Supreme Commander
Those of us who remember playing Total Annihilation recall what was easily one of the most unique Real Time Strategy experiences in digital gaming history. Total Annihilation was an ambitious game with dynamic base building, expansive resource collection, a heavily detailed unit roster, and a physics simulator that was ahead of its time. It was the closest thing to war simulation that the technology of the 90s could bring.
Gas Powered Games, now formally Wargaming Seattle, made Supreme Commander to be the spiritual successor to Total Annihilation and in this they succeeded brilliantly. Supreme Commander continues to capture the epic scope of strategic warfare that Total Annihilation first envisioned. Hundreds of air, land, and naval units clash in small or large engagements in an attempt to assault bases defended by gun emplacements, artillery cannons, and shields. A large unit roster features scores of units encompassing nearly any conceivable combat role. Each of the game’s three factions utilize the same unit types, but subtle differences in design give each faction its own strengths and preferences in combat style.
Coming to grips with the staggering number of units and the different faction abilities is perhaps the chief purpose and accomplishment of Supreme Commander’s single player mode. Each faction’s campaign encompasses six separate missions with each mission progressing in stages of increasing difficulty and scope as the player completes objectives. Often the player has to start with little more than their Commander unit, a strong but critically important mech unit with tremendous construction capacity, with which they must construct a fortified base to begin driving back the enemy. Base building and map expansion can take several hours per mission leading to over twenty hours of gameplay in single player. This is a two-edged sword where Supreme Commander is concerned. The first half of the campaign limits the technology tiers, of which there are three plus the mighty Experimental units, that the player can access and thus the units available. This slow progression gives the player a chance to get familiar with units and structures as they become available. Yet the slow pace of each mission can leave players impatient for higher technology tiers.
Although the campaign’s scripted fortifications and unique terrain features can lead to impressive clashes it is in multiplayer and skirmish that the combat becomes truly dynamic. Forty different maps capable of supporting up to eight players offer a wide range of options for multiplayer and skirmish matches. Some of these maps are quite large and allow for multiple combined arms conflicts; while smaller maps make quick victories possible by forcing two or three player matches into close quarters. The game’s online performance is surprisingly lenient given the large numbers of units generally on the map making most matches seamless on a wide variety of speeds. However the enormous numbers of units that can appear with six or more players can lead to a general decrease in speed without higher end machines.
Supreme Commander’s skirmish mode is very well developed for a modern RTS. Four different levels of AI difficulty can be chosen and the AI’s personality can be further customized with options like Turtle or Rush causing the AI to focus on specific strategies and their appropriate unit types. While this can make the AI predictable it also makes a wide range of battles possible allowing players to determine what sort of war they are interested in fighting.
A special mention should be given to the game’s expansive zoom ability which allows players to move from up close unit examination to a map-encompassing eagle eye view. The system is perfect for managing battles on the scale that Supreme Commander delivers and is meticulously designed for easy control and management. The only tragic aspect of this system is that when the action heats up players tend to spend more time gazing down on a world of dim terrain features and unit markers instead of watching the colorful explosions and dramatic unit destruction.
Supreme Commander is the success story that Total Annihilation deserved to have in the modern gaming community. With an expansive single player aspect and high potential and reliability in multiplayer it caters to any level of RTS preference. The game features a rather high management learning curve for new gamers but its single player campaign and skirmish customization options allow players to become accustomed to the game at their own pace. Supreme Commander isn’t perfect and suffers from unit-pathing issues, particularly among naval units, as well as a weakness for large slow operations. Yet it is a welcome addition to the modern RTS community and a necessary experience for any dedicated RTS player.
Endless Legend
Endless Legend: This past year saw two notable franchises release the latest titles in their series. For 4x giant Civilization this game was Civilization: Beyond Earth. Beyond Earth was highly anticipated and featured many revolutionary new takes on elements of 4x play as well as radical departures from previous Civilization mechanics. Yet despite this strong contender for the 4x spotlight the Civilization series’ most recent arrival seems to have fallen behind Amplitude Studios’ latest production in their Endless series: Endless Legend.
Any veteran 4x player will tell you that the 4x genre is not a story-driven genre. Indeed the appeal of single player 4x games is crafting your own story. Take a faction that starts out with literally nothing but the clothes on their back and turn them into an empire to dominate the world; success is dependent on your choices and management skills. Endless Legend is no different; the customization of faction perks and background info is half the fun in starting a new game. Yet there is one important variance that Endless Legend brings and that is the Faction Quest system.
Each faction in Endless Legend has an unchanging Faction Quest which is assigned on the turn after you settle your first city. Like the generic quest system the Faction Quest features a flavorful background or dialogue with short descriptors related to the quest objective. Each individual part of the quest also gives a reward which varies from anything like Dust or artifacts to technologies and even heroes. The Faction Quest provides the primary flavor for factions with each completed objective unfolding a narrative that describes the faction’s development from their first arrival on the world stage to eventually discovering the secrets of the long-lost Endless and culminated in the Wonder Victory condition.
Unless the Wonder Victory is the only victory selected the Faction Quest is not essential to the game although it is a convenient and reliable source of quest rewards. It also does not change for custom factions, taking its cue from the baseline race chosen when developing the custom faction. Although static and linear it is by far one of the best and most flavorful narratives ever inserted into a 4x game and makes the generally tedious Wonder Victory enjoyable and intriguing to pursue.
Multiplayer is seamlessly integrated into Endless Legends regular game mode and the game has no trouble switching between AI and human interaction (it even allows players to abandon their team and take control of an existing AI team in the game lobby after loading a save). Turns take place simultaneously ensuring that each player stays busy most of the time and turns are only as long as the slowest player. As with most 4x games data transfer between the host computer and the other machines is minimal and the principle source of lag is the few seconds after a new turn begins when the host updates the AI progression and activities.
The only weakness to Endless Legend’s multiplayer is its strangely bugged performance. The game occasionally suffers from corrupted save files which are usually caused by the host computer encountering an error and crashing. Thankfully Amplitude Studio’s has already released one patch which addressed many issues and is continuing to resolve different bugs in the game. This problem is also curbed in part by Endless Legend’s excellent re-sync system that allows the host to manually reload the players into the game with play resuming at the start of the turn on which the re-sync is initiated.
Like all 4x games Endless Legend’s re-playability is extensive with eight base factions to try and eight different victory conditions to achieve. Maps are highly customizable with variable terrain features such as rivers and hills as well as settings for temperature and amount of strategic and luxury resources; although this also leaves maps without flavor or a sense of setting and not a prime source of player interest. Factions however can be customized in many different ways.
The core faction trait, Faction Quest, and faction units will remain the same but all other perks and penalties can be swapped out for new ones from a list of every perk and penalty available to each faction. A point system with a maximum of eighty governs how many perks can be acquired with stronger perks costing more points and penalties providing additional points. Persistent gameplay will reveal that some faction builds work better than others regardless of faction race, but the number of possible combinations is quite large and can produce of hundreds of hours of extended play.
Endless Legend’s AI leaves a few things to be desired. Although adaptable, reactive, and surprisingly capable of adjusting to the wide variety of playstyles found among the factions the AI is diplomatically one-dimensional and heavily reliant on its starting circumstances to succeed. AI opponents devalue truces, even when severely losing a war, and flatter or insult generically rather than based on their current mood towards you. The AI is not totally devoid of reactive ability however; its relations will turn sour if you prove aggressive around its borders and AIs that are ‘terrified’ of you will happily embrace offers for peace and alliances, even going so far as to give gifts for free.
Yet the prime source of entertainment when replaying Endless Legend comes from making your faction grow and succeed. The AI serves more as a barricade and additional factor for determining strategy and should not be the sole focus in the endgame. Exploring ruins for special quests, finding new minor factions, and uncovering the best locations for new cities provide more than enough variable challenges for watching a custom faction grow from an idea to a monolithic reality.
In conclusion Endless Legend has extensive replay options with entertaining factions and superb customization options. I am confident that the bugs in its multiplayer system will be gradually eradicated and its simultaneous turns provide for fast gameplay among friends. This game is certainly worth the price and provides the adventurous and imaginative player with weeks’ of content and entertainment.