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Richard Bruns
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NC, USA
Nov 1999
time: 06:27
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This is an old fantasy strategy game with dated graphics but absolutely excellent gameplay. Iīve downloaded the demo and become quite addicted. The thing I like most is the world design and sheer variety of the game. Each time I play, I seem to run into a completely new set of monsters and enemy armies.
But the best thing is the way that the different sides have completely different resource and strategy requirements. In too many games, it seems like you are playing the same side with different graphics, but in this one the game style for different sides is very different. Warlords need money from towns to raise standard armies. Priests need to gain congregations in order to access their more powerful spells. Wizards collect all kinds of different resources, from fungi to dead bodies, to fuel a variety of summoning spells.
There are also a lot of fun little details. In my last game, I was playing as the troll king. This side starts slowly, with no income at all, but can eventually build up a nearly unstoppable force. Thatīs because, thanks to their regeneration, your trolls almost never die in battle, so once you recruit them you keep them for the rest of the game. Other sides, meanwhile, have to keep replacing their battle casualties. Trolls are also incredibly strong, just a few of them can take on whole armies. And "Mum the Troll" is possibly the coolest unit Iīve seen in any game.
Anyway, I was expanding my kingdom and came across an interesting group of independents. It was a band with three hobbits, a dwarf, an elf, two heroes, and a wizard wearing a ring called Narya. Given the side I was playing, my choice of action was obvious  I flattened the entire group, my only casualty being a troll Gandalf blasted into oblivion. During the battle, I ran across the fourth hobbit, who was invisible.
Too bad trolls canīt use equipment. It would have been fun to play out the rest of the game with Narya, Sting, The One Ring, and a mithril coat, those being what I looted after the battle. That little incident was still quite amusing, though, and typifies the impressive scope of the game. Until then, I had never suspected that they would add in such a thing, and I had played lots of games.
However, the game has quite a few problems, apparently due to the fact that it comes from a tiny company and wasnīt polished. The interface is odd, and often fails to give useful information. If you get wiped out and there are two or more computer players left, the game will happily run them all until one wins, so if you get the defeat message you have to hit control-alt-delete to exit the game. You also canīt save in the demo, but that isnīt a problem because games donīt take that long. I like to set the maximum number of computer players on a small world, so I get a quick game with lots of variety.
If you want a fun strategy game in an incredibly diverse world, and are willing to overlook antiquated graphics and a lot of minor flaws, download the demo at:
http://www.illwinter.com/dom_downloads.html
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03-04-2003 00:13
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