Rise of Legends - Hands On With Tim Train

Making strategy games loosely based on historical events has developed into a rather predictable cliché over the years, akin to the fantasy RPG and the first-person shooter where you take on an army of man-eating aliens. No matter how fantastic your game is, we've already seen Command and Conquer, Civilization, Total War, and any number of other games that thoroughly met our mental quota for that specific sub-genre. It gets old. Rise of Nations as well as Thrones and Patriots managed to circumvent our expectations by delivering a type of gameplay scenario that wasn't just unique in its premise, but exceptionally well-done in its delivery. The Risk-esque Conquer the World campaign added a special twist and unique urgency to every skirmish you fought in Rise of Nations. And since every strategic move was up to the player - there were only as many hard/easy fights as you wanted. You could choose to play conservatively at the risk of failing to meet your objectives, or you could stack the odds against yourself to see how you'd fair under the pressure. Whether it was founded in history or not really wasn't the point, and it managed to transcend expectations by making us forget altogether that we were playing a game that was loosely grounded in history.

So, realistically, it wasn't terribly much of a stretch when Big Huge Games announced last year that the sequel to Rise of Nations would be going in an entirely different direction, as it wasn't the history component that kept us interested, but the game's overall premise. Rise of Legends takes the very basics of the Rise of Nations gameplay and transplants them into what has been described as a "steam punk" alternate fantasy. The Conquer the World mode is returning once more, though this time it's linked together with an actual narrative. We only got to play one scenario thus far, so it may be too early to tell how this works out in practice, but the overall gist seems to be that you can advance the narrative in any manner of your choosing, depending on what territories you go after, who you ally with, and so on.

Actually sitting down and playing the game however, revealed that the new fantasy-based strategy might take some time to get used to. In Legends, you build "districts" onto your city which, in addition to giving you upgrades like population and wealth bonuses, allow you to build a number of other different structures separate from your city itself. For example, if you want to build a barracks you first have to build a military district. It's interesting the way this plays out, because when trying to capture a city, you won't go through and try and level each building individually, you'll be aiming at a single big target.

Also simplified are the research and resource collection systems. Instead of having to micro-manage an array of resources from food to ore to oil, you instead focus on two - mining Timonium ore and managing wealth by building caravans between a number of structures. You also accrue research points by building individual research facilities, and rather than ‘advancing through the ages' as you did in Rise of Nations, you simply get access to higher caps on production and population, as well as specific bonuses. Our feelings on this are sort of a mixed bag. It's hard to tell from such a small part of the game whether this simplification really helps things, and it can be pretty disorienting for those of us who once took pride in our ability manage resources effectively. The change in research, by the very nature of the game, is less satisfying than it once was. Where you once raced as quickly as you could to get that technological edge to best your foes, you now only have access to generic technology upgrades, which eliminates that wonderful transformative feeling that Rise of Nations gave you. Again, too early to say just yet, but this is definitely a totally different beast.

The two races playable in our preview build were the Vinci, who make use of a sort of wacky knock-off of 19th century technology and the Alim, who have a sort of magic Arabian flavor to them. If there's one aspect of the game we're excited about, it's this new fantasy that Big Huge has crafted for us. The Vinci are the "technological" race, and their units tend to look needlessly complex and elaborate. They have an array of interesting-looking flying machines, and their tanks and armored units look like everything from mechanical spiders to giant slow-moving mechs. The Alim, by contrast, are as magical and earthy as you can get. Their technology is really just stronger and more robust levels of magic that, while lacking the punch of their Vinci counterparts, lends itself to a trickier, less blunt play-style. The artwork for both sides is absolutely fantastic - the buildings for each side are extremely complex and lend the feeling that these are real and complex structures, instead of static representations. It should be noted of course, that there is a third as yet unrevealed race in the game, and we have no inclination yet as to what side of the technology/magic spectrum they will fall.

As with all preview builds we get our hands on, we're left wanting and wondering. It's difficult to tell whether the new dynamic of the game will work as well or as fluidly as Rise of Nations did, and we've seen next to nothing of the narrative yet, so it's too early to say whether the new and improved Conquer the World mode is as well tied together as we hope it is. The one thing that has become crystal clear just in our brief time playing the game is that, while it bears the same as Rise of Nations, this is really an entirely different animal. Those expecting Rise of Nations: Fantasy will be in for a bit of a surprise when Legends hits in May. We're looking forward to it.

Until then, however, we thought it would be beneficial to get an insider's look at the game in addition to our bit of hands-on experience. We sat down and spoke with Tim Train, VP Development & Executive Producer on Rise of Legends to get his perspective and personal insights into the project.

Hi Tim. Thanks for taking the time to speak with us. Obviously, the change to a fictional world is a big departure for the series, especially in terms of visuals. To what degree do you feel this affects the dynamic of the gameplay? Can we expect to see individual units and smaller engagements taking on a greater degree of importance, as in Warcraft 3, or will it feel more or less the same as Rise of Nations and Thrones?

The combat is only one area where the fictional world affects the dynamics of the gameplay. The new subject matter opens up all kinds of possibilities that we couldn't explore in a historical context. We loved the gigantic battles you'd get in Rise of Nations, and we definitely feature these in Rise of Legends. However, your units have all-new capabilities and functions that derive from the setting and the game world. For example, your hero units, with a variety of different spells, are a big focus of the battles. We've also moved away from the hard "rock-paper-scissors" combat model of Rise of Nations. These changes mean that the combat feels very different than in Rise of Nations, and also fits our fictional world much better.

On the Rise of Legends website, Brian Reynolds writes that, "there will be another technology nation and another magic nation, and that they will all be as different from one another as the Vinci are from the Alin." In recent interviews however, you seem to indicate that there is only one other nation. Care to elaborate?

We originally planned four races in the game. However, we underestimated the story complexities of trying to weave four nations together in one narrative. We wanted each race to have equal weight in the story, and four was just too many to jam in. Once we trimmed the nation count to three, the story felt much more tightly focused.

To what degree will RoL be story-driven? Is there an involved overarching narrative, or is it more like RoN's Conquer the World mode, where it was more open to player input?

We got a lot of great feedback on Rise of Nation's Conquer the World mode, but we knew we wanted a great story with compelling characters and a rich, unique world in Rise of Legends. Our goal with Legends was to keep the strategic decision-making of the original, but have it take place in the context of an overarching narrative.

How responsive are cities to player input? In Rise of Nations, the order you researched your technologies played a big role in strategy, but you ultimately ended up in the same place. How significant are the upgrades in Legends?

The upgrades are very significant, partly because you usually can't research the entire tech tree the way you did in Nations. Depending on the map and your playstyle, you might have to pick one or two lines (out of four) to plunge, and what order you research the techs has a big impact on gameplay (of course, you can go for a more balanced strategy as well instead of plunging lines). This is one of the ways that leaving history behind frees us up--in Nations it wouldn't make sense for someone to discover, say, Rocketry without mastering Horseback Riding, which meant that you functionally researched the entire tree. In a fantasy game you don't have those preconceptions, so we can make tech choices harder and more meaningful.

Rise of Nations was a pretty big multiplayer hit, what sorts of new things could we expect for the multiplayer?

We're not really talking about multiplayer right now, but stay tuned for a comprehensive rollout of our new multiplayer features! Fans who wanted more from Rise of Nations' multiplayer will be very excited...

I've heard the Vinci described as "steam punk," and they obviously draw from Leonardo, and the Alin are of an Arabian persuasion. To what degree are the nations based in these types of sources, or are they just the inspiration for something more elaborate?

Our method of race development on this game has been to start with human cultures or mythologies, and expand on the basic themes of those cultures. So with the Vinci, we basically started with Leonardo's drawings and his inventor mystique, and everything Vinci flowed from there. So I guess I'd say they are the inspiration for something more elaborate, but by grounding them in real-world cultures we give people a sense of what those races are all about.

Is there any sort of present-day parallel you're drawing on with the conflict of technology and magic?

Nope. We think both are cool takes on the fantasy genre, and most importantly that approach allows for some of the most amazing graphics imaginable.

How has working on a world of your own design compared to the Rise of Nations experience?

With Rise of Nations (or any of the historical games we've done), the subject matter puts a lot of constraints on the way you approach game design, because you have to conform to people's perceptions of "reality." With a fantasy game, we're freed from reality and can be much more imaginative than in a history game. Among other things, this allows us tremendous freedom to create fantastic graphics.

Is it too soon to ask what's next for Big Huge Games? Do you see yourself continuing with Legends and turning it into a franchise of its own?

We're heads-down on Rise of Legends and not really looking past our master date. But we're excited to get Legends out there and give people the opportunity to check it out for themselves!

Jan 23, 2006 - 12:47 pm | 0 comments
Chris Chester