Oriental Empires -- 4x historical strategy

[Tpek]

It comes up $23.99 for me.  GMG is great as long as you're not on the fence, since refund will not be an option.

I guess users who have had some purchase history with GMG get better prices.

[Nefaro]

+1. Not of fan of unlocking stuff.

The preview vid I saw mentioned that the initially locked factions start in more difficult situations.  I suppose they want us to play one of the larger, easier, factions for a first play. 

Probably done to keep those who don't know any better from quickly getting curb stomped, in their initial experience, and giving it a poor review score directly afterward on Steam.  Which is a problem for the instant gratification crowd who don't bother learning how a game works before posting a bad review.



For better or worse, I've been seeing Steam-hosted developers placing extra artificial restrictions in their games, and putting higher prices on them, in order to dissuade the 2-hour-and-out gamers from giving them a bad review.  Some have even stated their intended purpose as such.

[tgb]

A lot of the buildings that go outside the city (pavilions, monestaries, and the like) reduce rebellion, but you have to unlock them through one of the cultrue trees AND have a suitable location.  Also any culture that increases Authority will serve to decrease Noble rebellion.

[Tpek]

Is there even a real difference between the factions?
I mean other than starting conditions and a small bonus here and there.

[tgb]

It comes up $23.99 for me.  GMG is great as long as you're not on the fence, since refund will not be an option.

I guess users who have had some purchase history with GMG get better prices.

I do, and later on I got an email about the price.  It just doesn't change until you actually go to your cart to check out.  Very good game at a very good price.

Is there even a real difference between the factions?
I mean other than starting conditions and a small bonus here and there.

Not that I can tell, no.

[Gusington]

Right now at GMG I get a price of 36% off, or 19.29. Definitely sounds worth it at that price.

[glen55]

Which is fine with me.  The combat system reminds me of a prettied-up version of the combat from the old Legion games from Slitherine

That's my very favorite quickie combat resolution system in any game I have ever played.

However, based on descriptions of it here, it doesn't sound quite the same. In Legion Arena (the one I played a bazillion hours of), yes, you gave orders at the beginning and then watched the battle play out, but you could also give an occasional order during the battle. Units carried over between battles and sometimes earned skill points, so if you pumped up whatever the skill was for taking orders, you could give more orders during battles. By the end of the campaign, if you focused on that skill enough, you could give enough orders during battle that you could have a fair amount of control over what was happening.

[Boggit]

Is there even a real difference between the factions?
I mean other than starting conditions and a small bonus here and there.

tgb's right. Not a lot as far as I have seen.

[Grim.Reaper]

+1. Not of fan of unlocking stuff.

The preview vid I saw mentioned that the initially locked factions start in more difficult situations.  I suppose they want us to play one of the larger, easier, factions for a first play. 

Probably done to keep those who don't know any better from quickly getting curb stomped, in their initial experience, and giving it a poor review score directly afterward on Steam.  Which is a problem for the instant gratification crowd who don't bother learning how a game works before posting a bad review.



For better or worse, I've been seeing Steam-hosted developers placing extra artificial restrictions in their games, and putting higher prices on them, in order to dissuade the 2-hour-and-out gamers from giving them a bad review.  Some have even stated their intended purpose as such.

I pay for the game, I should be able to play as I see fit and use all the content...just my opinion.

[Boggit]

It's fair to say, IMO, that many of the reports about bugs and broken features are from players who have not yet understood the game's mechanics but it's also true that some of those mechanics are a touch unforgiving !

I can say that the designer Bob Smith is active in dealing with the bugs, as I've just had an email from him about a bug I reported. I don't think the bugs being reported are a problem long term. That said the bug I reported about treasury problems came about when I deleted an Heir by accident, causing a game killing bug, so yes the logic can get convoluted but at least he is perceptive and can identify the issues quickly.

[Freyland]

Is there even a real difference between the factions?
I mean other than starting conditions and a small bonus here and there.

tgb's right. Not a lot as far as I have seen.

On one hand that sounds unfortunate, but then I remember that in civ each civilization differs only by a unit and a building, as well as the "perks" for a given leader, so it may not be a huge deal.

[jomni]

A lot of the buildings that go outside the city (pavilions, monestaries, and the like) reduce rebellion, but you have to unlock them through one of the cultrue trees AND have a suitable location.  Also any culture that increases Authority will serve to decrease Noble rebellion.

Thanks.  Those buildings are expensive to build too so it means the army has to disband for a while. 
But that's the beauty of this game.

I have a "barbarian?" faction that raids my lands but he's friends with the Qin that I don't want to mess with.  It's like a sneaky indirect provocation by the Qin.  If I deal with the barbarians, the Qin will automatically attack me.  Maybe it's best to make a deal with the barbarians instead just like in real life.  The diplomatic options are limited and I can't tell the Qin to break their alliance with the barbarians.

[Boggit]

Yes, there are some subtle things like that. I do think you point about expanding the diplomatic options would be good, but at least it's not a game breaker.

[Boggit]

+1. Not of fan of unlocking stuff.

The preview vid I saw mentioned that the initially locked factions start in more difficult situations.  I suppose they want us to play one of the larger, easier, factions for a first play. 

Probably done to keep those who don't know any better from quickly getting curb stomped, in their initial experience, and giving it a poor review score directly afterward on Steam.  Which is a problem for the instant gratification crowd who don't bother learning how a game works before posting a bad review.



For better or worse, I've been seeing Steam-hosted developers placing extra artificial restrictions in their games, and putting higher prices on them, in order to dissuade the 2-hour-and-out gamers from giving them a bad review.  Some have even stated their intended purpose as such.

I pay for the game, I should be able to play as I see fit and use all the content...just my opinion.

I suspect that you might be able to bypass the lock as you could with the Total War series as you could edit parameters like that in the desc_strat file. If Bob Smith looks in on our thread I suggest you ask him.

[Nefaro]

+1. Not of fan of unlocking stuff.

The preview vid I saw mentioned that the initially locked factions start in more difficult situations.  I suppose they want us to play one of the larger, easier, factions for a first play. 

Probably done to keep those who don't know any better from quickly getting curb stomped, in their initial experience, and giving it a poor review score directly afterward on Steam.  Which is a problem for the instant gratification crowd who don't bother learning how a game works before posting a bad review.



For better or worse, I've been seeing Steam-hosted developers placing extra artificial restrictions in their games, and putting higher prices on them, in order to dissuade the 2-hour-and-out gamers from giving them a bad review.  Some have even stated their intended purpose as such.

I pay for the game, I should be able to play as I see fit and use all the content...just my opinion.

I agree, in cases such as these.  Although the limitations in this specific game doesn't look very bothersome to me.

Remember how stubborn the IL-2:BOS devs were about having unlocks?  That was a worse situation, IMO.  They eventually removed such a need, but I think this is all indicative of how developers are implementing the digital equivalent of "kid gloves" to control the early impressions of twitchier gamers, and keep them from making too many bad choices while still learning. 

Since the factions are pretty much the same in this one, I don't think it will bother me, having to run 100 turns with one of the easier starting factions to unlock the rest.  Not near as much as the IL-2:BOS example, where completely different models of aircraft and weapons were cordoned off for varied & extended lengths of play time.

As Boggie mentioned, there may be a way to manually unlock them, anyway.