Alea Jacta Est and Birth of Rome?

[spelk]

Is there something I'm missing, I can't work out for the life of me why these two games are completely separate and the latter is not just an expansion to the former.

Has the engine changed between the titles? I look in the documentation directory for Birth of Rome and find the AJE v1.0 manual. So I'm sort of surmising they're very similar, why have two separate games?

[spelk]

Been looking over the BOR latest patch notes and noticed this....

**********
NEW FEATURE

BOR becomes AJE-aware!
Birth of Rome is now capable of using the AJE scenarios, if you installed it anywhere on your PC! Both games remain standalone, meaning you don't need to buy AJE to play BOR scenarios, but now, if you bought AJE, you only need to launch BOR to get the scenarios of both games!

So now, BOR will allow folks who have both games installed to play the AJE scenarios. I guess this means that they do use the same engine. There must be a marketing reason for making them standalone in the first place. And now convenience for people who have bought both is being patched in.

[Grim.Reaper]

If I am not mistaken their rationale was something this approach allowed the buyer to purchase just the time period they were interested versus having to buy the base game then an add on.  If you own the original game when you install birth of Rome, I do believe the scenarios get merged into the base game so you can really just play with the original game at that point.

Read this post at matrix and around reply 37 Ian gives the official reason.

http://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.asp?m=3260772

[Grim.Reaper]

With that said, a skeptic would likely think it's more about making money.  I have no facts but would think that most fans of the series will buy all released versions regardless of time period, which makes more money.  There might be some people who buy one version but thinking most would buy all eventually.  Plus originally they did state it would be dlc but changed their mind before release.

[spelk]

Thanks for the info Grim, perhaps I should spend more time over at Matrix Forums, just there always seems to be some controversy rattling around.

It's interesting stuff though, because when you load up a game like AJE, there are only a few scenarios to play (<10) , I realise some of them are epic 200-300+ turners, but you usually expect a few more than that. When I load up BOR, again theres <10 scenarios available to play. Feels odd, to see two standalone games, using the same engine, only have a small number of scenarios from the initial install.

I think I'd like to see much more smaller bite-size scenarios for the AGEOD stuff, chunks of strategy, but perhaps strung into a history led campaign style. It might be that I'm just a naieve Grand Strategy player and this sort of thing just isn't wanted by the AGEOD playing community as a whole.

[Nefaro]

Been looking over the BOR latest patch notes and noticed this....

**********
NEW FEATURE

BOR becomes AJE-aware!
Birth of Rome is now capable of using the AJE scenarios, if you installed it anywhere on your PC! Both games remain standalone, meaning you don't need to buy AJE to play BOR scenarios, but now, if you bought AJE, you only need to launch BOR to get the scenarios of both games!

So now, BOR will allow folks who have both games installed to play the AJE scenarios. I guess this means that they do use the same engine. There must be a marketing reason for making them standalone in the first place. And now convenience for people who have bought both is being patched in.

Yes, it uses the exact same executable.  The difference is just in the scenarios and their specific setup, events, etc.

I prefer Birth of Rome over AJE, myself, just because I find the Republic period of expansion a bit more interesting than all the in-fighting between Roman strongmen.  There's more variety in it regarding military forces involved.  Don't get me wrong, they're both great. 

[LongBlade]

I've got a review from Boggit taking a close look at this. It's likely to be a two-part review. The first part is in editing now.

[Martok]

Sweet.  Looking forward to reading it. 

[Toonces]

I suppose one could find a conspiracy theory in the decision to sell the games as two standalones vs. a game and DLC.  However, I like it.

I contrast these two games with the Field of Glory series.  I really only want the Storm of Arrows game, but in order to get it I have to get original FoG first.  I wish SoA was a simple stand alone.

It might be a little apples and oranges, but it's the only example that immediately comes to mind that illustrates the advantage to having two standalone games vs having one main game and then DLC's.

[Grim.Reaper]

I guess time will only tell.....if matrix's reason for making them stand alone were to truly serve the customer by letting them only buy the time period they want then it should not only apply to this game and ageod.  Your example of field of glory is a good one.  If they really believe in this approach, I would expect all their games to follow this lead, not just this one.  But to the best of my knowledge not sure if that has been the case with their other games as of yet.....so why would this approach only apply to this game if they think it is in the best interest of customers?

[Nefaro]

I suppose one could find a conspiracy theory in the decision to sell the games as two standalones vs. a game and DLC.  However, I like it.

I contrast these two games with the Field of Glory series.  I really only want the Storm of Arrows game, but in order to get it I have to get original FoG first.  I wish SoA was a simple stand alone.

It might be a little apples and oranges, but it's the only example that immediately comes to mind that illustrates the advantage to having two standalone games vs having one main game and then DLC's.

I didn't complain because the individual games only cost $20 when I purchased them, IIRC.  That was before Matrix started carrying them, so I think the price has gone up a bit even though they're still much cheaper than most in their catalog.