Yet again, questions for Target

[Jon]

Hope you don't mind these endless reams of questions, but you are almost a contradiction in terms, a member on the development team who actually divulges clear information!

1. A little general, but in what ways have the graphics been souped up?
2.Which is your favourite of the historical campaigns?
3. Is there a "strategy school" which is now avaliable to build in the game, which helps your generals, or did I hear wrong?
4. What are the ramifications for breaking an alliance?
5. We know that beach battlegrounds now make an appearance, but are beach battlegrounds at every coast province or not?
Thanks for your time. Oh yeah, is Max Payne as good as they say?

[HATAMOTOKILL]

some interesting (Questions) http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/biggrin.gif
like to know also?TARGET http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/rolleyes.gif

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Hato!!!
genie of the lands!!!
http://www.contrabandent.com/pez/contrib/legionxs/ninja1.gif

[Target]

Nah, I don't mind matey. Ask away.

Most of the graphical improvements have been made to the battlefield units. They've been more clearly rendered so that you can tell them apart more easily in the thick of battle, and there's a bit more detail on them so they look prettier and not so blocky when you zoom in. There are also battlemap texture improvements, together with additional building models.

On the stratmap side of things, graphical changes are a bit more functional. Army icons now carry an additional sashimono showing the general's rank, so you can tell at a glance where your best leaders are. The unit review panel when you click on an army highlights units containing heirs to help you keep track of them. What else.....er, ports are now have a piece on the stratmap. When you press shift, the regions highlight to reflect the loyalty rating ( green for good, red for bad ). There's other stuff, but I can't think of it off the top of my head.

My favourite historical campaign is definately the Mongolian one. All four have high points, but with the Khan, you get to play with the new units and blowing stuff up is always fun. http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/smile.gif

Don't know where you heard that, but there's no strategy school to build. The only new building that enhances the units is the Drill Dojo, and that mainly stops morale from dropping as quickly as it does.

Breaking alliances can have a detrimental effect on your relations with the other clans, but only if you break them by declaring war on an ally. There are other ways to amicably break alliances - having to choose between two warring allies means you have to break ties with one of them. Since you're forced to do this, we thought it a little unfair to penalise you for it as well. Breaking alliances in nasty ways means that the clan you broke the alliance with targets you for attack. Piss him off too much ( by expanding into his territories, bribing his armies, etc ) and he will actively attack you when he might not otherwise have done so.

There are a fair few coastal regions, but I don't think they all are because if they were, most of the battles would be fought on a beach seeing as almost every province has a coastline.

Max Payne review follow:

Max Payne is absolutely top. Some people have argued that it's just another action game with one cool gimmick, but Bullet Time really adds to it. The story is great - you actually want to find out what happens next - and there are some great set pieces. The dream sequences are really well done ( apart from a couple of tedious platformy bits which had me thinking of the planet Xen bits in HalfLife ), and there is a topnotch section where you have to escape a boobytrapped restaurant. Trying to find a safe path when explosions are rocking the scenery all around you ... well, it's top.

The Bullet Time system works really well. I didn't think it would, but apart from looking brilliant it's actually essential in some parts of the game. Trying to run into a room and clear it of goons in realtime is virtually impossible, so you have to dive about the place in slow-mo just to stay alive. The game as a whole is really excellent, and well worth the money.

I'll end on a tip I discovered that made playing the game quite a bit easier for me. When you enter Bullet Dodge ( diving and firing in slowmo ), the guns you're holding are automatically reloaded and primed with no delay. You can fire, say, the pump-action shotty and then immediately enter Bullet Dodge and the shotgun is ready to be fired as you dive forward. Essentially you can get off 2 blasts in a fraction of a second. Bloody useful if you're magazines are almost empty and the reload pause is likely to get you wasted.

One last thing - according to the blurb in the instruction manual, Remedy are in talks with Dimension Films and Collision Entertainment to make a Max Payne movie.

[Jon]

Great stuff Target, Max Payne sounds great, I might get that to tide me over till the 17th.

[KumaRatta Yamamoto]

I Really think i like you http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/smile.gif

[HATAMOTOKILL]

How come never hear of Max Payne on this forum? http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/smile.gif

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Hato!!!
genie of the lands!!!
http://www.contrabandent.com/pez/contrib/legionxs/ninja1.gif

[Shiro]

Since you gave us a nice Max Payne review...

Can you tell us of some of your other favorite games past and present?

shiro- see the Jagged Alliance 2 thread in OT http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/wink.gif

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I'm a man... I can change... If I have to...
...I guess...

[Dark Phoenix]

Wouldnt the Max Payne movie be The Matrix 2. http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/wink.gif

[HATAMOTOKILL]

MATRIXtop film!!!!!!

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Hato!!!
genie of the lands!!!
http://www.contrabandent.com/pez/contrib/legionxs/ninja1.gif