Rise of Nations - PC Review

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As you probably have read, this game is a "thinking mans RTS". I play w/ a group of co-workers who bragged constantly about how cool this game was, but I was put off by the "bigness" of it. The instruction booklet is massive, and ironically, my biggest complaint about the game is that it's not nearly big enough to even give you a good working understanding of the game!

Now, if you aren't afraid of an extraordinarily complex game, this is, in my opinion, the best RTS out there today. Over 10 different nationalities progress and fight thier way through different ages (starting w/ the Ancient Age, and progressing to the Information Age). Each age allows newer and better production, warwaging units, and capabilities. It's hilarious watching inferior players defending their cities w/ catapults while a highly skilled player rolls over them w/ tanks -or Archers being gunned down by an opposing player who's discoved Gunpowder. Yum, gaming goodness!!!

Many new concepts have been introduced in this game. My favorite is "National Borders". At a point in the game, each territory has borders that eminate from their civilizations center of power. What a blast it is to see the colored borders creep out and eventually meet other territories (doing damage to enemy buildings and units it envelops).

Difficult to learn, yes, but the payoff is (in my opinion) very well worth the investment.

Hope my input is helpful.

Enjoy...

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I knew it would take a great game to pull me away from Age of Mythology which I've been playing like an addict for over 6 months now. This is the game I was waiting for. As a veteran Player of both the Civilization series (and the far superior Alpha Centauri) and Age Of Empire series, the similarities to both series was immediately obvious. It shoudln't come as any surprise since this game was built under the Microsoft banner (makers of the AOE series) but developed by former Civilization creators. The end result is a game so close to perfection you are forced to wonder why no one had though of it earlier.

While the gameplay is real time, most of the interface concepts and strategy has been adopted from turn based strategy. Basically combat plays like AOE, but city management plays like CIV. It's the best of both worlds really. The depth of research, complex alliances combined with shrewd AI make this one of the deepest real-time strategy games ever made. Probably the deepest. The use of nukes, aircraft, and huge armies result in huge bloody battles that every real-time player looks for.

One of the best concepts taken from the turn based games is the way cities are the key to conquest. Cities can be raided and completely taken over by hostile armies. Cities determine the size and shape of national borders. Operating outside of national borders causes your troops to suffer attrition damage if improperly equipped. Therefore, real-time players used to "rushing' will find they must adopt a whole new strategy. Armies might be the key to conquest, but it's developement that will govern their success.

There are two basic modes to the single player game: quick battle and the campaign. Players of the campaign will notice similarities to another hybrid type series: Total War. There is a huge world map where armies can be moved around like game pieces. After making your moves, the game goes into real time mode with objectives based on the decisions and moves you made previously. Unlike Total War where the real time is strictly combat, the real time portion of the game also forces you to build resources and raise armies if necessary. Exceptional victories are rewarded with game cards that can be played prior to going real time, another added bonus that gives depth to the game.

While their are few real ground-breaking concepts in this game, by taking the best concepts of some of the greatest strategy games ever made is a bold leap forward. Also, after playing Age of Mythology and Warcraft 3 with their beautiful 3D engines, the 2d graphics are a step back, but it's easily forgiven. I've been playing this game for awhile now, and it seems like I learn somethign new every time I play. Liek the best strategy games, there are a lot of layers and a lot of different paths to victory. Any strategy game fan should pick this one up regardless of their preferences.

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This game blows Empire Earth, Civilization III, and Age of Empires out of the water. It is just plain fun FUN FUN! I would recommend this game to any people that liked the games mentioned above. This is why i gave it 5 stars:

Single-player: awesome. you start off with one city, and then you keep adding (the maximum is 8 i think). You can invade enemy territoty and try to conquer them. And believe me, you can't just march in there with a huge amount of soldiers and expect to decimate them. Oh no. They have the homefield advantage. Their reinforcements keep coming & coming & coming. One time, I was fighting for a city on my border and the French's border. I fought for that city for almost half of the game. I would get it, then they would. This went on & on, just like real life. This game is very realistic and extremely fun. They also have a conquer the world campigne, but i don't find it amussing.

Another good quality is that the people move very fast, which is a major advancement. This helps a lot when you are under attack and have no troops there. The troops get there quickly, and problem solved.

This game is one of the best RTS games i have ever played.

BUY THIS GAME!!

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First of all, let me explain my gaming interest/background. I believe that Civ II is the greatest strategy game ever developed, bar none. I put more playtime into that game than I wish to admit. Once I began playing the real-time games, namely the Starcraft, Age of Empires, and Warcraft series, they provided a good time but always left something to be desired. I felt they were too one-dimensional, completely focused on resource allocation. Some strategy was involved, but that lay completely in the battle sequences.

Rise of Nations has set a new bar. It has brilliantly combined the aspects of the Civilization series with those of the real-time game. If you are familiar with Civ, you will see many similarities, in that you wean ore from mountains, lumber from forests, and so on. The difference is that you have to allocate citizens to build structures (mines, farms, etc.) to obtain these resources rather than get them passively. The research tree is a little more linear but still supremely superior to other real-time games. The Wonder of the World and national border concepts are preserved from Civ, also.

An interesting tweak to the game is rare resources, which are scattered throughout the maps, which give your nation special bonuses. You also have generals, which can give bonuses to their surrounding troops a la the hero from Warcraft.

The real-time playability is outstanding, garnering the feel of Age of Kings.

Overall, this game is outstanding. It is an improvement over both genres of games, a great feat.

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This game is one of the best RTS games I have ever played! You can choose one of 18 nations, Aztecs, Bantu, British, Chinese, Egyptians, French, Germans, Greeks, Inca, Japanese, Korean, Maya, Mongols, Nubians, Romans, Russians, Spanish, and Turks, all with different strenght's and abilities. You start off in the Acient age, with slingers (rock throwers) and finish in the Information age, with Nuclear bombs an Artificial Intellegence.

This game is very fast paced, as in, battles and wars. It is not easy to invade an enemy's territory, which is realistic. If you come with a huge assembly of soldiers, you won't have many left by the end of the battle because their reinforements keep on coming. For example, I wanted to take over the French city of Marsielles (bare with me on the spelling), and it took me nearly four epochs just to take over that city. It was frustrating, but, hey, welcome to the real world. The graphics are also superb. The battles are not extrodinary, but are fun to watch. When you drop a nuclear bomb, anything, or anyone for that matter, is destroyed within the explosion radius. You have to worry about radiation, too. After you drop your fist Nuke, a little sign comes up and says: Armaggedon-15. After you drop another Nuke, the number drops to 14. I think that when the number gets to zero, the world is destroyed and it is game over for everyone. I just wish that if you dropped a Nuke, it would destroy more that three buildings.

his may not matter much to you, but it matters alot to me. The people in this game actually walk FAST! This takes away the long waiting time if you want to move a person all the way across the map. It also can come in handy if you are in a large battle or your city is being attacked, and the reinforcments are a long way's away.

The conquer the world campainge is also a lot of fun. You begin with a map, very similar to Medieval: Total War. You do the same thing as Total War-move your army around the map trying to conquer the world, one terrritory at a time. When ou try to conquer the territory, sometimes there are missions: defend your city for 15 minutes, or, the usual: capture the enemy capital in 90 minutes or less. I have just begun the conquer the world campaigne, and it is very enjoyable.

The gameplay is bassically the same as Age of Empires-you start out with your capital, build farms & mines &woodcutters camps. But this game goes way beyond Age of Empires. If you liked the Age of Empires series, BUY THIS GAME!

Again, this game is highly enjoyable and very addictive.On easy, I beat the computer in about 3 hours, but that was on easy. This game is a great way to spend your spare time, and is definatly worth the price.

This game needs a top of the line computer in order to function right. I had a NVIDIA 64mb video card, and it needed to be updated. I called the people at Microsft, and they were very helpful. The walked me through how to update the graphics card driver and were ver nice. If you have anything less that a 64mb video card, you cannot play this game. Go out and buy a new video card.

This game is very fun and very addictive. It is well worth the price. BUY IT NOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!