I was delighted to learn I was wrong then, and Planetfall's broad array of units, weapons, and status effects means battles are even more varied this time around. When I first encountered these an Age of Wonders or two ago, I made the mistake of thinking they were a fun but simplified version of XCOM's tactics battles. That would be a shame though, because Planetfall's tight tactics battles are a treat, and they quickly become much deeper than they first appear.Įach unit on Planetfall's hex-based strategic map is actually an army that can hold up to six units, which then duke it out on three-dimensional maps when the conversation goes south. While you're free to fuss over each move in the tactical battles, you're can turn control over to the computer at any point, or have the AI adjudicate them altogether if the odds are wildly uneven or you aren't interested in that layer of the game. That increase in speed over the traditional 4X extends to most aspects of Planetfall. Once this has happened it can take several turns for you to gain control of an enemy's territory, which can make diplomatic options much more appealing. This keeps the map-filling early game pleasantly brief, and within a couple dozen turns you'll generally find that most areas have either been snapped up or at least been spoken for. Instead, you need to expand by picking resource-rich nearby areas, waltzing an army in and announcing you're the new lord. You can still build colonizer units, but these can't be used in adjacent regions. Each procedurally-generated world you land on in Planetfall has its own pre-defined geography of territories, and you'll take control of these deliberately rather than simply waiting as your population grows into them, per the Civilization model.Įach colony will attract citizens as you build improvements, and once you've reached a certain level, you can choose to annex a neighboring territory. Settlements tend to grow quickly, armies zip around the map, and territory is conquered in chunks rather than as a function of gradually bulging borders. More than any other individual element, what keeps Planetfall feeling fresh and fun is its relatively brisk pace. There's a splendid array of units available and, as in the old Heroes of Might & Magic games, you're free to recruit, mix, and match as you see fit, discovering new synergies and technologies along the way. While you can't opt to play as them, building trust will allow you to recruit their unique units, which can include floating jellyfish mind-flayers and the aforementioned war penguins. They have their own relationships with each other and your competitors. ![]() These native peoples can be either befriended or antagonized depending on your goals for a particular game. In addition to the playable species, you'll also encounter several NPC factions scattered across each map. This time, for instance, the Kir'Ko 'bugs' are the victims of generations' worth of human oppression and enslavement, and we get to experience fighting off an infestation in the form of "sack bleeders" who they can't seem to be rid of no matter how far away they travel in the galaxy. Planetfall flips the script on some long-standing sci-fi tropes in delightful ways. What at first seemed yet another stock-standard sci-fi pretext for dinosaurs with lasers on their heads quickly revealed a world I wanted to learn more about, and whose character backstories drew me forward through each subsequent mission. In other words, a SLOW paced real time strategy game, with relatively hands off combat like Kohan, with Pretenders like Dominions, map zones like Northgard and city development like Rise of Legends, wrapped up in some high fantasy like AoW.With each mission you'll also learn more about Planetfall's surprisingly deep setting. This drift has been happening since AoW1 though, so it is an interesting evolution :).Īnyway, getting more on topic, I would like for them to make a brand new fantasy game, a version of Kohan meets AoW meets Dominions meets Northgard meets Rise of Legends. The other main group of fans are people who cameon board with AoW3, or earlier, and here the game is considerably more divisive, on account of the sci-fi change and drift to more conventional 4x territory. ![]() ![]() ![]() They bought it because this is a PAradox game it seems, but then they went back to Imperator etc. Interestingly, alot of the Paradox fans fall into this category. I met several people for whom PF is their first AoW game, and Pf for them is just one of many games. Regarding popularity, I'm not sure how you measure that, or if it is worth comparing it with AoW3, because the audiences for the 2 are really quite different. AFAIK Planetfall is the best selling game in the series.
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