So glad the sequel to one of my favorite games of all time has finally landed on PC.
Things I like:
- Exploring Glorantha again. Setting this story from the “other side” is an inspired choice, and the Riders are at least as much fun as the Orlanthi were.
- Ventures. I’m going to miss having this when I go back to KODP next time.
- More lenient heroquests. I think Dunham mentioned this was something they were doing for this game, and it does feel that way (although I’m only about half-way through). You can still fail and suffer badly, but it doesn’t feel quite as random as in the old game. The failures I’ve had at least, can usually be attributed to questers that are of the wrong god or simply not skilled enough - with strong questers connected to the relevant god, my success rate has been excellent. No heroquests as bad as the old “Elmal guards the Stead” one.
Things I’m less pleased about:
- The Riders feel a bit too much like Orlanthi on horses, at least so far. They have all the trappings of nomads - horse archers, travois, etc - but they also live in permanent buildings, sow and worry about pastures, build stone walls, etc. They talk in awe about how the Orlanthi are so super-mobile. They on foot and we on horses, and they’re the ones who can strike anywhere? Really? One thing I liked about KoDP is that I felt like I needed to think like an iron-age clan when playing it. Six Ages doesn’t really make me feel like a Horseborn nomad.
- More abstract resource system. I’m OK with the detailed harvest system from the original being gone (as it was in the mobile version), but I really dislike the food stockpile system - do I have food for 2 or 2 1/2 season? How much food are my cattle and goats worth? How many people should I send out foraging? I’m never quite sure what the situation of the clan is, and there is absolutely no reason to make one of the core game-play elements this opaque.
- UI annoyances. E.g., why can’t I access the diplomacy details when a story requires me to take a diplomatic decision? Why do I have to chose a leader without full info about that leader?
- The “endgame” is way too finicky in that it’s very easy to “lose” the game by making the wrong choice. This is the one aspect where I think Six Ages is objectively worse than its predecessor - in KODP, you knew when you had entered the endgame, and while you could lose, it was usually by making obviously “wrong” moves, or simply not being strong enough. In Six Ages, you can easily lose even by making moves which seem like they’re the right ones.
I guess this may come of sounding more negative than I mean it too. As mentioned, KODP is one of my all-time favorite games, and this delivers more of the same. If I sound negative, it’s because I’d love even more improvements on an already great concept.