Jon Shafer's At The Gates

I’m so freaking happy for @Jon_Shafer. One of the genuinely nicest humans I’ve had the pleasure to meet. When I was at my darkest, he was literally on my doorstep with coffee and bagels and a hug. And it’s not like we are years-long close friends or anything. He’s just a good person.

Anyway, hopefully the game is worth a shit ;)

My kid is home due to a snow day, I put on a tv show and am trying to hide away and learn how to play. First lesson is that the interface is too small and there isn’t an option to change it directly that I can find so changing the settings.xml in the settings folder in the game to downshift from 4k to 1080p.

edit - didn’t really help. The info popups are shockingly tiny.

Ouch!

Just tried the final launch version and I’m sad that the caravan food exploit still exists.

http://forums.conifergames.com/index.php?topic=2322.0

Hopefully in the future the bugs & exploits will be fixed and the AI gets some loving as well.

That review would bother me if I had any respect for the writers at RPS. Then again, I suppose I should be happy they didn’t call the game an explore-em-up or something equally dopey and childish.

That review reads like a letter of admiration from an enemy.

While I don’t share Fraser Brown’s tastes in general, his account in his review for PC Gamer speaks a lot to me, when he shares an experience that reminded me of my own disappointment playing Heroes of Might & Magic IV. I’ll wait a bit before buying this (and getting out of the Euro-zone by the probable time of the purchase means it probably will be less expensive than the current discount even at full price).

I thought I was the only person on the planet who learned to despise the RPS style.

I didn’t have to learn. It just came naturally.

I mean, they call their reviews “Wot I think…” and that told me everything I needed to know right there. :)

A handful of Steam reviews are up and they are mixed with even the recommended reviews stating that the AI is missing. Here is an example from a favorable review, “The environment provides the strongest foe, as the AI is very passive and easy to defeat with a strong economy. At the Gates is a truly unique 4X game that is a couple of minor improvements (interface, diplomacy, AI) away from being phenomenal.”

How minor of an improvement is including a functional AI? So at this point winning the game is accomplishing a strong economy and dealing with some bandit harassment, oui?

I liked RPS at first but then it was like I felt when I ate too much cotton candy as a kid and I never ate it again.

I am wondering if I still need to grab a new key… I have had the game in my Steam library for a few years now and just assumed it would update and I could play. I guess I will see…

If you don’t get a “play” button when on the store page right below the screenies, odds are you’ll need a new key.

Isn’t that the Civ model as well?

Seems it shows in library and has a Play Now button… I will see. Thanks!

While I don’t always agree with Fraser Brown, I respect his knowledge of the genre. That review just hardened my resolve to hold off.

Hellooooo!

Helloooooooo!

There is no chance he tested this game on a 4k monitor, or had any players test it on a 4k monitor. You literally have to change your desktop resolution to 1080p if you want any chance of reading anything on the screen. You can’t play fullscreen 1080p without the game crashing. It even warns you in the settings.xml that fullscreen is likely to crash the game. So you’re stuck with borderless widescreen, which is awesome, but it won’t do borderless widescreen at anything less than, of course, your desktop resolution. That’s a minor pain in the ass that I just don’t expect to deal with in a game released in 2019.

At one point I thought their content was witty and funny; I guess I didn’t visit their site for awhile and I guess I had gotten older and no longer did …