|
|
MLH - The Princes' Revolt
|
Author |
File Description |
Julius999 |
Posted on 08/15/11 @ 05:12 PM
File Details |
Version: |
The Conquerors 1.0c |
Style: |
Other |
Number of scenarios: |
2 |
The Princes' Revolt
Entry to the Myth, Legend and History Contest
Background
This is a historical scenario about the revolt in 1173-74 against King Henry II of England by his own sons. The style of the scenario is intended to be something of a cross between a normal B&D and a Risk-style scenario. Play as the King and restore order to the realm.
Features
• Capture (and lose) towns and cities
• Raid merchants and murder innocent civilians for extra gold
• Lay siege to your enemies to cut off their food supplies
• Data editing
• Giant map
• Introductory cutscene scenario
|
Author | Reviews ( All | Comments Only | Reviews Only ) |
---|
Thekingof555 |
Posted on 08/17/11 @ 03:15 PM
The Princes’ revolt consists of two scenarios; one short cutscene and a large playable scenario. The playable scenario features a unique kind of build & destroy, where the player has to capture cities and villages and defend them against huge enemy attacks.
PLAYABILITY: 4+
Let’s talk about the cutscene first. It is a nice, not very special cutscene to introduce the player into the story. It runs very smoothly except for some of the dialogues, which are sometimes a bit too fast (for me, that is).
The first scenario starts with the siege of London. The player has to defend the city against several enemy attacks. After you break the siege, you will need to conquer every city and village on the map.
A downside about this is that the attacks on the towns and defending yourself was practically the same throughout the whole game. I lost interest near the end (but I forced myself to play on). It would have been nice if there was a side-quest or something, but that might make the scenario historically inaccurate.
Near end of the scenario, when the player reaches his population limit, the game can sometimes be very laggy (especially when launching large-scale attacks). It was a little annoying, but not too bothersome.
Different tracks were being played during the scenario, which suited the game well, though it drove me crazy listening to them all the time.
BALANCE: 4+
Overall, the scenario is very well balanced. However, some points were a bit easy for me. I had hardly any trouble defending London and destroying the surrounding siege camps. This also applies for capturing the first villages. After liberating London completely from the siege, the player gets a huge stream of taxes. When the enemy was attacking one of my settlements, I could easily create an army to repel them, since the training time for the units is extremely small. I also noticed London will never be attacked later in the game (maybe that’s because I captured the southern villages very quickly).
The only really hard part in the scenario was when I attacked Nottingham. It took me quite a while to take down the defenses of this city.
CREATIVITY: 5+
I think this was the best part of the scenario! The game features (at least for me) an unknown part of history, making it all very interesting.
The author included a modified data file which makes a bunch of new effects possible. The training time of units, the food system, supply carts and siege camps made the campaign have a very unique feel. Together with the music and map design it has become a very ingenious scenario.
MAP DESIGN: 5
I really like the way how the author creates the look of the maps. It looks a little similar to the maps of his other works, but that doesn’t matter much. The towns were neat, London was good (maybe a little too much dirt 1?) and even the sea looked great. The only downside was that the map felt a bit empty between the towns. This detail is not enough to lower the rating though.
STORY/INSTRUCTIONS: 4+
The story and the instructions are nicely written. However, I thought the instructions were not yet complete. It doesn’t say that the prices of the units were different and the training time is much lower. I found it out after failing my very first try.
OVERALL RATING: 4.4
ADDITIONAL COMMENTS:
This is a very good scenario and a highly recommended download![Edited on 08/18/11 @ 04:48 AM]
|
Sarn |
Posted on 01/10/12 @ 02:17 PM
The Princes' Revolt is a campaign by Julius99 for the MLH contest. It consists of a cutscene describing the roots of the revolt against King Henry II of England by his sons and a B&D/RISK-style scenario where the player commands King Henry's army as he reconquers his rebellious barons.
Playability: 5-
I loved this campaign. From start to finish, it kept me on my toes and constantly working. The cutscene scenario was very well executed and played without a hitch, so no problems there. In the siege of London, it was touch and go for a little while, but once I figured out that the train cost and time of unit was much lower than normal, things became a lot easier. My first time through, I didn't bother training any units, planning on doing so after I had broken the siege. After my rapidly decreasing army was nearly dead, I tried to train more units and was surprised at the cost and speed, but by then, it was too late. The next time, I constantly trained units and immediately destroyed one siege camp to supply myself, then methodically worked my way around. Even then, though, I constantly had to be aware of everything else around me.
I especially loved the RISK/B&D crossover that Julius designed. Capturing towns and gathering food from them was a brilliantly implemented idea and worked very well. I also appreciated that the AI didn't just sit back and wait for you to amass enormous amounts of resources and soldiers. There was never a lack of action and the pace of the scenario never fell.
The one minor problem I had was a bit of lag towards the end of the game when I was at my population limit. This, however, is not nearly enough to lower an entire point.
Balance: 4
I feel like on standard, it is a little too easy, while on moderate, it's too hard. Once the besiegers were defeated, a quick sweep through the empty villages to produce more food was enough to set me up for the rest of the game. As I captured more towns (Oxford and Bishop's Lynn) I was able to support larger armies and fight off the attackers quite easily. Even the last towns (Durham and Nottingham) were easy, especially Durham, which fell quickly to siege. Nottingham, well, there's not much they could do against nearly 200 soldiers. On moderate, I wasn't able to even protect London, let alone take any other towns. I think the issue is less a problem of it being too easy or hard in general, but more that the difficulty progression is too steep. Maybe making Standard a little harder and moderate a little easier would work.
Creativity: 5
This scenario was very creative. Some of my highlights were the RISK/B&D system and the siege camp aspect (both as the besiegers and the besieged). The near-instant training system also created a new aspect to the game and the food/gold system redefined the economy of the game. The map design also included a number of creative elements, including palisade bridges and shoreless water. The music fit very well and and both scenarios illustrated a great deal of creativity.
Map Design: 5
This map was a pleasure to play on. Every single tile was the way it was for a reason. The amount of detail on the map is just another example of Julius' design skills. I liked Sherwood forest especially and all the huts, houses, and inns helped fill the countryside between towns, which were also quite good. In general, the the map design put a great deal of detail, creativity, and life into the scenario, without overdoing it.
Story/Instructions: 4
Between the introductory history and instructions, the scouts tab in the objectives, and the cutscene, the story was very well laid out. Almost all the significant information needed was present (ie, siege camps). Notable exceptions here include the change in the cost and train times of units. This would have been helpful, even as a note in the hints section. Also, I did not know how I was supposed to pillage towns. I eventually assumed that it was taunt-activated, but this would be a good point to include in the instructions as well.
Overall, this was a great campaign. I enjoyed every minute of it and would recommend this for downloading immediately. |
HGDL v0.8.2 |
Rating |
---|
4.5 | Breakdown |
---|
Playability | 4.5 | Balance | 4.0 | Creativity | 5.0 | Map Design | 5.0 | Story/Instructions | 4.0 |
Statistics |
Downloads: | 2,976 |
Favorites: [] | 4 |
Size: | 4.67 MB |
Added: | 08/15/11 |
|