Abandonware of the week: Settlers II

First if you don’t know how to play old games on Widows Vista/7/8, go read this article. It’s quick and easy.Then jump with me in Settlers II!

Settlers II is a real time strategy game but definitively not a click fest like other RTS. Here building an economy has a real meaning. To deploy new warriors you need to forge weapons. To get these weapons you need a forge, and ore, and coal. Of course your mines will starve without farms, windmills and bakeries. You need a complete industrial and agricultural infrastructure to succeed.

The game put great emphasis on logistics: between each waypoint there is one of your settler transporting resources back and forth. If too many resources need to travel on the same road you create a bottleneck and you entire economy will slow down. Of course you can breed mules to help, but the key is to balance priorities, build alternative routes, and create new independent logistics hub closer to the frontline. Settlers has many parameters to play with and remains amazingly user friendly for such a complex game. It is fun to design a little animated empire of builders and workers, so that when everything is ready you can watch your small roman warriors crush the enemies.

Why would you want to play it?

1. The initial exploration of the game is really fun, with many things to discover.
2.  A short game is enough to have fun. With a 4 hours session you can be satisfied with your experience and go to something else. You do not have the feeling of investing too much energy for no direct result.
3. You can play at your own pace. There is no need to be good to enjoy the game. I am not saying that the campaign is easy, just that it is very well balance right from the start.
4.  Graphics are still cute for such an old game.
5.  While the start of the campaign is nice, the sandbox mod works well like in a Civilization game.  

Why you won’t play it for too long?

1.  The strategies to beat the higher difficulties are not worth the effort. It’s only a cheating IA after all.
2.  The campaign starts to be too long after the 3^rd mission. You can stop here and already have a very good feel of the game.

Never played it? some advice for a quick start.

1. Build barracks at each end of your territory. Once built soldiers will occupy it and expend your empire.
2. The first thing to develop at first is the building material industry: 3 lumberjackers, 1 planter and 1 mill (medium building) should take care of basic needs.
3.  Link every construction site with roads and workers and materials start flowing out of the base.
4. Once you have mountains, create a road on them, send a geologist, and see what he finds. Once you have coal you can start building other industries.

Have a good time with the oldies dear reader! In your opinion, what should I play next.

EuroExark

Dwarfs Versus Ninja - Please Bring Balance to the Force!

Matrix Kung Fu masters, Tiger & Dragons martial artists, Lord of the Ring Elves, League of Legends Assassins, these are the ultimate warriors nowadays. What happened to Conan and real battle hardened warriors?

Last night I watch the new Bilbo movie, and again, one of my biggest torment of the last decade resurfaced: Dwarves are pictured as goofy characters. Sure they are good, but nowhere near as good as the eleves in Lord of the Ring. This article is a plea to restore balance between Elves and Dwarves.

The good old days: Elves vs Dwarves

When you played Advanced Dungeon & Dragons, Elves had a bonus in Dexterity and Dwarves one in Constitution. Both could compete to be the most fearsom caracters of the party! Same balance was found in Warhammer: Elves had a +1 in weapon skill, whereas the Dwarves had a better endurance. Statistically speaking you could even argue that a Dwarf was better 1vs1.

This equilibrium also exist in Tolkien. Legolas and Gimli score similar amounts of kills at helms Deep, and Dwarves of the Iron Hill are evenly matched with Black Forest Elves at the battle of the 5 armies.

Both races are different, but they are equaly as strong. This was the world I grew in!

The inexorable ascension of dexterity based warriors

I don’t know where it began, but here are some of the main offenders:

• Matrix. I like it here as it is part of the plot that you do not need muscles, but it definitevely did set up a disturbing artistic trend.
• Tiger & Dragons and all similar chineese movies… Stop jumping arround and dodging arrows with your hands!!!
• Jackson’s Lord of the Ring: Dwarves are the side kicks, the funny guys. Just degradating!
• Equilibrium: The films that theorizes that with training you can know gunfights patterns and thus dodge bullets… Come on… (Still a great movie!)
• League of Legends: One of the most resistant hero (“tanky”) it a Ninja (Shen). Hello, are you kidding me ? Irelia, Ahri, Fiora dodge your damages and kill you in a few seconds.. Why? Because they are cute and quick!
• In the last version of Warhammer, Initiative, with describes agility, is now one of the most important stats. Now Dwarfs are unable to defend themselves, they are dead before having the right to roll the dices, even when they are the attackers! Have you never know a dwarf, not to swing his axe beofre dieing? Nonsens!
• Can we have a James Bond where a pistol is enough? Jumping and fists seems a bit distracting…
• And please don’t make me start with WW2 movies like Inglorious bastard, where it seems efficient to bring a sword along. Please stop bringing your sword to a gunfight… You. Can. Not. Dodge. Bullets.

Dear senarist, if you are reading this, please give some love to the dwarves and their fellow warriors! Is visual the only important thing in a movie? What about realism?

Hail to GMM Martin and his Song of Ice and Fire. At least there, a big strong man can hit you hard even if you are a fine swordsman. But don’t get me wrong I also like some sneaky characters. Arya for the win!

If you want to restore balance to the force, comment!

EuroExark

Could the Indians have resisted - a Gamer's view

While surfing on one of my favorite forum, I came across this question, again. Games are meant to explore the possible, what do they tell us about this question. I selected 3 games that offer different perspectives.

• Civilization: Why wouldn’t they  be able to survive?
• Europa Universalis: 400 years of struggle for survival.
• Colonization: The brutal confrontation

Civilization: This game asks us what must a nation do to survive the tides of time. You are dealt with an open hand and you can freely choose your path. Terrain is the only limit, but the start in Central / North America is as good as any in game terms. Like real life Pre-Columbian nations you are able to thrive in your new environment. Like them you can focus heavily on mathematics and astronomic after the construction of your first pyramids. However in our timeline, these technologies did not lead to many practical developments for the Indians. No sailing with the help of the stars for example.  In game terms it is like rushing astronomy and religious technology without taking time to invest in libraries, commerce and machinery… You won’t score high, and the IA might crush you.

They already have gold and silver. Development of tools and weapons in iron was one of the possible next step. What if they had? They might have expended just as we have.

Europa Universalis: For those who do not know, I encourage you to try one of the Europa Universalis. It is historically quite accurate with a lot of depth. Here you can start 100/200 years before contact with the Europeans. You might think that with historical foresight you will be able to prepare and expend before the clash. You fool! You are already doomed by your slow moving culture. Despite a very limited technological lag at start, you will not be able to compete. Why? Is it unfair?

Look at the technology panel:  First you get a large malus for isolation. True you don’t a lot of caravans from the Orient nor Arab traders selling you old greek books.  Then you get another malus for being a Theocratie. I guess that this kind of regime is less progress oriented that an Italian Renaissance Republic. On top of that your “society sliders” are geared heavily toward conservatism. You can change them, but the game rightly force you to do it slowly (1 slider change every 10/15 years), you can’t revolutionized a country in 1 year!  So even with an heavy investment in technology, will not be able to keep up with the Europeans. These malus will decrease with time and contacts with other nations, but it will be hard to survive long enough for it to have an impact.

To add insult to injury you, it will be harder for you to colonize America. Your society sliders indicate that your population is not very willing to go out colonizing. So while you can increase your empire, you will not be able to color the continent as fast as the new comers. Your only option is to overwhelm the conquistadors. You have to send hordes of warriors to stop them on the beaches but as if technological underdevelopment was not enough, you have no cavalry. Like real life Indians you have to wait for Europeans to master the art of horse riding. As you imagine, there is an important malus in battle when you can’t field any horse during the XVI Century...

In conclusion, you game survive with a perfect gameplan, including in radical revolution and intensive efforts toward administrative and military technologies. But does it feel right to invest all the gold of the Incans in funding colonies and researching better tax authorities?

Colonization:  Here they are! And it is too late. Despite being IA only, you can learn a few things about the Indians in this game. Sure they will adapt very quickly to gun and horses but their main weakness is that they are very naïve and unorganized. They will accept gifts, welcome your missionaries, teach you how to survive in the wild even sell you lands. Sure they will raid your settlements when unhappy, but that doesn’t mean that the whole tribe will launch an extermination campaign against you. Surely the Europeans who dealt with the Arabs in Spain and then with the Turks across the Mediterranean had a much more cynical view on inter cultural experiences. They were prepared for a relentless campaign with no compromise. Indians come unprepared to this clash of civilizations.

Historical addendum: A major aspect missed by all these game is the genetical diversity enjoyed by Europeans. We had dealt with much more viruses and bacterias during our History (from Asia and Africa), so that our diseases had a much larger effect on Indians that their on us. The scale of their losses (80% for some nations) was such, that no recovery was possible.

Various Links

Spanish Conquest of the Americas

Population History of indigenous peoples

Epidemics in the Americas

Download:Civilization

Paradox Interactive and their superb catalog of historical games

Aztec After Action Report EU3

Did gaming help you understand History? Or on the contrary do you think that games distort reality too much?

EuroExark

Warhammer, I tried it again!

A game for kids and you are not a kid anymore? 

I stopped Warhammer in the late 90’ having played countless battles with my dwarfs and elves. It was a time of superheroes and I still remember some epic battles. “Ok your frenetical Bloodthrister killed 3 ranks of my elite troops, but my Dwarven King is still alive. He kills on a single wound and has 4 attack dices with a few other magical bonuses… so….”

Basically, between invisible mages and unkillable heroes capable of killing literally hundreds of the “basic” guys, most battle where decided before they begun. Tactics was rarely to be found on the battlefield. May the best optimizer win… or the worst spirited player!

How does it look now?

Focus is back on troops: Basic troops are relatively much more powerful, so that maneuvering and placement will play a huge role.

Still very fun: Even basic troops have been customized for each race, with special rules to make them interesting and unique. You don’t have to rely solely on heroes for the fun factor.

More realistic: Numbers matter in war. Now big units provide larger bonus in a fight. Soldiers in the second and third rows will not sit idily when they camarades are fighting for their lives. Also large units do not flee so easily.

All in all, I find the game more interesting, with more choices to be made on the battlefield. You feel more like a general managing his troops and reserves. 

 

5th Ed. vs 8th Ed. – 5 Chaos Knights vs 40 Imperial Halbardiers

As we said, its more realistic, but I feel like making the point. Let us do some maths using edition 5 and edition 8 of Warhammer.

On one side, 5 Chaos Knights charging with lance and heavy armor. On the other side a horde of 40 Halbardiers with light armors. In Warhammer 5th Ed. it represents 330 army points of Chaos vs 360 of Imperials. But as you may remember, it is not an even fight… 

In 5th Ed.: Knights and horses will inflict 6.9 wounds in the first round. The lone halberdier still in contact will inflict 0.1 casualty in return. Chances to flee 89%. Chances to get caught and destroyed : 68%. 

If you stay for a second round of fight the odds will be exactly the same. Cumulatively you have 1% chance to see a 3rd round of fight.  

Result 5th: Imperials are doomed. 

In 8th Ed.:  Knights and horses will still inflict 6.9 wounds in the first round. The 17 surviving halbardiers in range will kill 1.4 knights in return. It is still a defeat, but they have only 50% chances to flee because they are more numerous. 

In the 2nd round, 4.6 halbardiers will perish while killing 1.6 chaotic knights. Comparing casulties and the +3 rank bonus, the 2nd round is a draw. Guess what? The 3rd round will be a crushing victory for the Imperials!

 

Result 8th: Imperials may not withstand the charge, but if they do, they will overrun those few knights with ease.

My recommendation:

If you enjoyed it back then, please come back. It is not the game for kids you imagine. Tactics, figures, emotions, It still has plenty of surprises for you. Also note, it’s a good option to lure your kid into gaming !

Let's go check it out Warhammer Official Website

Have you tried looking into the new Warhammer stuff ? What did you think about it ?

EuroExark

Easy Abandonware: How to revive them?

Have you tried a recent game online, lost in a fraction of second and thought you were happier in the 90’ soloing through Duke Nukem, Populous or Red Alert ?

Well don’t despair, most of these old titles are still available, even free… and some or them are still really good!

Download + Install time, less than 2 minutes!

Ready to use only, no time to waste!  

The main difficulty with old games is the compatibility with newer systems. Some of you have probably tried to install old games without success.

The big news here is prepackaged games for Windows XP and Windows7 that come directly with the emulator. 

Here are my 2 favorites links for that:

DJ Old Games The one we will use in this demo

Abandonware France for my fellow French speaking gamers

 

Need a quick guide?

1. Find the game of your childhood, check that it is available for PC (See red box), click on the name (See red box).

2. Click on download (See red box), then check that an install package .exe exists (See red box)

3. Final check that you have the good package and then lets go, download.

The rest is as easy, double click on the downloaded file and follow instructions !

Last words on install:
- Alt + Tab to go in full screen
- Keybord will probably be in QWERTYfor the game… you will be fine, just click around!

For those who want to go further and customize their install or want a really obscure game to run, try DosBox the most used emulator out there.

Let’s enjoy the goodness!

	Lemmings Are you clever and quick?		Dune 2 The Father of all RTS
	Populous Still simple and efficient		Wolfenstein Shoot'em all!

Is it really free and legal?

General answer is yes, but please use good judgment. If the game isn’t more than 10 years old, it probably shouldn’t be available for download. Here are some legal information from Wikipedia

"Abandonware is a product, typically a software, ignored by its owner and manufacturer, and for which no product support is available. It is differentiated from a discontinued product because the manufacturer has not issued an official notice of discontinuance, instead, the manufacturer is simply ignoring the product."

For example no game from Lucasarts (Monkey Island, Star Wars: X-Wing) is in Abandonware. They still maintain their copyrights on them. Don’t be sad, there are litteraly thousand of other good titles out there.

Did you had success reviving an old game ? Please let me know!

EuroExark