The "What are you playing?" topic.

[Hooahguy]

speaking of classics:
im playing Empire Earth, from 2001. a very standard RTS thats plays like any other, but its huge in terms of its scope.

back then it was the pinnacle of 3D graphics.
since then there have been 2 other EE games, both of which were horrible compared to the original. the 2nd and 3rd were dumbed down in terms of units and tactics but more complicated in terms of options, like the tech tree and crowns and native tribes. EE3 just put it down to an even dumber level. the first EE was obviously the best.
heres the good things about EE compared to EE2.

1) aircraft have fuel times, which restricts flights and you actually need to plan out your attacks and aircraft carriers have a use. in EE2, there is no flight time, making the concept of aircraft carriers utterly pointless.

2) many types of units for land, sea and air. in EE2 and 3, theres a very little amount. one type of fighter and 3 types of infantry and tanks compared to in EE, wheres theres about a dozen types of infantry, 4 types of fighters and the like.

3) gameplay is actually fun. on hard, the AI buulds up its forces not too fast but fast enough that you can steamroll them. even when you have a huge force you can still loose your entire force quite quickly. in my current game, i sent a huge number of tanks and arty, with air support- including A-10s, fighters, B-2 bombers and B-52 nuke bombers. and i still got crushed. multiple times. and usually i do very well with RTS games. but here the are actually smart. if you attack with aircraft, they divert other aircraft to intercept, and if need be, they will land to refuel first before taking off again to intercept. if you send infantry, you can be sure they will counter with fighter bombers, MGs and snipers. with tanks, you can be sure there will be A-10s filling the skies above them. ah what a great, fun game.

4) battles are actually fun to watch and very interesting, whereas in EE2 battles are dull because all it is, at least in the modern ages, missiles flying at each other. and there are ICBMs which cant be shot down which, if you save up enough uranium, can quickly end the game. and mobbing works in EE2, even on hard, where in EE1 it doesnt even on medium.

5)naval battles, especially in the WW1-2 ages are very fun to watch- revolving guns are a lot of fun and the ship sinking animation is also great. pity that in EE2 the ships just explode and disappear.

the only disappointing thing in EE1 is there are no faction-specific units and the only differences between nations besides the stats are the color of the units. but its not such a bad thing, i can easily live with it.
man, i love EE.

[Prussian to the Iron]

i had to re-buy that a little while back. i considered downloading it, but i just bought it.

still a great game! i perefer it to AoE honestly.

[Meneldil]

EE was indeed a great game, though the whole Paper/Scissor/Rock gameplay was kind of dull and annoying.
The first 2 or 3 eras were kind of useless too.
The fact that the main point of the game was to rush to the last age also kind of made most of the game pointless. Most players would build dozens of walls and towers and then go straight to the last available era :-/

[Alexander the Pretty Good]

Well, the later ages were the coolest. :P I only played it single player and generally messed around in the gunpowder eras. Some of the campaigns were pretty cool, too, but they got devilishly hard.

[Meneldil]

Yeah, the Mech eras were fun. But it kind of sucked that whenever you tried to attack someone in the middle of a game (during middle-age or renaissance), by the time you would gather a decent army, your opponent would have discovered two more ages, making said army pretty much useless (that is, against decent players).

The campaigns were cool too, yes. I kind of was like "wth?" when I invaded Britain as Nazi Germany, but the last one is really great, with the Russian dictator conquering Europe and China with his awesome Mech warriors.

[Tony Furze]

Hello All,

I'm normally in one of the upstairs forums, and that some time back now. Since the demise of my favourite total War game MTW VI, I've sortof lost heart.I have both Rome and M2TW but I just can't get on with them. I've yet to try out Barbarian Invasion and Alexander, but they're supposed to be more difficult (?)

So here's where I m going and have been: X Com UFO Defense , Starcraft, Civ 3.

nothing fills that "hole".

Interested to see the comments on EE since I have a copy of that + exp. somewhere.

Frankly, newer games are a disappointment.

[Prussian to the Iron]

Just bought The Elder Scrolls 3: Morrowind GOTY edition. just noticed a giant gold box laying around in Best Buy. I'd always heard really good reviews about it, and being a prequel to oblivion meant that i was bound to like something in it.

I would absolutely reccomend this game to anyone. Un-modded, I am having great fun with it. a couple major drawbacks:

-Lots of boring missions. An example would be just going into this mine and killing 2 ex-miners stealing from it. after killing 3 rats in a house. I'm not saying I hate the missions, I just don't really like how pointless or easy lots of them are. However, I'm still very early on, and I've heard that they get much better as time goes on. i can only hope :D.

-No non-city fast travel. its really annoying, especially when trying to get to little villages repeatedly. if there were horses, i could excuse this. lack of horses makes me sadfaic though.

-Very little voice acting. in Oblivion, everyone who said anything was voice acted. however in Morrowind, the only voice acting (besides a few important parts of the game) is greetings, nothing more than "Hello, Outlander" and then a wall of text.


Some major positives:

-Skills make tons more sense. If you are good at using a longsword, that doesnt mean you are necessarily good at using tantos or knives.

-Dwemer(dwarven) ruins are much easier to find, and have more of a draw than Ayleid ruins in Oblivion. you're just kinda walking, and than all of a sudden there is this giant tower and ruins in front of you, and you think "Hey imma check that out!", whereas in Oblivion, it was like "oh hey another one. whatever if i want to come back ill fast travel back to it.

-Tons more stuff to do. I love freeing slaves and joining this slave-freeing guild. ive heard it leads to abolition of slavery in the region, which would be really cool.

-no Adoring fan. this is enough to trade out the 2 games.



i might do a review if i get some time tomorrow.

[Hooahguy]

Yeah, the Mech eras were fun. But it kind of sucked that whenever you tried to attack someone in the middle of a game (during middle-age or renaissance), by the time you would gather a decent army, your opponent would have discovered two more ages, making said army pretty much useless (that is, against decent players).

The campaigns were cool too, yes. I kind of was like "wth?" when I invaded Britain as Nazi Germany, but the last one is really great, with the Russian dictator conquering Europe and China with his awesome Mech warriors.

thats why you turtle until the last age.
personally i stick with the modern age. helis and nukes FTW.