By Jim Rossignol on March 2nd, 2010 at 8:59 am.
Can we judge a wargame by its map? I think so, and it’s clear from the map of Ageod’s latest (they’re the Europa Universalis, Pax Romana types) we can see that they’ve not strayed far from their classical historical wargame roots. Check out the trailer below and you’ll see what I mean. This one is all in the map. Rise Of Prussia focuses on one particular stretch of the 18th century (reportedly it consists of six “Annual Campaigns Scenarios”, for each year between 1757 and 1763 and one Grand Campaign Scenario 1756-1763,) which is – obviously – the period in which Prussia was at its most arsey. The full game is out on 9th of March.
You can absolutely judge a wargame by its map. Medieval 1 had the best map ever. NO ARGUMENTS.
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I got AGEOD’s American Civil War for Christmas. I picked up their Wars in America and Napoleon’s Campaigns games in the Gamersgate sale in January. I’ve barely had time to play any of them (though I’ve greatly enjoyed dabbling so far), and now they go and do this.
Grand historical strategy’s going to be the death of me, but between Paradox and AGEOD I must admit that it’s a pleasant way to go.
Oh, and thanks Jim. Grand strategy is a niche that is easy for game sites to overlook. I’m glad you have one of my favorite subgenre’s back.
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Looks like the Austrian army is are going to be… under a lot of Prussia.
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@Pew
I lold, are you David Caruso?
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Awesome Pew. Quality.
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Nice one, I chuckled :>
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*sunglasses*
YEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEAH
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@Fashigady
I blame Queen, Bowie and one too many of those CSI ME2 youtube vids,
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So Otto Von Bismark is Vanilla Ice then?
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On a related note, where’s Tim Stone been? IIRC he was a big fan of AGEOD’s previous work, plus I need him to tell me whether or not to buy Achtung Panzer!
Tim, true grognard of RPS, why hast thou forsaken us?
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Vinraith: Tim’s doing a full Wot I Think about Achtung Panzer at the moment.
KG
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i’m not Tim Stone, but you should buy Achtung Panzer.
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@Kieron
Well, that’s just exactly what I asked for, isn’t it? Well done, then.
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The map really is quite ugly. This is such a pity, I’m actually STUDYING this period of Prussian history and salivating for a game on it, yet all these Paradox published games still manage to be less appealing than Empire: Total War EVEN WHEN THEY ARE SOLEY BASED ON THE SUBJECT I WANT.
I want to love these games, but the maps, oh god the maps.
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What’s wrong with those maps ?!
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@DMcCool
How odd, I think AGEOD’s maps are lovely.
Now, Paradox’s in-house games of late (Europa Universalis 3 in particular) have considerably uglier maps than their old 2d engine games IMO, but since their appearance is moddable it’s easy to find something that suits your sense of aesthetics. Pishtaco’s map mod bundled with Magna Mundi, for example, has an “old world atlas” look that I think is a vast improvement over vanilla.
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I actually prefer the in-house Paradox maps (they are more…mappy. As someone pointed out the best in-game map ever was Medieval’s). Its something about the colours, the perspective, the weird UI..that video actually gave me a headache.
Someday someone will find the hinterland between the extremes of CA’s Playability and Paradox’s History Geek Overload. And I will give them all of my money.
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Agreed ! Medieval 1′s map was perfect. It’s a real shame they moved away from that
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ETW/NTW map is the best. MTW1′s map was nice at the time but this is 2010, I don’t want a risk map. If I do I’ll buy risk.
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But this is 2010 and if the AI isn’t broken it’s not a valid TW game!
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Paradox basically rules on the wargame front. Neither I’m very much concerned on the art behind the map when I’m leading the destinies of an historical nation on such a grand scale and depth as that offered by Paradox games. Be it medieval France or WWII Germany, the giant 18th century English empire, or small non influential Switzerland.
I’m a fan.
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The depth is too much for me. It seems you have to spend 6 months working out how the game works before you can start enjoying it. Well at least that was my experience with HOI3.
I really wanted to like it too! *Sigh*
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For what it’s worth, AGEOD’s games are very different from and more intuitive than anything Paradox does. Birth of America is pretty cheap on Steam if you’re interested in checking one out.
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