|
Author |
File Description |
Lord Basse |
Posted on 04/19/14 @ 05:28 PM (updated 05/19/20)
File Details |
Version: |
The Conquerors 1.0c |
Style: |
Mix |
Number of scenarios: |
7 |
This is the sequel to Gwyndlegard, its bastard child/spin-off The Epic Adventures of Marvin & Rob, and The Rockspring Revolution. If you haven't played either of them, you might still enjoy this campaign, but the story will make more sense if you play them in the right order!
FEATURES:
• A 7 scenarios long campaign!
• Various gameplay styles: pure B&D, Fixed Force, one-on-one boss fights and stealth missions.
• Extensive modding: around 400 new units (soldiers, buildings, eye-candy and other stuff) made uniquely for this campaign.
• An epic in the literal sense of the word - quite likely bigger in gameplay hours than "Gwyndlegard" and "The Rockspring Revolution" combined!
• Emphasis, as usual, on the storyline, humour and atmosphere, although I try to spruce it up with new ideas for gameplay as well!
• A vastly expanded Gwyndlegard universe,
• Music from a wide range of composers, including Ramin Djawadi, Howard Shore, Russell Shaw and Kevin MacLeod.
• A grand conclusion to the Gwyndlegard trilogy!
• Insivible flying bananas!
STORY:
This campaign starts right where The Rockspring Revolution left off. Our hero Immanuel returns to his home province of Gwynhill, and his soon-to-be-wife Emily. Immanuel longs for peace and quiet, and the opportunity to finally marry his beloved girlfriend, and for a short while it looks as if his dreams will come true. But a campaign isn't very interesting if it's all peaceful and quiet, is it?
Out in the ocean, at a top-security prison, five iron-clad, monstrous ships show up at the horizon. They blast a hole in the wall of the prison, and its most dangerous prisoner escapes. Xaphira, the former Queen of Xioché, is on the loose.
The news travel swiftly to Gwynhill, and the local priest and recovering alcoholic Father Garnas is very troubled by it. For the past two years he has been studying an artifact that was used in the war against Xaphira (as seen in "Gwyndlegard"), The Relic of the Rock, and he has made some astonishing discoveries. He believes that it is one of the four Relics of Athalën, immensely powerful artifacts created by the ancient king Athalën, the man who founded and ruled the Old Kingdom for a thousand years. Father Garnas fears that Xaphira knows of the relic, and that she is coming to Gwynhill to get it. He thinks that she too knows of the power of the four relics: that with them you can shape the world completely as you wish to see it, and possibly live forever. And indeed he is right, and Xaphira comes as a thief in the night and snatches The Relic of the Rock away.
It is now up to you, as Immanuel, to make sure Xaphira doesn't get her hands on all four of the relics.
SCREENSHOTS:
Gates of the Old Kingdom | An army has amassed | An indoors scene | Up on a rooftop | Into Xioché | A peaceful monastery | Bigass Castle | An abandoned city | A faraway village | Naval action | A quick stop in Arthalien | A monument in the mountains | Mountain stream | Abandoned mineshaft
IMPORTANT NOTE:
This campaign requires the 1.0c patch for The Conquerors to work.
CAN I PLAY THIS WITH THE HD/2013 EDITION?
Yes you can! For this you will need the AoE2HD Compatibility Patch, which you can download here. More information on how to install this for HD is included in the download.
This campaign is brought to you by StormWind Studios! |
Pages: « First « 1 2 3 4 [5] 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 » Last » | Author | Comments & Reviews ( All | Comments Only | Reviews Only ) |
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xVortexXz |
Posted on 05/16/14 @ 11:46 AM
I had the same crash in mission 2. What i did was to destroy the whole castle, the walls, towers, buildings, everything and to be sure that only the heroes are in the castle and it didn't crash. |
Spoffin1 |
Posted on 05/16/14 @ 12:13 PM
Thanks xVortexXz - I actually ended up trying this moments before you posted and it worked.
Now in Scenario 3, when I try to save (immediately or 5 minutes in), it crashes. Loading those saves causes AoE to stop responding. |
rewaider (id: Rewaider) |
Posted on 05/17/14 @ 04:38 PM
Is it incompatible to any operational system? Because sometime ago I've just swiched my HD (for a SSD) and Windows 7 to Windows 7 ultimate and the campaigns doesn't runs anymore :/ |
Lord Basse
Official Reviewer
File Author |
Posted on 05/17/14 @ 05:18 PM
I think I know why the game's crashing in scenario 2, then. Should get that fixed in an update.
The crash when saving the game is one I'm having a lot of problems with personally, but it only seems to happen in AoKHD. If you can get it to work in regular AoK, you shouldn't have this problem. It does make me worry about the Steam Workshop port though. :/
@Rewaider, I've only tried it with regular Windows 7, so I couldn't say honestly. :/ |
Spoffin1 |
Posted on 05/18/14 @ 02:51 PM
Saving problem occurs in s6 as well, just FYI |
NertyOX |
Posted on 05/19/14 @ 09:37 AM
Playability: 5
One of the best Campaigns that I have ever played, yes and I could sadly say that this is better than Prince Ulio ( i know some might disagree but, w/e ). I simply enjoy every moment of this campaign and it is worth spending every single second on it, so I got nothing to say here - simply wonderful!
Balance: 5
The balance generally is perfect, I mean you cannot say that 'oh, it is impossible to do this and that' - the balance is simply amazing and you cannot complain or whine on this part, (atleast not me). We all know that the Balance is an important part of any campaign because the Balance is kinda connected with the Playability, because if you do not have the element of Balance settled up, then the Campaign will be less playable. Anyway, I won't extend it further, but as for the Balance - this one deserves a full 5.
Creativity: 5
What can I basically say here? - Well, we all know Lord Basse as a successful writer as well, I mean it is worth reading these little novelettes' (books) in the game as well, they simply show the Creativity of the author, and his imagination overall. I'd like to add something else here, Lord Basse has some nice writing skills and he could really do something more about this, probably write a book about Gwyndlegard or whatever, I mean it is worth a shot, because you simply never know.
Map Design: 5
PERFECT! - Exactly, perfect! The Design is simply highly detailed and mapped perfectly, I did not see any mistake or lets better say any part that I did not like on the 7 scenarios, Lord Basse received a lot of positive ratings on his designs generally, and yes, I am willing to give him a full 5 on this as well, because this is simply amazing and I got no words to describe it. ( :) )
Story/Instructions: 5
Story and the Instructions overall were simply great, the story of Gwyndlegard is something that I admired a lot, but coming with this extension 'The Relics of Athalën' is something even more greater that has no- or, zero words of DESCRIBING it.
Additional Statement:
- I really congratulate Lord Basse for finishing this long project he started, I do believe it required a lot of time and patience eventhough Basse might have been busy with his daily basis routine, but yet he has successfully made it and I am really happy to see this campaign here, I was waiting for it myself for a long time, and I do have to say that I checked the process of the campaign almost everyday, because I knew it was going to be a GLOWING MASTERPIECE :).
Thank you for this awesome project Basse, and take care buddy! |
Jatayu (id: Sword_of_STORM)
Official Reviewer |
Posted on 05/19/14 @ 12:32 PM
'The Relics of Athalen' is another chapter in Lord Basse's 'Gwyndlegard' Saga. It contains 7 scenarios, wherein your heroes battle the evil guys for control over the powerful relics.
Looking back on playing this campaign, the words 'huge' and 'epic' come to mind. I took around 10+ hours of gameplay to finish it, and it was just amazing the whole time. The author clearly put an incredible amount of hard work into this and the result is a masterpiece.
Note, that I played it without the userpatch, and also not on the HD edition. As a result I didn't face any crashes like many people reported, it worked smoothly for me.
Playability: 5+
The campaign contains 5 playable scenarios ( 2 cutscenes ), featuring virtually every style of gameplay like fixed force, RPG, puzzle type, defend the spot, build & destroy, boss fights and so on. And everything was just fantastic. I really can't emphasize how much I enjoyed playing the campaign. The action takes place in a variety of locales, such as forest, grasslands, island, big cities, underground, etc., and each scenario is unique and has many novelties.
The campaign has good replay value, as there are some side quests I didn't get around to doing, or other choices ( like going against the cheese cult or w/ever ). And of course, trying it on harder difficulty settings- I certainly intend to get back to the island one for that.
Having said that I did find a few bugs. In the 5th scenario, the whole Night Escapades is a problem because I still have control over all my units- they don't change ownership while the pond romance is happening, or when Ori goes around collecting things ( that part is not explained later in the story btw ). And I also have control over all the B&D stuff while going on to the next area ( over the bridge ), which is.. awkward? I also could not do the reflecting fireballs of Tengil with much success ( and really appreciate the workaround provided ), and the Yelonese swordsman icon reads 'warranty.rtf'. In general however, none of the bugs are game breaking and the playability is just superb.
Balance: 5-
I played the first scenario on moderate, and after beating pink and orange, I started using the robin hood cheat, because I ran out of gold. After that I played it all on standard difficulty.
Still, it wasn't a cakewalk or anything. Most of the campaign was still pretty hard and especially the boss fights, RPG stuff took many reloads. Either I'm really rusty, or the campaign is a bit on the hard side, I'll have to check out on the higher difficulties. In general the balance is good.
About the RPG parts Felicity annoyed me very much being very prone to dying, lowest hp, lowest damage, melee, seriously fail. Ori in contrast had big ranged damage output and could tank quite a bit- easily the strongest.
Creativity: 5+
Is there a campaign more creative than this?? I don't think there is.
I have played, and designed any number of data edited and mods. And the stuff showcased here still blew my mind, on many, many occasions.
Between fully functional staircases, tunnels, a proper 'wizard' unit, cool underground areas and whatnot it often feels like a new game rather than AOE2. The author has gone to great lengths for little creative details, such as the flagship that fires cannonballs broadside ( like real life historical ships ).
Special mention must be made for the boss fights. Now, AOE2 is a game that is not designed well for bossfights, but people do them anyway, often featuring lame stuff like type a number to cast X spell. Here there isn't any of that, but rather really creative stuff like mirrors, throwing rocks, moving statues! It's incredible.
Map design: 5+
Yet another area, where Lord Basse really hits it out of the park.
The maps are all really well designed, with a lot of attention to detail and does not hinder the gameplay in any way. The mod pack used really makes the map beautiful and the new graphics are of excellent quality. The waterfalls, the indoor areas, the new castle types, underground areas. All excellent.
Story/Instructions: 5
While I wouldn't call the story a literary masterpiece, this is about as good as it gets for AOE2 scenarios. It is, mostly a simple good vs evil storyline with conflict over powerful artifacts ( rings of power anyone? ). What is notable is the character of Ori. At first I thought he will simply be an evil guy who will try to steal the relics at the end but then it seemed too obvious and I wasn't sure. But the twist at the end was really good and I liked it.
The author has also kept all of his characters and back story consistent with previous other scenarios, which is quite an achievement. Though it isn't really necessary to play those in order to understand this story. Also, there is a lot of bonus materials and history in the optional books that you can find lying around. I would like to suggest something here, why not put all the books into one Word file included, so that we could refer to it. Ofc it still is in the instructions screen, but that isn't very user friendly to read, and some of the books are in really obscure places.
The instructions and hints provided are quite detailed and adequate. I only had one issue here that I didn't understand how to make pink my ally ( first scenario ), and ended up defeating him. But otherwise I was never confused what to do.
Additional comments:
In addition to providing a lot of novel and exciting gameplay, this campaign is very polished and professional. By that I mean, there is there very little that is 'half-assed'/requires suspension of disbelief aka 'it's AOE2, what more can you expect' type of mentality. Here, a secret passage is more than just a palisade wall with a delete object trigger, instead a whole thing slides forward revealing the passage clearly. Also the beginning and end credits, it's just a lot more professionally done rather than the usual 'Display instructions' trigger. The author clearly has a lot of passion for scenario designing and I would say keep it up! as it leads to such excellent work.
Conclusion:
You absolutely MUST download and play this campaign. It is not an exaggeration to say that this is perhaps the best campaign ever made. |
Lord Basse
Official Reviewer
File Author |
Posted on 05/19/14 @ 02:47 PM
Thanks a lot for the reviews chaps! I should probably be able to get another update out this or next week, and fix the bugs and stuff you've mentioned. :) |
rewaider (id: Rewaider) |
Posted on 05/25/14 @ 12:08 PM
Oh nevermind, it works fine in win7 ultimate too. I've just forgotten to install the 1.0c patch :P |
Dracones |
Posted on 05/29/14 @ 04:14 AM
Been a fan of the game ever since it came out. Last week I checked the top rated campaigns and found this gem! Simply amazing! Hands down the best campaign ever created for aoe! Original, intense and addictive! Congrats and much respect to Lord Basse and everyone that contributed! |
Pages: « First « 1 2 3 4 [5] 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 » Last » |
HGDL v0.8.2 |
Rating |
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5.0 | Breakdown |
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Playability | 5.0 | Balance | 5.0 | Creativity | 5.0 | Map Design | 5.0 | Story/Instructions | 5.0 |
Statistics |
Downloads: | 12,651 |
Favorites: [] | 26 |
Size: | 74.86 MB |
Added: | 04/19/14 |
Updated: | 05/19/20 |
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