Illwinter announced Dominions 4 today on their website. There isn’t much information available yet (such as a release date) but I expect they will fill in the information in due time. Right now there is just this very Illwinter-ish statement:
Dominions 4 is under development. It has been under development for quite some time and it has come long enough that we feel certain that it will be completed. More information will come later.
EDIT: The full name of the game will be Dominions 4: Thrones of Ascension. Like some game names but unlike others, that text after the colon has a certain specific meaning in the world of Dominions.
Looking forward to this! I hope they add in some simple diplomatic options, i.e. formalizing stuff like the 3-turn NAP that is so common in multiplayer.
I hope it’s free to play and they add in an energy system that only lets you take a few turns per day. Unless you buy a booster, of course. Ooh, and you could buy gems as IAP! And make some nations pay-to-unlock only. And a real money auction house!
Okay, so let’s map out some features of a prospective freemium Dominions 4.
Free to play.
Always online.
Start off with Marignon, Arcocephale, Caelum and Abyssia unlocked.
Other nations can be unlocked via an XP system. You can buy XP boosters in the shop.
Ermor, R’lyeh and Pangaea are “premium nations” that can only be directly bought.
Gems can be purchased as IAP for an individual match. They can be bought in groups of 10, 50, or 100 (best value!)
“Mana” system limits number of turns allowed per day. You can buy a mana booster in the shop.
Real money auction house for forged items. You create items randomly: you never know what you might find!
You start with one set pretender available for each nation. You can buy “slots” for others from the shop, and can even buy the ability to design your own.
Great news. I think Dominions is one of the greatest games ever created. But, it is ruined by the incredible amount of micromanagement, especially in the end game. That’s why I stopped playing. Here’s hoping they address this.
Dominions 3 was so well received for what it is, I am actually curious as to how much they need or want to change. For me, the time commitment to learn and play the game always seemed too great. I would say an improvement for me would be to make is a little easier to get into, but I fear that would take some away from what so many others love about the game. I am curious to know what those of you who love and still play would like to see changed. A basic, updated version of Dominions 3 or an evolution of the game to something new that still retains the feel of D3.
I’ll say this much: It is an evolution of the Dominions engine, though clearly recognizable as the game we all know and love. The UI has been redone and is like the UI in Conquest of Elysium 3. It is also a lot more informative in many respects.
There have been some changes that reduce micromanagement, especially some of the more tedious battle mage micromanagement that has been among the holy grail wishlist stuff for UI since practically 2007.
The game may not be any easier to get into (in terms of learning curve), but it is easier in the sense that you don’t need to feel like you’re wrestling the UI to submission all the time. I had gotten so used to the old UI that I hadn’t even though of it as a problem. Not until I went back from the Dom4 beta to check something in Dom3.
For me, the reason I haven’t invested in this amazing looking game (and I got CoE3 instead, which I adore) is that I’ve been told from many sources there isn’t much in terms of a single player experience here, and that’s really what I want in a game like this, a solid (or at least “not embarrassing”) AI that can provide me with a challenge for when I want to sink into a big game like this on a weekend. Hopefully the single player (AI implementation) is one of the features they are working on, as it really benefits everyone, even folks playing multiplayer (with AI slotted in with the human players).
There are some ways to improve the single player experience even though the AI can’t take advantage of all the things a human can. It’s been on my list of priorities for a long time, so I’ll bring it up in the beta, since it would be fantastic to have it in the vanilla game without needing to use mods to reach the same effect.
I play Dom3 with friends from time to time, but every so often when I need a fix I’ll just load it up and stomp on the AI for a while. To me the building up of your empire, planning armies, casting spells, etc. is still pretty darn fun even if the AI isn’t super competitive, so I’ve never really had a problems with playing Dom3 solo.
Have we talked yet about how Dom 4 will feature spells that can only be cast using “gold gems” which are conveniently available from the Illwinter Store™?
