So How is Age of Mythology Shaping Up?

For those of you who’ve played the beta or preview copies, how is this game shaping up compared to AoE I & II? I am looking forward to it but am wondering what it brings to the table.

I have three main questions:

1)Does it bring anything new to the series that really enhances, changes or adds to gameplay?

2)Does it add in much micro-management (like special power clicking, minute micro-control of individual units required etc)?

3)Overall, is it mostly an evolutionary step in the series, or is it leaning towards the WC III style of action/RTS?

Mind you, as long as it offers spiffy new units, and does not have WC3 levels of micro, I’ll buy it :).

Dan

Dan,

We chatted a bit about it here earlier, but to answer your questions briefly:

1)Does it bring anything new to the series that really enhances, changes or adds to gameplay?

Yes. The three cultures and god stuff are significant additions.

2)Does it add in much micro-management (like special power clicking, minute micro-control of individual units required etc)?

Not at all. It’s a very sleek and manageable game!

3)Overall, is it mostly an evolutionary step in the series, or is it leaning towards the WC III style of action/RTS?

It is very much in the style of traditional RTSs like Age of Empires.

Mind you, as long as it offers spiffy new units, and does not have WC3 levels of micro, I’ll buy it .

It definitely qualifies on both counts – spiffy new units and no need for WC3 level of micromanagement.

 -Tom

Hmm, what thread? I missed it :(. This board is definitely not a place where the thread content is clearly indicated by the title :).

Dan

Try this one: http://www.quartertothree.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=931

It’s easy to miss, though, with a thread title like “Animal Crossing vs Age of Mythology: Chicken Fight.” :)

So how does it take out or reduce the micro-management of previous Age games or any other ‘standard’ RTS?

Have they changed the ‘farm is depleted’ sound to something a little more jingly and magical? That’s the important question.

Even better: farms don’t deplete.

Age of Mythology is fantastic.
But the real surprise, for me, is how excellent (and revolutionary) Rise of Nations’ beta is.

There’s a demo out now.

So how does it take out or reduce the micro-management of previous Age games or any other ‘standard’ RTS?

One of the things it does, Jason, is streamline resource gathering and make it unique for each of the three cultures. It also streamlines the tech advances by making you choose a limited number.

It also gives you units with interesting unique abilities (Frost Giants freeze people, Medusas turn them to stone, Valkyries heal units, etc), but you don’t have to fire off the abilities yourself; instead, the AI handles them reasonably well.

The only spell powers the one-shot god powers that require only two mouse clicks (or three when it’s a power that requires a starting and ending point, like Shifting Sands or Underworld Passage).

 -Tom

Demo is now available at your fav. bandwidth provider…

337 MB!!

Even better: farms don’t deplete.[/quote]
Woohoo! Your shitting me! Woohoo!

Woohoo! Your shitting me! Woohoo!

Hold the phone!! You have got to be shitting me! [size=2]Shit![/size]

Tyjenks, I believe I can truthfully say that I’ve never shit you.

“One of the things it does, Jason, is streamline resource gathering and make it unique for each of the three cultures.”

Not to pry but ‘streamlining gathering’ is rather ambiguous. I read that while they cut the number to 3 thats still 1 more than a game like WCIII.

"It also gives you units with interesting unique abilities (Frost Giants freeze people, Medusas turn them to stone, Valkyries heal units, etc), but you don’t have to fire off the abilities yourself; instead, the AI handles them reasonably well. "

Well here comes more WCIII. Outside of the heroe’s abilities the “magic” units of each side and be set to auto cast too.

I know this sounds like wanting WCIII vs AOM but really I don’t see were AOM is making it any less mico-management than a game like WCIII or Battlecry II etc.

I guess I’ll bring back something I remember you said about the WCIII beta. “What does WCIII do that Battlecry II doesn’t already do?” Seems to me you can subsitute names and reuse that question here. Maybe not just specifically WCIII but most recent RTS’s.

Well here comes more WCIII. Outside of the heroe’s abilities the “magic” units of each side and be set to auto cast too.

Nah, it’s really different. There’s very little babystting units. If any at all.

I’m a big fan of Warcarft III. I’m also a big fan of Age of Mythology. They’re very different games, but I think they’re both great.

I just downloaded and played some of the demo after a 3 hour wait in Fileplanet’s queues, and am now eagerly planning to buy Age of Mythology when it hits stores.

There’s just lots of variety in units, factions, and god selection, which bodes well for the breadth of potential strategies. The auto-use of unit abilities is welcome as well, and the interface seems quite easy to use and informative. I would like to know if there’s a way to see individual unit hitpoints in a group without specifically selecting individual units, though.

Not to pry but ‘streamlining gathering’ is rather ambiguous. I read that while they cut the number to 3 thats still 1 more than a game like WCIII.

That is pretty ambiguous, isn’t it? I guess what I meant, Jason, is that recource gathering is built smoothly into the gameplay as one of the distinctive characteristics of each culture. I have a hard time playing the Norse, for instance, because of how they gather their resources, but I can kick ass as the Egytpians.

Granted, the economic game isn’t as easy as Battlecry II, which took the Total Annihilation model and improved on it. But it’s also not as sprawling as Age of Empires with its 4 resources and depleting farms. It’s a very player-friendly model. Particularly if you’re Egyptian.

Hopefully that’s less ambiguous…?

Well here comes more WCIII. Outside of the heroe’s abilities the “magic” units of each side and be set to auto cast too.

No, you don’t understand. You never control the special abilities of units in Age of Mythology. It’s like Kohan. You group your armies together and the AI does it’s thing: formations, target selection, special abilities, the whole kit and kaboodle. There’s almost zero tactical management in Age of Mythology when a battle starts.

There’s none of the infuriating unit hand-holding you get in WCIII.

I guess I’ll bring back something I remember you said about the WCIII beta. “What does WCIII do that Battlecry II doesn’t already do?”

I’m not arguing that Age of Mythology is anything other than a traditional RTS with loads of personality, some excellent design choices, and some very entertaining artwork and animation.

The big difference from WCIII is that it doesn’t treat the player’s attention as a resource by necessitating a lot of micromanagement. I hated that about WCIII, where if you’re not pushing your units around and firing off their abilities, you’re losing the game.

In WCIII, it’s as if the interface was hobbled to make the game more challenging. Fuckers. Don’t do that to me. I’m your customer. Make the game as easy to play as you can and let me get down to business.

 -Tom

But doesn’t controlling units in battle make RTS fun for the mass audience? Maybe that’s why Warcraft III sold millions and Kohan tanked. You actually play the game in Warcraft III, instead of just watching.

Yeah, that’s also the reason why Majesty tanked. People hated the fact that they couldn’t control their units directly. Most RTS fans see these games as some kind of finger-centric sporting event. They get angry when the fastest clicker doesn’t win the game. Sad but true.

But doesn’t controlling units in battle make RTS fun for the mass audience? Maybe that’s why Warcraft III sold millions and Kohan tanked.

Well, Mr. Guest, I sure don’t know what makes an RTS “fun” for a “mass audience”. If I did, I’d be a millionaire game developer instead of a freelance writer driving a 15-year-old car.

However, I’m not naive enough to think Warcraft III selling millions and Kohan tanking were simply matters of game design. If that were the case, if mass audiences just wanted to babysit braindead fancy polygonal models, Battle Realms would have perched it at the top of the charts for months on end.

 -Tom