Product Description: Rise Of Nations combines the thrills and speed of Real-time strategy with the in-depth management of turn-based gaming for an all new experience! Streamlined multiplayer action forup to 8 players on a LAN or an Internet connection!
Customer Reviews
Average Rating:
Rating: - Strategy in RON
Although many people have been comparing Rise of Nations to Age of Empires, despite the admitted similarities in graphics and nations building, Rise of Nation's campaigns significantly differ from their counterpart.
The Rise of Nations campaigns are "Risk"-esque. Instead of going from scenario to scenario until the conclusion of the campaign leader's life, as it is done in Age of Empires, the aim of RON's campaigns is to conquer the total territories on map. This affects the historical accuracy of the campaign, which is not compromised in AOE. For example, Alexander the Great must conquer the Italian Peninsula and defeat the Romans, an event which never occurred in real time.
The user begins the campaign with a view of the map and the territory which his/her character occupies. There is a maximum amount of "turns" the user has before the campaign is over, whether successfully or unsuccessfully completed. To enter a scenario, or as RON terms it, "battle," the user must click an area from the map to conquer and is thus transported to to a "real-time" battle. If the battle ends up badly, the user has a choice to forfeit that particular battle, but is not permitted to replay that battle until the next turn. Something of note, as well, is that the user is also given a limited amount of time to complete each scenarios (max: 80 minutes). A conquered territory also has the ability to be invaded by a parring civilization.
Despite these differences, I still enjoy RON. To me, it feels more like a strategy game than AOE. Not only is there strategy required in "real-time" battles, but also strategy required when deciding which territory to conquer, etc. Those who are interested in something more historically accurate, however, should aim for AOE.
Other differences:
- User cannot build walls
- User can obtain generals for battles, which grants his/her army powers
Bugs:
- After prolonged use, the music can become eerily distorted
I apologize for lack of further detail. I have to continue studying the triumvirate for my college class. Hope this helps!
Rating: - Excellent choice
I played the heck out of AOE II. I really enjoyed it, and then when AOE III became available for the Mac I had to have it. That too was fun. I saw Rise of Nations on the shelf one day and picked it up to see what it was all about. Wow! Simply awesome. I haven't touched AOE III for months. I haven't done any online play with it, and I am still just making my way through the Naploean campaign, but this game is great. I enjoy building new cities and linking the trade routes. Game play is enjoyable. Armies are cool. Really , everything about Rise of Nations is great. If you enjoy real-time strategy games, then you should get this one.
Rating: - What I expected (kind of)
I had played a PC based demo before, so I was acquainted with the game and it was kind of what I had expected. However the game crashes about 60% of the time as soon as it starts and I have to restart it to be able to play. I doubt it is some hardware related issue since the remaining 40% of the time it plays well. I have a 12" Powerbook G4 on which even much more demanding games (as far as hardware goes) run such as Call Of Duty 2 or Doom 3.
Rating: - One of the greatest strategy games in the world
This game is great overall: excellent graphics, excellent sound, and it never gets boring because the experience always changes depending on the scenerio you choose. You can play as Napoleon or Alexander the Great, an American Revolutionary or a Russian Czar, or any number of world leaders past and present. You really have to plan ahead to devise strategies to defeat your enemies. You can change the outcome of historical battles -- I have made Napoleon conquer England, America take over South America, the Russians win the cold war, and the Bantu take over the world. The only downside is that it takes a lot of computer memory.
Rating: - Rise of Nations - a fun game
I purchased the Mac version of Rise of Nations and have had an enjoyable time playing this game. This is the first Real Time Simulation I've purchased, so all comments should be taken in that context.
The learning tutorials are informative and the quick games (the only I've played so far) are entertaining (especially when one acheives nuclear weapon status...). There's a balancing act between building military items and civilian items that is not easy to achieve. The mechanism which drives "advances" is your library. Researching things like military, civic, commerce, or science enables your progress through "ages" (classical, medieval or industrial, for example). Each advance can affect many aspects of one's national health. Exploring for rare resources, building various structures (which enlarge your national borders) and building a military reserve also add to your nation's health.
As to nations, there are 18 groups or tribes or peoples from history and around the world. Each has special abilities and advantages.
In the quick game, you choose the nation you wish to play, choose the type of map you wish to play on (rain forest, great lakes, old world for example) and hit return. The computer generates a map and an opponent, and your little corner of the world appears on the map. Most of the map is dark, encouraging you to find out "what's out there" by using your scout to, er, scout. As you start in the stone age, it behooves you to build your nation quickly (by building barracks, markets [which allow you to build caravans and merchants], universites, farms, woodcutter's camps and mines). Everything produces various resources which you spend to build other things, generating more resources, building more things, back and forth, over and over. By itself, this can be an interesting struggle. However, the trick is to do all of this while competing against a "hostile" computer opponent. There are options to play against other real people, but I haven't gotten that far, yet. I'm still learning the "hot keys" and trying to develop some sort of strategy/plan of attack...this is where the Real Time Strategy enters into the mix. The computer is doing the same as you (building a nation) at the same time as you. I have a similar game (about 6 years old and OS 9) but it was turn based (I go, you go). So things heat up in Rise of Nations much more quickly than in my older game.
All in all, this is a fun game. The only thing I would say that is a negative is this:
MAC OS 10.4 and up users need to download a patch to allow you to actually play this game. The patch has worked for me just fine, so there's no probelm. Although, it took about 35 minutes (from putting the disc into my computer to actually playing) to get everything synched up. It wasn't a huge negative, I just wish I knew beforehand.
- Excellent choice
- What I expected (kind of)
