I've started my 4th game of Age of Wonders 3.
Couple of observations:
Sorcerers seem far more powerful than every other class.
Extra Large worlds are gigantic. So big that you may never finish a game.
Large worlds are huge. You can finish a game only after a hundred hours of play.
Medium worlds are probably the biggest world that you could reasonably finish in 40 hours of play.
Game is really good. A big improvement over Age of Wonders 2. Your leader can cast spells in any battle - at double the mana cost. The range limitation in Shadow Magic slowed down play considerably. To expand against a strong opponent you had to build a town & a wizard tower - then leapfrog again. Sort of like an island-hopping campaign in the Pacific if I'm remembering right. Now you can expand with an army group leader that is not a strong spell caster if you have concentrated your Sorcerer leader in obtaining personal mana.
The sounds in Age of Wonders 3 are a light year ahead of the sounds in Shadow Magic. Battle sounds are a critical part of the game to me, and AoW3 did a great job. I have not even turned off the background music yet - it has lasted longer than most every game I've ever played where I did not load my own soundtrack.
If you like Fantasy 4x games - this is a good one.
I assure you it wasn't near as good on release. Subsequent releases have added to the base game to bring it where it is now. Which is a really good game, as you have already noted. Wanna mp? ;)
+1 Great game indeed.
Quote from: MetalDog on August 10, 2015, 10:40:16 AM
I assure you it wasn't near as good on release. Subsequent releases have added to the base game to bring it where it is now. Which is a really good game, as you have already noted. Wanna mp? ;)
I bought the core game plus all expansion packs on the Steam sale about 10 days ago. Game has been stable and fun.
No time. Between my job and getting a teenager - my time is obligated.
Buy him a copy, too. You can use it as a 'teaching exercise.' :)