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PUFF88
Scharfuehrer
Posts: 388
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Post by PUFF88 on Jan 8, 2005 19:12:11 GMT -5
last two games i got were Half-life 2 and Tribes Vengenace. and United Offensive for Call of Duty.
i want to get the sequel to IL2 sturmovik as i think Matrix games and someone else made a expansion that has tons of missions on it.
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Post by Keith Heitmann on Jan 20, 2005 12:27:31 GMT -5
Cool. I tend to only get games around my birthday or xmas since there isn't much else I want from anyone. The only other time I add something new is when I get my picks for moderating at VU Games forums or after a beta test. I've got stacks of games that I've asked for that I haven't played yet.
Often I'll just request another copy of a citybuilder game I already have just to have a backup on hand incase my old originals die on me. I must about 4 copies of Caesar III, Pharaoh, Zeus, Emperor and their addons here. 
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Phil Walker
Scharfuehrer
VERY opinionated. Best stay away from. You've been warned!!!
Posts: 251
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Post by Phil Walker on Jan 20, 2005 13:34:03 GMT -5
Since you mentioned them, I have to ask. I've been considring some of the older games myself. Emperor was my first, so I missed out on the others. Are they still available and if so where? Specifically Zeus, Cleopatra, Pharoh, and Caeser. Just like to know so it will save on browsing for them.
Also, bit of your own review on each WOULD be nice ;D !
Sincerely,
Phil
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Post by Keith Heitmann on Jan 21, 2005 4:45:58 GMT -5
Caesar III is the third game based on Rome, but it the first in the "new" series of citybuilder game styles that Emperor belongs to. I plays differently than Emperor and some find it and Pharaoh more difficult to play due to the various types of ratings you must acquire, such as culture, prosperity, peace,and favor.
Caesar III being the oldest doesn't have some of the later refinements added in the other games like roadblocks for instance. You have a choice of playing a peaceful career with little fighting or a dangerous career where there is more fighting. Peaceful careers require higher ratings than the dangerous careers.
Pharaoh is the second game and it uses a modified Caesar III game engine. It plays similarly to Caesar III, but it is the first game to introduce the construction of monuments like pyramids mastabas. It also introduces the roadblock and warships into the series. Cleopatra is the add on to Pharaoh. I adds four new campaign games, cliffside tombs and some new buildings like the "zoo".
Zeus is the first game that plays similarly to Emperor. Many people didn't like what they thought was the cartoon-like graphics of the game. However, the game play lets you soon forget about most of that. It also introduces a lot of humor in to the game with many comical sayings from the people. Zeus introduces the "gods" as beings that walk the streets (unseen by your people). You must also summon heroes like Jason, Odysseus, Achilles, etc. to fend off gods and various monsterous beasts that the hostile gods inflict upon your city like the Calydonian Boar, etc.
Poseidon is the addon for Zeus and in it you play as the Atantians vs. the Greeks. Your time is spent fending off the Greeks and Egyptians etc while settling the Mediterranean and the Caribbean Seas. Warships are powered by a mystical ore called orichalc which also allows your ships to shoot "Greek fire".
After that came Emperor, which you have.
Each game has its own appeal and charm Once you start to play them most surface level objections or criticisms will tend to disappear. Being that you started with Emperor you may find the earlier games much tougher to play. Many feel that starting with the changes in play style in Zeus through Emperor the game got easier.
To find Caesar III by itself would be nearly impossible. However there were several combination packages put out over the years, the first being the "Great Empires Collection". That came with Caesar III, Pharaoh and Cleopatra. That package is no longer available, but on a rare case basis you may just stumble across one somewhere.
The next package was "Great Empires Collection 2", which included the first three plus Zeus and Poseidon. This package is also no longer offered but you might have more luck finding it than the first one.
The latest package is called "The Greatest Builders of Empires Collection" and includes all the citybuilders and their addons. This would be the easiest one to find.
There was a Zeus/Poseidon only package that was put out for a short time called "Acropolis" but that would also be nearly impossible to find.
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Phil Walker
Scharfuehrer
VERY opinionated. Best stay away from. You've been warned!!!
Posts: 251
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Post by Phil Walker on Jan 21, 2005 7:00:42 GMT -5
OK, noted and thanks. Believe it or not I THINK I saw one of the Great Empires Collections at WalMart. So, may just be worth looking into. Of course there's always ebay or ebay's Half.com as well, so who can say for sure?! Will check it out and thanks again!!!
Sincerely,
Phil
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Phil Walker
Scharfuehrer
VERY opinionated. Best stay away from. You've been warned!!!
Posts: 251
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Post by Phil Walker on Jan 26, 2005 20:42:41 GMT -5
Some additional notes and questions!
By their names, I'm making some "suppositions". You said Caesar is based on Rome, so I guess Pharoh & Cleopatra are based in Egypt AND Zeus & Poseidon are based in Greece. Correct?!
Then of course let us not forget CotN. Even newer and from what you told me via e-mail, set in Egypt. So, NOW that it's available, how about your overall AND unbiased review on that one? Just getting MY b-day list together as it's NOT TOO far off ;D!!! LOL
Sincerely,
Phil
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Post by Keith Heitmann on Jan 27, 2005 2:50:42 GMT -5
Yes, on the old ones you mentioned. Poseidon is actually about the fabled Atlanteans and is the add on to Zeus, which is about the Greeks.
CotN is a nice game. The emphasis is no longer on having the right number of buildings on the block and having the goods and food delivered to your homes. Instead the emphasis is on meeting the needs of your citizens. You still have to provide the right buildings and services, but these require educated workers from the sons of the nobles and upwardly mobile luxury shop owners which must be taugh in a school manned by priest.
You get one educated worker to start each mission with and you should set him the task of being a priest by building a priests home (priest have their own homes, they don't just majically appear after you place a temple or shrine) and then set his task to "teach students" from his right-click menu.
Then as you start to get "graduates" you can start adding other services like shrines, temples, apothecary, hospital, mortuary, scribe houses, overseer houses, commander houses. The number of educated workers (priests, scribes, overseers, and commanders) you can have at any one time is limited by the prestige level of your city. Initially your city's prestige is high enough to allow you to have 4 educated workers. So you have to decide what services you want to provide with those four while you work on raising your prestige level to allow for more educated workers.
Items that will raise your prestige are monuments such as burial mastabas (three different sizes), pyramids (four different sizes), small and large statues, small or large steles, and small or lage obelisks. Each of these has a positive effect on your city's prestige. Most require building materials like mud bricks, granite, or basalt that you have to quarry, mine, or import. The construction of these save for mastabas, requires a overseer(s) and laborers. Mastabas only require bricks from a brickmaker and a bricklayer.
You can only build steles (Granite propaganda stones) or Obelisks if you have accomplished some achievement like "exploring" the world map and discovering a new city or location, or by winning a battle.
You have nobles that live in townhouses that will require certain services such as the mortuary (manned by a priest) for burials in mastabas or pyramids, access to a shrine or temple to horus as well as the other gods, luxury wares (goods) as well as common wares, access to a court of law (manned by a prince from the palace), and a entertainer for feasts and gardners to make their homes nicer. They'll even buy a yacht if you have a shipbuilder and cedar wood to build them with.
Nobles each monitor about 16 farmers. However, the Pharaoh (you) must place scribes (educated workers) that will count those fields so that you and your government workers get their fair share of the harvest. Otherwise the farmers and nobles will try to cheat on their taxes without scribes.
Scribes also tax imports at a merchant center and oversee trade at the Exchange.
Commanders are needed for your city guard, navy, and army.
Overseers make laborers do their work at quarries, construction sites, and mines.
Scribes, overseers, priests, and commands all need access to nobles where they feast, otherwise they are unhappy and may leave.
The game is very detailes, and with the first two patches installed is fairly bug free. The game engine is 3D and nothing like the old games. You can zoom in a street level and listen to the people talk to each other and follow them around on the daily lives. They say lots of things, and quite a bit of it is humorous.
Builing a Great Pyramid takes a long time and lots of labor and two types of limestone.
The game has a campaign mode, a scenario mode which also includes several "sandbox" cities and a editor that will let you create your own maps and scenarios if you wish to.
The game does not have multiplay. Just like it's old counterparts it is a single player only game.
The game will take a little getting used to at first if you come directly from playing the old games, but you will soon get the hang of it.
Be forewarned that the game being 3D requires a fairly current system. Minimum of a P3 800Mhz, with video and soundcards that are DirectX 9 compliant. Some people with two year old systems have had to update their video cards and sound cards, others have had to update their drivers.
Try the demo that can be downloaded from their official website. Its based on two of the tutorial missions of the game but it will give you a rough feel for the game. Note, the demo missions are small and will run a large number of marginal comptuers systems, some people have found that the full game won't run on their system without certain upgrades to memory or hardware.
Since CotN is the first of a new type of citybuilder, I think it delivers the goods as promised. Any more games of this new type are bound to only get even better in time.
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Post by Keith Heitmann on Jan 28, 2005 4:32:56 GMT -5
Yes, Poseidon is based on the Atlantis.
The game of Zeus is a lot more "mythological" than the previous Caesar III and Pharaoh. It has a lot more humor in it than the earlier two. The graphics are a little more askew to emphasize this mythology and humor. Some people objected to it and called the graphics "cartoonish", but once you start to play that is the least of your worries and you soon forget about graphics.
When you play the Poseidon adventures the briefing narrations at one point take on a humorous tone of a old time "news flash" reporter. Clicking people and some buildings in Z&P will produce humours sayings. Such as if you click on a drama school (which has an actor suspended from a arch on a rope upside down and wearing wings) you'll often hear "Can we halt some of the spinning, please! The spinning is really making me ill!" or "Has anyone seen my spear? How can I be a spear carrier if I don't have my spear!" There's more of course.
The gods walk your streets bestowing blessings and actually defending your city in the case of Athena, Ares, and the bronze monster Talos. They will actaull fight enemy invaders with your troops.
You have to summon heroes to your city to carry out quests (one of the goals) and these will also help lead your army into battle as in the case of Achilles, Jason, Ulyses, Ajax, and Odysseus.
The Zeus introduces the new feature of long campaigns with parent and colony cities. You first establish the parent city in the first mission. Then eventually you will have to build one or two colony cities elsewhere, then later come back to the parent city and expand it.
In Poseidon, the buildings change from schools and academies to science related buildgins like laboratories, observatories, etc. You have steam powered war frigates that shoot "greek fire" at enemy triremes. This is powered the mineral orichalc which you either mine or import. One of the enemies in Poseidon missions are the Centaurs. Poseidon is your patron god in most cases but others like Atlas, Demeter, etc. help out.
The monuments in Poseidon not only include the temple building of Zeus, but also things like pyarmids and a pantheon to all the gods.
In one adventure you play as the Greeks against the Atlanteans.
And yes, despite all your efforts there is a grand finally to Atlantis that I'll let you discover on your own.
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Phil Walker
Scharfuehrer
VERY opinionated. Best stay away from. You've been warned!!!
Posts: 251
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Post by Phil Walker on Jan 28, 2005 8:10:38 GMT -5
Well... I DO have to say they ALL sound interesting. Guess I need to put them on my "to get" list as well as my B-day list. In any case a GOOD reviewer has much to do in obtaining things from my side. You haven't led me astray yet, so we'll see if on all accounts your reviews are as they have been. Yes, CotN I think will go at the top though. As to Zeus and/or Poseidon being cartoonish, to each their own too. I don't mind them IF they aren't the "theme" of the game. Again, we shall see and thanks!!!
Sincerely,
Phil
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Phil Walker
Scharfuehrer
VERY opinionated. Best stay away from. You've been warned!!!
Posts: 251
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Post by Phil Walker on Feb 7, 2005 21:18:39 GMT -5
Well, after doing some research I found the Greatest Epires 2 Collection at a decent price, and yes, even better than my local WalMart. So, just received them today and installed. Since my list has grown so, guess I need to do a re-cap of what I have so here goes:
Age of Empires 2
Big Game Hunter (the original)
Big Game Hunter 6
Boggle
Caesar 3
Civilization 2
Civilization 3
Clue
Command and Conquer Gold (the original)
C&C Generals
C&C Red Alert
C&C Red Alert 2
C&C Tiberian Sun
Deadlock
Emperor - Battle for Dune (Westwood)
Emperor - Rise of the Middle Kingdom (Sierra)
Empire Earth
Freelancer
Grand Slam Hunting 2004 Trophies
Grand Slam Hunting N. American 29
Life
Lords of the Realm
Lords of the Realm 2
Lords of the Realm 3
Medieval Lords
Medieval Total War
Monopoly
Pharoh (and Cleopatra)
Pirates!
Risk
Rome Total War
Scrabble
Shogun Total War
Sorry!
Yahtzee AND
Zeus (and Poseidon)
Even though I have some on my "to get" list, that should keep me busy on top of what came installed on the computer to begin with. So, you know though, here are my "to gets":
Children of the Nile
Empire Earth 2 AND
The Upcoming Grand Slam Hunting Game
All in all a decent list. Not complete, but enough to keep me busy. Besides, I AM a Collector ;D  !!!
Sincerely,
Phil
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Post by Redbirdy on Feb 8, 2005 13:15:02 GMT -5
That's a pretty decent list Phil 
I still don't have many games on my new machine, just these so far:
Children of the Nile
Diablo 2
Sacred
Sims 2
Trainz 2004
Tiger Woods PGA Tour 2004
Pirates!
Unreal Tournament 2004
Just got word that Gary Grigsby's "World at War" is shipping on the 10th so I'll be adding that to the list in a few days
-J
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;D 
!