4Gamer.net (Japanese) has up a gallery of 26 screenshots, from which it is apparent a Japanese language version of RoN is in the advanced stages of development.
If you understand Japanese, you can also visit the Microsoft Games Japan RoN Home Page here.
RoN Center’s very own two-page RoN Preview by The Black Knight is up and ready! “I believe Rise of Nations will be one of the best RTS games of the year. It is interesting, and has a huge amount of gameplay settings that make for good replay value. Kudos to Big Huge Games, I can't wait for the full version.” Article includes 16 screenshots.
CDV has announced the games that will make their dayview this year. Cossacks II is currently set for quarter 3 however please bear in mind that it will most probabaly change drastically! To see the list visit gamespot HERE
We still have a problem with the download server ... if you are having problems downloading, please close the normal small download box and press on the 'click here' of 'If your download does not start, please click here.' It should then download normally.
As you know, Merepatra, whom all of us hold in this special place within our hearts, has accepted a job at BreakAways, of Emperor fame. At first she hoped she'd be able to combine her tasks of being an angel at Stronghodl Heaven with her new job, but this is simply turning out to be too much of a good thing.
So, with sad heart I've accepted her resignation from Stronghold Heaven. So join me in saying:
Thanks for all the great work you've done for the site! And don't be stranger...
You too can say thank you Mere in the Inn. Note that she will still be active as an angel on the City Builder forums.
Thank you for visiting our site during our Beta Sign-up contest. We have sent the emails to the winners - if you are one of the lucky few to receive the email, be sure to follow the directions in the email! Contest winners will be announced Monday after we confirm the entries.
Then go no further than KS_Josey_Wales' Archive. He's begun posting answers to his emails(all of which he replies to), as well as a recorded games clinic. Wales is an awesome guy, there aren't too many experts of his caliber that take this much time out of their day to help out fellow gamers. Definitely take a look at his site and head down to his thread to comment.
With the huge influx of new games into the gaming market recently, Age of Mythology was completely pushed out of the top 10 list during the week ending on the 15th. Here's hoping they're just #11 and will get back up next week.
1 Command & Conquer: Generals - Electronic Arts $42 2 Battlefield 1942: Road To Rome Expansion Pack - Electronic Arts $17 3 Unreal II: The Awakening - Infogrames Entertainment $41 4 Sim City 4 - Electronic Arts $48 5 The Sims Deluxe - Electronic Arts $44 6 The Sims: Unleashed Expansion Pack - Electronic Arts $29 7 MS Zoo Tycoon - Microsoft $28 8 Battlefield 1942 - Electronic Arts $43 9 Medal Of Honor: Allied Assault Spearhead Expansion Pack - Electronic Arts $21 10 NASCAR Racing 2003 Season - Vivendi Universal Publishing $41
Thanks to the great guys at PAoM for this bit of news; Quakeskills has interviewed current ES employee Paul Jaquays for his previous work on Quake's levels. Here's a snippet of the interview:
"With over 20 years experience in game design, Paul Jaquays is a name that many in the gaming community know and respect. Paul was kind enough to take some time out of his busy schedule at Microsoft Ensemble Studios to speak with us about his career history, his years spent at id Software creating levels, and his current RTS projects. It is with great pleasure that I was able to interview Paul. Aside from mapping some amazing levels for the Doom and Quake series of games, Paul is a talented artist and game designer. He is also a technician and contributed documentation for GTK Radiant (so next time you are stuck making your map, RTM - it's all in there!). At Ensemble, his role is Content Designer - a position where his years of art and creativity come together to craft the look, feel, and mechanics of the game as a whole."
Brian Goldstein of Gamers Pulse updates the site’s RoN preview:
Rise of Nations is shaping up quite well. While there haven't been Earth shattering changes since we last saw it, the single player campaign aims to please and seems like it will not disappoint.
The promising siegelet Kingdom of Wra has been canceled.
"I have bad news to anounce to you, my friends. The Kingdom of Wra project is ending. Sadly, but it is. I do not have the energy to put into it anymore, and we don't have nearly enough people. So I am ending the Kingdom of Wra project. The site will remain up for about six months more, and then it will be taken down. Most of the code that we would have used will be released to the community either as open source or as small mods. Thank you for your time."
Shadows of Winter has updated their site yet again, this time with two new renders.
"Many of the refugee's who have made there way north to avoid the ongoing civil war have taken to the ways of thievery and murder. The woods of the northern realm have become a lawless land."
The well known Clan ranking, RTS-League is holding a banner contest. Here's what FOPT_Strawberry had to say about it:
Join the official "RTS-League Banner Contest" for the chance to win US $50 in cash or (alternatively) a full version of the upcoming strategy-hit "Rise of Nations" by Big Huge Games and Microsoft. The prize will be given to the banner that is being selected by the League Staff Team to appear on our mainpage. For more info, visit www.rts-league.com
Kumar Shah has posted the ladder warriors for the fourth week of the ladder's operation. Khadafi, Zero_Sum_Gamer and ladder champion WK_Wolf. Find out more in the ladder warriors thread. Congrats to the ladder warriors! And not to be forgotten is the hard working Kumar Shah!
Rise of Nations Empire has announced the winners of their Wallpaper design beta contest, their wallpapers just those of the 5 runners up for posted on their site. Congrats to the winners, and good job to all the wallpaper designers.
RTS-League (www.rts-league.com), the leading international Clan League for Age of Kings: The Conquerors and Age of Mythology, needs your help!
While moving to our new and super-fast server we decided to do a redesign for the website. First and foremost we need a new banner so we are hereby calling all graphical talents to the arms (pencils).
Join the official "RTS-League Banner Contest" for the chance to win US $50 in cash or (alternatively) a full version of the upcoming strategy-hit "Rise of Nations" by Big Huge Games and Microsoft.
The prize will be given to the banner that is being selected by the League Staff Team to appear on our mainpage. Additionally the creator will have his name placed on our site.
Submissions will be accepted from Monday, February 24th to Sunday, March 9th 2003.
We've just opened a brand new forum in anticipation of all the people receiveing copies of the Rise of Nations Sneak Preview Beta. This will be a good place for people to post their impressions of the game, their war stories and any minor issues or concerns they may have with the game after playing with it for a little bit.
For all those lucky winners, we have started a beta checkin thread where people can list their GameSpy Login names, so head on over and check it out by clicking here.
Just a quick reminder that today's the last day you can submit entries into the fan art contest. So if you've yet to submit yours, get ta steppin'! After the contest, the winners should be announced by the end of the week. Good luck to everyone that's entered!
Sumthing Distribution have teamed up with Ensemble to publish the AoM Soundtrack on CD. Stephen Rippy and Kevin McMullan's original compositions comprise 17 tracks with a wide variety of instrumentation, including titles, themes, in-game music, and more.
If you're interested in this product, buy through one of the links below and support HG:
1. Cat Named Mittens (Main Title) - Northwest Sinfonia and Chorus 2. Eat Your Potatoes 3. Chocolate Outline 4. Never Mind the Slacks and Bashers 5. Suture Self 6. Flavor Cats (In the Comfort Zone) 7. (Fine Layers Of) Slaysenflite 8. Hoping for Real Betterness 9. Adult Swim 10. Ballad of Ace Lebaron 11. In a Pile of Its Own Good 12. Behold the Great Science Fi 13. Have You Met Her Thunder [Trailer Soundtrack] - Northwest Sinfonia and Chorus 14. If You Can Use a Doorknob (Victory Theme) - Northwest Sinfonia and Chorus 15. Ma'am...Some Other Sunset (Defeat Theme) - Northwest Sinfonia and Chorus 16. Gary's Revenge (End Credits) 17. Eat Your Potatoes (Quiet Mix)
I recently received an e-mail from FOPT_Strawberry, with the following news attached:
RTS-League (www.rts-league.com), the leading international Clan-League for Age of Kings: The Conquerors and Age of Mythology, needs your help!
While moving to our new and super-fast server we decided to do a re-design for the website. First and foremost we need a new banner so we are hereby calling all graphical talents to the arms (pencils).
Join the official "RTS-League Banner Contest" for the chance to win US $50 in cash or (alternatively) a full version of the upcoming strategy-hit "Rise of Nations" by Big Huge Games and Microsoft.
The prize will be given to the banner that is being selected by the League Staff Team to appear on our mainpage. Additionally the creator will have his name placed on our site.
Submissions will be accepted from Monday, February 24th to Sunday, March 9th 2003.
GameWatchers have recently reviewed AoM in a highly praising but admittedly not very detailed look at the game. (The author also contends the campaign is 'hard in places', where I have seen most other sites' reviews say the very opposite.) The reviewer rated it 91 out of 100.
The last thing I admire about this game is the accuracy and the detail went into the units and background. The game even comes with an encyclopaedia, which gives descriptions of the units along with where they come from in mythology. Now I study mythology as a past time and I must say that they have done so much that other developers may have set aside for the sake of time or money. It’s those small touches I admire and what make me think this is an excellent game, as you can see the love right from the start.
Rise of Nations Center has announced that it will be holding a tournament for all you lucky people who have received a copy of the Beta.
Yes, RoNC will be hosting a beta tournament for the lucky people who received the RoN beta. The signup date is still up in the air (we'll be waiting to see when people recieve their betas). There will be prizes (RoN stuff of course) for the winners. Be checking back soon for full details.
It's open to everyone, so sign up and get ready to rumble.
NPD Techworld has released the top-20 selling games during the month of January. Age of Mythology is above any real competition at number 7 and Age of Kings is still going strong at number 17. This month appears to have shown a rise in other games such as Unreal II, but last month AoM seems to have done most excellently. Though this month isn't over, AoM could jump up a couple spots in the last two weeks of February.
1. Sim City 4 - EA, $49 2. The Sims Deluxe - EA, $42 3. The Sims: Unleashed - EA, $28 4. Zoo Tycoon - Microsoft, $27 5. Harry Potter & The Chamber Of Secrets - EA, $28 6. Roller Coaster Tycoon 2 - Infogrames, $28 7. MS Age Of Mythology - Microsoft, $43 8. Sponge Bob: Operation Krabby Patty - THQ, $17 9. Roller Coaster Tycoon - Infogrames, $16 10. Warcraft III: Reign Of Chaos - VU, $43 11. Battlefield 1942 - EA, $47 12. MOH: Allied Assault Spearhead - EA, $30 13. Zoo Tycoon: Marine Mania - Microsoft, $29 14. The Sims: Vacation - EA, $29 15. The Sims Online - EA, $45 16. MOH: Allied Assault - EA, $47 17. Age Of Empires 2 - Microsoft, $24 18. James Bond 007: Nightfire - EA, $26 19. The Sims: Hot Date - EA, $30 20. Lego Racers 2 - EA/Lego, $15
Well, I've just finished updating the interviews page. As the title says, I recently did an interview with Tim Scott known quite well around the forums as Hank. I'm sure most people remember him for his sniper multiplayer scenario as well as others. But quit reading and go check out the interview here.
The Alliance Francophone is probably only known for its name in a community that doesn't speak French, so Lunatic at PAoM decided to interview one of the two webmasters of the site, Dallas. The interview is an excellent source of info on the beginnings of the Francophone as well as some information on Dallas himself. Here's a snippet:
"Lunatic - Wow... but when you started the site, you were still a student? how can you manage to put all that time on a website and have a full time job? Dallas - The first year, I was actually doing an internship at MS France. As soon as I came home, I was working for the AF site, often until 1 or 2 AM. Most of my week-ends were also very busy. After that I completed my last year as a student and, well, I had even more time to spend building and managing the site. What happens now is that I am way more busy with my full time job, and I need to take some rest when coming back home. So I only spend 1 or 2 hours per day for the AF site, and also part of my week-ends. Fortunately, Magellan has more free time than I have so this is not a problem."
Michael Rymaszewski, well known strategy guide writer for many RTS's is now in preparation for a RoN Strategy Guide published by Sybex(US $19.99 | Can $31.95 | UK £14.99 |April 2003 | 240 pages). Thanks to Graham Somer’s remarks at RoN Planet.
Gamer.tv publishes a two-page preview of RoN with an accompanying video of a short interview with Brian Reynolds from last summer’s E3. (The RoN user interface shown in the video is obsolete and has been replaced.) Gamer.tv reports the UK release date as 25 April 2003.
Between now and midnight, February 26, 2003, if you see the picture to the right pop up, click on it and you will be given a chance to win one of 5 copies of the Rise of Nations Beta. Entrants must be 13 years old or older, and not have won another Rise of Nations beta from Microsoft or another Rise of Nations Fan Site. One entry per household. Duplicate applications will be deleted and removed from consideration. Winners will be picked randomly from the pool of qualified applicants and notified by email. If we do not receive a reply within 24 hours of notification, another winner will be chosen. Best of luck everyone.
Shadows of Winter has posted an update on their website consisting of 2 screenshots and a faq. Here's a few of the questions answered there.
How does Shadows of Winter differ from DungeonSiege? Shadows of Winter is different than Dungeon Siege on many levels. Most noteworthy is the goal of providing a rich, living single player world full of interesting people to interact with and an epic quest to not only save mankind and the world but also all of exisitence.
How many hours of gameplay can I expect to get out of Shadows of Winter You can expect there to be roughly 30 hours of gameplay.
Copperhead has posted two new screenshots showing the main character inside the game. They have also created a newsgroup that you can join if you want to get an email every time the site is updated.
The Dark Angel stopped by today taking the credit that he had caused the press release by Activision of Stainless Steel Studios' new game. Honestly, I don't believe him but hopefully he doesn't read this news piece, or I'm in big trouble.
Anyway, he approved of my exclusive piece of text which means I'll be posting it tonight as long as no disasters happen. I'm proud to say this would be EEH's 6th feature although I cannot take full credit. And to calm any fanatics, it isn't a recording of Rick's voice or any type of picture.
Thanks to Mike "Archangel" McCart for informing me on this. ES, from now on, will be actively stopping cheating and abusing in the rating system on ESO. It's become rather rampant, and this move will definitely please a lot of gamers. Here's the scoop from our winged friend:
"ES takes pride in providing a fair and consistent competitive online environment for the enjoyment of our games by all our customers. To that end, we have begun an ongoing examination of ESO records and ladders to ensure that the integrity of ESO is maintained for all players. Accounts of those individuals found to be willfully manipulating their records, scores, or rankings to circumvent ESO and/or it's Ladder system will be dealt with accordingly. Penalties can include the resetting of the account's rating and ladder rank, with repeated violations resulting in even more serious consequences."
With L_Clan_Chris winning the first place and $1,500 dollars! You can talk about the conclusion and see the rest of the list in the MFO news post. But if you don't really want to go there to see the other prize winners, here's the list right here:
I apologize for this rather late news notice, but I've been buried in work. :-S Angel Winston, a highly respected member and a great guy altogether, has decided to resign from the HeavenGames staff due to a difficult real life situation. His explanation to us all is the following:
I have resigned from Heavengames. This was not an easy decision by any means. This had to do with real life work. On thursday, they laid off 20% of the current workforce at our division. I am one of the survivors due to my abilities and tenure. It does require me to think long and hard since I no longer have a 2 year backlog, in fact I dont think I have much of a backlog.
In order for me to be true to HG and myself, I feel we must part. I cannot put the effort I need into HG as I need to refocus elsewhere. I am sorry, and I love you all. This is not an easy decision as many of you know.
If you wish to bid him farewell, head over to this thread. On behalf of the entire HeavenGames staff, I wish him the best of luck in sorting out his problems.
For those of you that have yet to enter your work of art to the Fan Art Contest, you've got two days. It ends this Tuesday, so get to drawin and sendin'!
Well, okay not pirates. But the other server IS down (again) and has been for most of today, which means that the downloads database is currently unavailable and AoMH is likely to not load properly for you. (Technical explanation: the style sheets and some of the images are stored on the other server to decrease loading times. Obviously they won't load at all if that server isn't working.)
Hopefully these issues will be resolved soon. Thanks for your patience all!
Update 2/23 10:03 PM - Downloads server is back and running. Some people have reported proxy errors connecting to AoMH, I am not sure of the source of these, but I don't believe they are happening anymore. As usual, thanks for bearing with us.
Update 2/24 1:05 AM - I've just been told that the downloads server wasn't completely restored, as it crashed earlier. Some file submissions have been lost. File ID's 669 - 675 are the only ones I know for sure as lost. If your submission was in those files lost, please feel free to resubmit. Hopefully this server will last a little longer than the others.
As some of you might know, the application we were previously using for the AoM Toons section isn't being very helpful anymore, as it refuses to display thumbnails of new submissions. (Which is why the toons section hasn't been updated for umm....a long time now.) However, TSD has finally gotten off his backside and done something about it. We've moved the toons over to the gallery, and you can now see all the submissions from the toons contest we held back in December. (They start on page 7, I believe.) So if you wanted to see the results of that contest, head over and check out the AoM Toons gallery.
Submissions will from now on be handled via email, so if you have one to send in, drop me a line. Thanks to Kyle Leach for the toon featured above.
This week we present the Nubians. A somewhat enigmatic long lost civilization, kind of like the Nation of the week feature, but we've found them again! Not only that, the unique units section features never seen by the public unique unit art from the latest beta! Here's an excerpt:
Nubia was known as "Ta-Seti", or the Land of the Bow, by the Egyptians. The skills of the Nubian Archers were well known in the ancient world. In rise of Nations, these archers make up one line of unique units for the Nubians. ... The Nubians were also introduced to the use of camels in war early in its history providing them with their second unique unit. The Nubians receives Camel Archers starting in the Classical Age that continue into the Enlightenment Age as the Camel Corp.
Check out the article here, and if you missed the other Nations, you can check out the full list!
Our latest review comes from GameSplurge, who rated AoM 86%. The review is to be honest, brief, and the reviewer seemed of the opinion that it was everything we've seen before done more time.
Fortunately, everyone the world round looks just great. Like Warcraft III, AoM has gone completely 3D with a whole new graphics engine. The units are detailed, animations are smooth, and in the larger battles, you can get an impressive number of combatants slugging it out without any slowdown. The new 3D landscape looks good too, with nice water effects and some minor terrain morphing as you flatten land to build on it or just smash it with meteors.
Flammifer and Kumar Shah send word that they need your help starting up the new ladder spotlight games. The idea behind the spotlight is - as you might have guessed - to show off the records of the most interestering ladder games played each week. To find out more, head over to this thread in the forums.
I'm happy to present to you a new gallery: Swolte's Gallery. He has submitted eight beautiful screenshots taken off his scenario creations. The gallery of screenshots also includes comments by the scenario designer himself. Check it out here. Enjoy!
Lucasarts has annouced 2 new cheat codes for Star Wars Galactic Battlegrounds: Clone Campaigns. Thanks to Ian Blinkhorn for a heads up.
To use a hint, hit enter and type the code into a chat window.
The Force is strong with this one Jedi turning range increase
Most powerful Jedi Jedi faster and more deadly
Note that you can get updates and hints of the week for any Lucasarts game by subscribing to their exclusive free program. Sign up at Lucas Arts' Official Website today!
Users using Internet Explorer may be experiencing download problems when trying to download files from HG. They may receive an error saying:
Internet Explorer cannot download from files.heavengames.com
Internet Explorer was not able to open this Internet site. The requested site is either unavailable or cannot be found.
Please try again later.
While we work on fixing the problem, user can click "OK" at the error message, and then proceed to download the file via the link provided in the "Download File" page.
-To build a central knowledgebase of everything related to modding Dungeon Siege.
-To provide a central place for DS modders to congregate and learn from one another.
-To provide constantly updated information regarding the latest developments in the Dungeon Siege community.
-To build support for mentorship between GPG, the Dungeon Siege community leaders, and the Dungeon Siege community at large.
SWO is built to be a very community oriented site. The bulk of the knowledge regarding modding Dungeon Siege lies in the minds of the Dungeon Siege community members. SWO Members thus have access to our Member Submissions section and are encouraged to submit or inform us of any good news, articles, FAQ's, or files which will be of benefit to our members.
This is only the beginning! We have many exciting plans in the works. Signup today and become a SWO member and get the inside scoop on future SWO developments!
Sincerely, Jason "Unkle Ernsie" Ernsdorff Gas Powered Games
I think this is the important part of the equation when deciding just how random those random maps have to be. That is, the factor of how fun something is versus how fair it is.
Like many agers out there, I played a little Warcraft 3 on Battlenet when it came out. Playing on the eerily symmetrical maps is a whole lot different from the random maps of AoM. These maps are fair, because they give every player exactly the same resources, right down to how far away the next gold mine was and where creeps were placed. But you play exactly the same map each time. How fun is it to memorize exactly what you are doing in building up your base, (right down to where you would place your buildings, probably) then simply repeat for the first few minutes of every game you play? You can liken this to AoK's build orders, but at least in AoK you had to find those two boars and lure them. In AoM we step further away still, how do you even know you're going to have two boars?
Sure, you can have a fair game, but it's not as fun...is it? Random maps chance the possibility of map screws, that's life. But I for one welcomed the variability of AoM's maps compared to AoK's. And I definitely appreciate the randomnity of the maps in ES games that make each game a new and exciting prospect where everything still remains uncertain, unlike the premade maps of Blizzard and Westwood's titles.
But I digress. The reason I raise the subject is because forumer Ferrari_Warrior recently started a post about his gripes with the random map system. Greg "DeathShrimp" Street dropped by to give his thoughts on exactly why Ensemble favored this approach with AoM, and why it was so different again from the random maps of AoK and AoE.
We want our maps to be random. That may sound trite, but the truth is that we make a lot of decisions to make the maps unpredictable. We generally don't like maps where players always know where the gold mines are, because that leads to static build orders and makes the games play the same every time. Now, maps where things are too random aren't fun either. There needs to be a balance.
Our decision with gold placement was not to gaurantee that each player would have 50% of the gold on their side of the map. We just thought that would be too boring. If you look at the RM scripts, you will see that the "far gold" just attempts to avoid player towns. They don't try and split the map down the middle and apply half the gold mines to each side.
On maps like Med, players tend to assume that half of the map is "theirs" and half of the map belongs to the other guy. It's an obvious assumption to make, but it doesn't have to be that way. Think of everything outside of your town as being neutral and up for grabs. If the enemy encroaches too close on one side, encroach on him on the other. If the enemy finds a cluster of 5 gold mines and builds to defend them, that means the rest of the map with its other 5 mines can be yours.
If gold mines could somehow be brought back to the TC like Relics can, then minimum distance to gold mines is much more of a factor. But as long as players have to control the territory around gold mines, you should always have a chance at getting your share when playing against a person of even skill. If you claim that your opponent can hold 5 of "his" gold mines, and 3 of "yours," well, heck, he was probably going to beat you anyway.
Territorial control is fun--it leads to strategy. Don't turn the game into a build-up race or you'll get bored quickly.
But an even cooler God. MFO's blue_myrridn has written up an article for the recently rising strategy on ESO: The Set Fast Heroic. Although Loki's Hersir rush is the dominant strategy as of now, Set is fast gaining fans and this article shows you how to properly conduct the strategy. Here's an excerpt:
"This strategy is really geared towards land maps with some decent animals on the map. On water, a boat boom is generally a better plan and the gameplay is quite a bit different. Not to say that you couldn't do this on a water map - might suprise the hell out of someone if you did If you scout and notice that there aren't a lot of great animals around, you may want to shift gears towards getting a classic army together or just risk it and run for the heroic age anyways. Either way, you will have some choices to make based on the map."
For the week ending February 9th, the top 10 list rearranged enormously. Battlfield 1942's expansion pack is on top, and AoM is 10th, with several games competing with the game above it. Here's hoping things will improve for AoM next week.
1 Battlefield 1942: Road To Rome Expansion Pack - Electronic Arts $19 2 Sim City 4 - Electronic Arts $49 3 Unreal II: The Awakening - Infogrames Entertainment $48 4 The Sims Deluxe - Electronic Arts $42 5 The Sims: Unleashed Expansion Pack - Electronic Arts $27 6 MS Zoo Tycoon - Microsoft $28 7 Battlefield 1942 - Electronic Arts $46 8 Medal Of Honor: Allied Assault Spearhead Expansion Pack - Electronic Arts $22 9 Roller Coaster Tycoon 2 - Infogrames Entertainment $31 10 MS Age Of Mythology - Microsoft $45
mace windu9d9, a forummer here at SWGBH wrote up an excellent guide about genie editing. Don't worry though, none of these modifications can be taken online. So don't worry about online cheating.
Ok, you've learned how to mod. Graphics,sounds,icons,unit names. All of those are good for modding, but what if you could go deeper? Change unit statistics? Make your own unit? Edit a technology? These and more have been sought by many modders. The answer is finally here. With lots of work, and alot of help from Ykkrosh, GeniEd, the art of editing the Genie.dat, has been unveiled. This guide will tell you how to edit unit stats and more.
o all the changes you've seen so far, I have to add two more. I do hope these will come as less of a shock. ;-)
Please welcome two people you all know, to the site as staff:
Macdaddy, who will be moderating the General & Strategy Discussion, Age of Empires III Discussion and the Training Camp Forum along with Winston and myself; and Cherub Aro, who will be joining BrandNewCar and myself as moderator for the Scenario Design and Modpack Discussions Forum.
Activision, Inc. marks a new era in the historical strategy genre with the announcement of Empires: Dawn of the Modern World from acclaimed designer Rick Goodman and Stainless Steel Studios. A real-time strategy game of epic scope and breadth, Empires: Dawn of the Modern World lets players command legendary civilizations as they battle to forge mighty empires during the days of longbows and charging knights to the awesome land, air and sea battles of WWII involving Tiger Tanks, Storm Troopers, Spitfires, and stealthy submarines.
Looks like an interesting title, with a more narrower focus but greater depth then SSSI's previous title Empire Earth. Check out the original article here.
RoN Eden’s Nox devotes this week’s Focus article to resource accumulation. He has even built a Flash-enabled interactive graphic of the primary resource information display that sits in the upper left corner of the game screen top give fans an idea how the actual interface works! You can click on the gray show/hide bars (with the squiggles) just as you might in an actual game. The site is is French in case you don't know, so get your French dictionary out or just use Babblefish or just look at the english version, translated courtesy of Vovan.
Ryan Bohlman of Gamers Depot previews Rise of Nations saying:
Armed with the understanding that epic scope and depth work well in the RTS genre, Microsoft looks to pick up where they left off and take things in a new direction. Featuring a massive 18 playable nations - including the British, Chinese, French, Japanese, Germans, Aztecs, and more – as well as things such as scenario and script editors, Rise of Nations is shaping up to be quite a nice package indeed.
Nathan Davison from 3DAvenue got a chance to check out a pre-release version of Rise of Nations, with a preview. He says:
RoN is looking to take the classic formula of RTS gaming beyond our usual expectations and give gamers the ultimate combination of real time combat and long term civilization establishment all in the one experience
The Article includes eight screenshots including a nice one of Europe – Mediterranean – Western Russia in Conquer the World.
The name is finally official. Activision, the publisher that brought us such games like Medieval Total War, has announced the development of Empires: Dawn of the Modern World. Here's a quick snip from the press release:
Activision marks a new era in the historical strategy genre with the announcement of Empires: Dawn of the Modern World from acclaimed designer Rick Goodman and Stainless Steel Studios. A real-time strategy game of epic scope and breadth, Empires: Dawn of the Modern World lets players command legendary civilizations as they battle to forge mighty empires during the days of longbows and charging knights to the awesome land, air and sea battles of WWII involving Tiger Tanks, Storm Troopers, Spitfires, and stealthy submarines. Empires: Dawn of the Modern World has not yet been rated by the ESRB.
Well, there is a bit more to it in the press release, but overall still pretty vague. When Empire Earth was being publicized, they always said EE spans thousands of years from fire to laser. But Rick's new game appears to only cover 1000 years perhaps suggesting no stone age fighting (did anyone really like playing prehistoric just to eventually get to copper farms?) as well as no future ages. No doubt many readers will complain it is just an Empire Earth clone. Perhaps you're right, but what about the fans that liked EE but wanted just more? Better unit counters, more options, better graphics and more? Guess we can all decide when more information comes along as I hear it should be soon. Give your views about this new game here. Thanks to Hank for the update.
I was looking around once again the gaming scene and spotted this. Tilted Mill posted news about licensing EE's engine. Here's what they said:
Tilted Mill Entertainment has signed a license agreement with Stainless Steel Studios to use the Empire Earth™ engine. The Tilted Mill team has been working on its first project based on this technology for almost a year now.
This engine has been the cornerstone of Empire Earth™, one of the most successful games of all times, having sold roughly 1.5 million copies worldwide. “The technology is very solid, and incredibly versatile. We will be enhancing it further, and plan on using it to create a variety of different titles in the coming years. This technology will not only save us several years of research and development time, allowing us to jump start development and build momentum for our projects quickly, but also removes a huge amount of risk and uncertainty from the process. We’re confident this engine will allow us to make the best games ever, and Tilted Mill is indebted to Rick Goodman and all the team at Stainless Steel Studios for their efforts and cooperation in making this possible.” says Chris Beatrice, president and director of development at Tilted Mill.
Tilted Mill is actively using the engine for one project right now, but has begun laying the foundations for two others to be based on this technology. The studio is already working with a major publisher on its first project, due to be announced this year.
The programmers at SSS must be very proud to have created an engine that'll be now used for 4 games including EE. Who knows maybe we'll be seeing more companies focus solely on the engine instead of just the physics and such. Tilted Mill has been getting a lot of attention, and their staff looks very well experienced. I might just be converted.
Also, Praetorians Multiplayer Demo, a RTS game obviously based during Roman times, has appeared at Gamespy. Haven't heard much about this game, but the graphics look quite impressive.
The grand city is now quiet. The time of celebration and playing has passed. Now the grand elders tell stories of old to keep the younger ones happy, but anxiety grows. So, the old Dark Angel long forgotten reappears at EEH in all places to deliver something nice. The Dark Angel, the owner of HG & the bringer of good puzzles, shares with me.
I'll hopefully be bringing something besides online gaming news soon. But don't be expecting me to bring Heaven itself
AGE OF KINGS HEAVEN HeavenGames names Angel Luke AoKHeaven Site Director Posted 2/20/2003 @ 10:27 PM EST by Zen
HeavenGames LLC (http://www.heavengames.com) today named Angel Luke as site director of Age of Kings Heaven (http://aok.heavengames.com). Currently a volunteer moderator at Age of Kings Heaven, Luke will assume the responsibilities for overseeing the day-to-day operations of the oldest active Age of Kings fan-site on the Internet.
An experienced Age of Kings scenario designer and a member of the Dragon Gaming Design Network, Luke initially found HeavenGames through Age of Empires Heaven back in 1998, and generally moved to Age of Kings Heaven after its release later that year. In 2002, HeavenGames appointed him as Scenario Design Forum moderator for AoKH. In the months since his appointment to AoKH, he has volunteered to update the many sections at AoKH that requires updates, and in late 2002, he was promoted to Angel and put in charge of the University, AoKH’s Strategy Section.
“We are extremely excited to have Luke onboard as the site director for Age of Kings Heaven,” said Zen, Chief Technology Officer for HeavenGames, LLC. “The dedication, commitment, and professionalism he brings to Age of Kings Heaven are key traits we look for in site directors. I congratulate Luke on this appointment and look forward to working with him and the AoKH team.”
“Luke is the Best person I have ever had the good fortune to meet, he works untiringly at anything we ask of him, plus his friendship is a true one. Luke inspires people to work and do thing's they would not do otherwise,” commented Cat, Dragon Gaming Network’s (http://dgdn.net) headmaster.
Marduke - a clan - has recently interviewed the ES staff member Gx_Vega. Here's a snippet, and thanks to PAoM for the news:
"Sacrafix: So Vega, tell us about your early beginnings in Age of Kings, how you got started, how you got better....your early evolution. Gx_Vega: I'm not sure how I started playing Age of Kings, but I just remember it being really fun and addicting. I made a lot of friends online and was always playing every night trying to improve my skills."
Users using Internet Explorer may be experiencing download problems when trying to download files from the downloads database here at AoMH. They may receive an error saying:
Internet Explorer cannot download from files.heavengames.com
Internet Explorer was not able to open this Internet site. The requested site is either unavailable or cannot be found. Please try again later.
While we work on fixing the problem, user can click "OK" at the error message, and then proceed to download the file via the link provided in the "Download File" page. Thanks for your patience.
IGN’s Unit Showcase VII by B.C. Milligan is up and ready with information on Light Cavalry/Armored Cars, Mobile Anti-Aircraft Artillery (AAA), and Helicopters! The IGN media gallery has also added seven new screens for RoN.
Anyone want to take a college class in Real Time Strategy (RTS)? I did a search on Google looking up RTS Games and came upon Michael Buro, a professor at Alberta Universtiy. He offers a class entitled "Topics in RTS Games" as individual study. To be quite frank thats the most I got from the site, the few papers I could find were a bit too complicated for me. Though I would love to see some of the papers his students have done such as, "Generating fair and interesting random maps". No doubt something real designers and programmers have to think about when developing a RTS game.
Anyone mind sending me a tape of what they talk about in his class? I always dreamed about having a "Strategic RTS Decision Making" class in my school.
AGE OF MYTHOLOGY HEAVEN Hey you! Yeah, I'm talking to you! What's your favorite random map? Posted 2/20/2003 @ 7:38 PM EST by Socvazius
Joe "GeneralZod" Gillum - a designer at our beloved ES - has stopped by our forums to ask just that. So head on down there to voice your opinion! I personally prefer Vinlandsaga, I likes the Skraelings ;-)
If you have not noticed already the HG servers have been in a flux. Sometime tomorrow the download servers will be completely down for a hour or more. Happens to the best of us considering the server is on all day every day of the year so sooner or later it breaks. Please hold off any downloads until the next notice. Anything submitted now is very likely to never appear so there's no point in trying. Also, some pages maybe not be displaying correctly including the downloads.
If you tried to reach this site yesterday, you most likely failed. This was due to the servers problems, and everything at this site should now be back working. However, there will be a smaller downtime tomorrow to finish cleaning up the mess. Here's the words from Angel Zen, HeavenGames CTO.
"As we're preparing the final phrase in the recovery from a complete hard drive failure last night, HG will become unavailable yet again tomorrow for anywhere between 15-minutes to an hour, so that the server can be propped back into its "rack" at our ISP's datacenter."
Strategy Informer also published a preview of Rise of Nations recently, here's an exerpt:
In a nutshell, imagine combining Civilization with Age of Empires, as well as throwing in a smattering of Risk or Total War and you get a game that looks, sounds and IS very impressive.
Most of you will have noticed the server trouble we had yesterday, and sadly our troubles aren't over yet. The Downloads Server (which was hit hardest yesterday) will be shut down sometime during today.
This will take at least an hour, so it's prudent not to upload any files during the cause of today.
Most of you will have noticed the server trouble we had yesterday, and sadly our troubles aren't over yet. The Downloads Server (which was hit hardest yesterday) will be shut down sometime during today. This will take at least an hour, so it's prudent not to upload any files during the cause of today.
The official AC competition site has now been given a chatroom for discussing the contest feel free to visit it HERE
EMPEROR HEAVEN Server Downtime and Uploading New Files Posted 2/20/2003 @ 2:45 AM EST by GillB
After a complete hard drive failure, the final recovery phase will mean that HG will be down again tomorrow for up to an hour so that (to quote Angel Zen) the server can be propped back into its "rack" at our ISP's datacenter.
Please do not submit any files to the download section until the move is done otherwise there is a chance that they will get lost.
One civ that has certainly received a lot more attention since the 1.03 patch (and with good reason) is Set. There are a lot of ideas going on about this civ and it's unique options, but it seems people aren't exploring Set as quickly perhaps as Ra or Loki were, but despite this some interesting debates have popped up. In reponse to these, Stryfe_ has made a nice post at MFO which talks about some of the attributes of the Set civilization.
Set can get the initiative by taking the information gathered from their scouting and map control above and use their converted animals to exploit this. Initiative is something that needs to be kept in mind all game long, not just in the very beginning. The advantage Set has is that the early converted animals allow him to gain the initiative very early in the game.
To read what Stryfe_ has to say about Set, head over to MFO and have a read.
Action Trip just published a preview of Rise of Nations primarily focusing on the Conquer the World Campaign. The article gives an overall good impression of the game that shows it will change some minds of those who are tired of the same old RTS. The article including 2 exclusive in-game movies and 25 screenshots!
"Sometime" tomorrow, the downloads server will be shut down to be worked on. It's likely that the main server will be down as well during the *hopefully* hour-long outage. So, as a result, it probably wouldn't be a good idea for any of you to submit any files to the downloads section tomorrow.
AGE OF KINGS HEAVEN Scheduled Server Downtime, File Submissions, and info about The Announcement Posted 2/20/2003 @ 12:29 AM EST by Zen
As we're preparing the final phrase in the recovery from a complete hard drive failure last night, HG will become unavailable yet again tomorrow for anywhere between 15-minutes to an hour, so that the server can be propped back into its "rack" at our ISP's datacenter.
From now until after the move is completed, we urge download section authors to hold on file submissions, so we don't risk lost files during the process.
Lastly, the "reorganization" and announcement everyone's waiting for has been pushed back until tomorrow evening as a result of the server crash. We appreciate everyone's support on the forums and over email, and we hope to bring AoKH to new heights this year!
Last night our downloads server died a horrible death. Luckily, Angel Zen was able to salvage most of the data off the hard drive and all downloads should be working again!
Meowie at PAoM has been doing some work on number crunching and has posted about his results in the site's forum. What he's been working on is how many villagers a player needs on each resource to keep constant production for 3 barracks in the Classical Age. It's a great read to improve your economy and, as a result, your military when you're playing an Egyptian Civlization. Take a look.
While we were having server troubles of our own, Through The Ages had just finished theirs and are online as of now. Here's what the hard-working Ogre has to say:
"The Through The Ages main site is finally back online! Please, bare with us as we get our feet back into the community. Look for some major updates to the site soon."
"The Ogre has been working on major site maintenance. He just finished overhauling most of the Age of Mythology game information section. Now he is working on getting the buildings page completed for it. Also, he has been working on the downloads center as well. Look for more changes here shortly."
Earlier today you may have noticed that you couldn't get onto AoMH or any other HeavenGames sites. Well, the servers apparently "died a horrible death". Most of the data was saved from the server harddrive, and HG is currently working hard to restore the system. As of now, the servers are back online.
Just a quick post, Age of Mythology Heaven's god powers guide has been updated to reflect some information from current tactics on ESO, patch changes and user feedback. As always, please direct any comments my way.
Rohag gives his impressions of a Conquer the World campaign in Press Beta #2.
Here's an excerpt:
This was the most fun I’ve had yet with a Press Beta of Rise of Nations. In about twelve hours play I led the Maya from the Ancient to Information ages while allied with the Spanish against a host of enemies, especially those insolent British, Russians, Japanese and Greeks!
The official Microsoft RoN Win-a-Beta contest registration is closed. “On or around February 20 we will select the 1000 winners via a random drawing from all eligible entries. We will contact those lucky winners via email. Please note, only the winners will be contacted.” You can still download a video trailer at the contest site.
Jason MacIsaac of Electric Playground has published an extraordinarily enthusiastic preview of RoN!
Here's an excerpt:
Rise of Nations looks like it's going to be one of the deepest, most flexible and fun RTS games ever ...this game is already looking like a strong candidate for the best RTS of 2003. Yes, our expectations are that high after playing this game.
RoN Center adds news screenshots from the Press Beta #2 to their Beta gallery, most scenes are of modern or information age battles, including some impressive shots of cruise missiles in flight, and nuclear explosions.
A German and French site in the Rise of Nations community, Rise-of-Nations.de and Rise of Nations Eden, announces their winners from their respective contests for a copy of the beta. According to Apolyton fansite the French site only has twenty entries, so you had a 1 in 4 chance to win! Aren't you sorry you fell asleep in French class now?
The good man Kumar Shah has posted this week's ladder warriors. They are Grumpy_Canuck, Zero_Sum_Game, and WK_WOLF(who was featured in this last Saturday's party feature warstory). Both Zero and Wolf were ladder warriors last week, making this their second time getting the title. Congratulations to all three!
The Ultima VI Siegelet Project has posted a long list of available jobs in the siegelet. Some of the positions are various programmers, designers and modelers. If you're interested - check it out!
Tilted Mill recently published a press releasing revealing that they licensed the Empire Earth Engine. You may remember that Deus Ex was based off the Unreal Engine and Star Wars Galatic Battlegrounds is based off Age of Kings Engine. Tilted Mill is a relatively new developer with a very skilled staff (Heroes of Might and MagicII fans will recognize a few) so no doubt whatever they're are developing will be great though their game is still a secret. Here is the full press release:
TILTED MILL LICENSES EMPIRE EARTH™ ENGINE
Wellesley, 16 February 2003 – Tilted Mill Entertainment has signed a license agreement with Stainless Steel Studios to use the Empire Earth™ engine. The Tilted Mill team has been working on its first project based on this technology for almost a year now.
This engine has been the cornerstone of Empire Earth™, one of the most successful games of all times, having sold roughly 1.5 million copies worldwide. “The technology is very solid, and incredibly versatile. We will be enhancing it further, and plan on using it to create a variety of different titles in the coming years. This technology will not only save us several years of research and development time, allowing us to jump start development and build momentum for our projects quickly,
Between now and midnight, February 26, 2003, if you see the picture to the right pop up, click on it and you will be given a chance to win one of 5 copies of the Rise of Nations Beta. Entrants must be 13 years old or older, and not have won another Rise of Nations beta from Microsoft or another Rise of Nations Fan Site. One entry per household. Duplicate applications will be deleted and removed from consideration. Winners will be picked randomly from the pool of qualified applicants and notified by email. If we do not receive a reply within 24 hours of notification, another winner will be chosen. Best of luck everyone.
Well, okay not pirates. But the other server IS down (again) and has been for most of today, which means that the downloads database is currently unavailable and AoMH is likely to not load properly for you. (Technical explanation: the style sheets and some of the images are stored on the other server to decrease loading times. Obviously they won't load at all if that server isn't working.)
