Rise of Nations demo

[Egeides]

I tried it, and it's frankly refreshing to see a RTS that brings new content, concepts, stuff :P

Basically, Rise of Nations (RON) is Civilization III as a RTS, with borders, culture, wonders, eras, everything. Really looks like the best RTS since ages to me.

I propose you check by yourself with the demo (200Mb!!):

http://www.avault.com/pcrl/demo_temp.asp?game=riseofnations

EDIT: GameSpot gave 9.3/10 in his review (http://mads.gamespot.com/mac-ad?&_RGROUP=2313&NCAT=1:&CNET-BRAND-ID=4&HUB=pi&PTNR=2&LOCALE=En_US&&CNET-SITE-ID=6&ASSET_HOST=mads.gamespot.com&adfile=3023/11/526060_wc.ca)

[number6]

It would be insteresting to see an RTS with politics and treaties in it as opposed to the destroy everyone mentallity that is the norm. Thanks for the heads up!

[Khan]

It's pretty good, played the trial and getting it on friday. You guys should check out here it's a pretty neat forum but the main page is down. :'(

[Nyarlathotep]

I bought the game and played it for a day. My first impression was that it's just another Age of empires/Age of Mythology kind of games. Overall I was right. Build you city, vreate farms, barracks, stables, ect. Create schools to increase knowledge and advance to the next age. If you've advanced far enough, you can have nukes. I thought I'd blast my way to victory and nuke the hell outta my enemy. After having nuked a few cities, somewhere close to 5 (those nukes ARE powerfull, you'll blast everything away near the city) I get the end game screen saying I caused an armageddon and there are no winners... Now that was surprising and excellent to see. You can't win with nukes (you can get far though).

As for the graphics, they are excellent. However, do keep in mind you'll need a sweet machine to run full graphics and zoom in. Game play is easy to learn, very easy indeed. I love the population limit (planes and missiles are included). What I also liked is for your citizens, merchants and everything else that can walk/drive (in later age) is the auto explore. You don't need to baby sit the citizens to have them explore things. They can do that automaticly.

The planes in the game could have been developed better. I think their controls could have been improved a lot. Although there's a button to have them all out of the hangers in no time if your city get's attacked.

I didn't try the online play yet, but I assume it's a full scale rush game for most players...

Out of 10:

Game play: 9

Graphics: 9

Originailty: 6

Re- playability: 7

[Navaros]

fter having nuked a few cities, somewhere close to 5 (those nukes ARE powerfull, you'll blast everything away near the city) I get the end game screen saying I caused an armageddon and there are no winners... Now that was surprising and excellent to see. You can't win with nukes (you can get far though).

so that means that pricks everywhere whose sole purpose for playing will be to ruin the fun for everyone else; will simply advance to the nuke age and deliberately negate the game into a stalemate with nukes. gee, that sounds fun! i just invested X_number of hours into building a great Empire, and now one jerk can stalemate the game instantly! ::)

anyhow, i don't like this game in the first place because it has the Age interface - which sucks - and Age-esque graphics, which means miniscule, poorly-drawn Stick Figures which look they were made by a 6-year-old with an Etch-A-Sketch

[Nyarlathotep]

anyhow, i don't like this game in the first place because it has the Age interface - which sucks - and Age-esque graphics, which means miniscule, poorly-drawn Stick Figures which look they were made by a 6-year-old with an Etch-A-Sketch

If you'e going to reply on something, read the whole story. The graphics are awesome, so is the game play. On these two points there's no negativity from my side. If you haven't (and I know you didn't) played the game, stop bashing it.

[Khan]

so that means that pricks everywhere whose sole purpose for playing will be to ruin the fun for everyone else; will simply advance to the nuke age and deliberately negate the game into a stalemate with nukes. gee, that sounds fun! i just invested X_number of hours into building a great Empire, and now one jerk can stalemate the game instantly! ::)

Welll if you have created a great empire by the time you have reached the Modern age you should easily be able to take out any opponent. Besides there are easy enought ways to prevent a nuke.

[Nyarlathotep]

Besides there are easy enought ways to prevent a nuke.

Indeed, after the last age, you can build missile shields..

[Khan]

BTW it's 10 nukes before the appocalypse, and you can edit out the nukes.

[lowzeewee]

Well,the unit type is rather limited :-X

[Khan]

But they are actually different as opposed to AoE, where everything is the same.

[lowzeewee]

Has anyone tested out using Stone Age clubmen against Information Age battle tanks? ;D

[Khan]

I did once have T-80s against pikeman, and lost. That was a crazy game.

[lowzeewee]

I think it is simply just like AOE2 but they change the champion[highest rank of swordsman]image to a T-80 image.

[Khan]

Actually they changed knights to T-80s and champions to Assault Infantry, it's still a good game though.

[lowzeewee]

But NO games can EVER be realistic,that's why they are games,so RoN is still good ;)

[Khan]

Yeah, itsa' hella' good game.

[number6]

I just got the game yesterday and did not play long enough to say I like or dislike it. I have high hopes for this game because Brian Reynolds (who developed Alpha Centauri/Civ II) designed this game. He left Firaxis in the middle of development on Civ III to start up the company that made Rise of Nations. Civ III has suffered from the loss of Brian because he would put a lot of effort into the combat model for units. I am hoping this will be the case with RON.

[Khan]

The biggest dissapointment was the single player TBS mode. There was no strategy and no real planning. Compared with games like the Total War series, the single player is almost unworthy to be counted in the same genre, but online and the quick battles are amazing. However there are huge amounts of lagg, even for those with a fast connection and a good PC.

[lowzeewee]

I just checked up on Civ III because I am preparing to buy it when I head off to Australia with my family to visit my sister who is in her 2nd year in Melbourne University.I will spend about a week there with the first and last days being used for flying to and from Australia,thus during the 5 days,I have virtually nothing to do,so I will just purchase Civ III,buy some Mechwarrior miniature figurines to add to my game collection and possibly get an MTG deck. ;)

Oh,I forgot to talk about RoN,well.......RoN is rather dirt slow actually,even Cossacks is better :)

[Nyarlathotep]

Oh,I forgot to talk about RoN,well.......RoN is rather dirt slow actually,even Cossacks is better :)

Slow ?? Slow as to what ?

[lowzeewee]

When playing online that is :)

And it seems like most nations end up with the same units in the end.

[Khan]

Most of the unique units are in the middle, yes, buut there are afew which are unique at the end, take Russia for example. or Germany.

[lowzeewee]

But excluding Russia and Germany,most of them end up with the same tanks and same vechicles and infantry and makes the game quite pointless if the game last long >:(

[Nyarlathotep]

But excluding Russia and Germany,most of them end up with the same tanks and same vechicles and infantry and makes the game quite pointless if the game last long >:(

No it doesn't. Every side has unique things, if it isn't in units, it's somewhere else, which could bring you your advantage if used right. Pay close attention to details and you'll discover a world of difference between the different sides ;)

I think most of you are looking to closely at unique units and do not pay attention to other unique things in the game (per side). Instead of wanting the most unique units, try to discover a game for once, it's fun and that fun will last long :)