be watching this closely now.

(I was a big fan of Lord of the Realms II and wanted to take something along the lines of that system and put it in a Dom3-like scale.)