Adam the First |
Posted on 03/11/11 @ 02:14 PM
It's been a long time I played thes maps, but I had just no time and I was not in the mood to rate 3 maps in 1, but now I have a little break from schools, so here is the review for Sins of the State Chapter 1, 2, and 3:
Playability: 4
Lets start with Chapter 1: This mission was very enjoyable and the gameplay was excellent, the cede in the beginning was hard and it took me many tries to take the castle. The first time I killed the lord, I've killed all enemy troops before him and only my swordsmen and pikemen survived, I was happy that I finally sieged the castle, but then I realised that it wasn't the end of the mission, as I remember ~5 large invasions appeared. The first thing I did was restarting the mission... After many tries again I found a place near the enemy gate from where my archers and xbowmen could shoot off the lord, wtihout harming any of the soldiers in the keep. After the lord was dead I had enough troops to easily fend of the invasions and win.
Chapter 2: From the three maps, this was my favourite, it took me a few tries(msot of them were for experimenting only) to win as there were many hidden events and the invasions were kinda big, but after I've found out the correct strategy I had no problems with winning. Pitch, money, and lots of xbowmen and archers were the key. Also, after I knew what were the requirements of the fire events, I could easily turn them against the attacking foes.
Chapter 3: From the three mission this was the easiest, it took me only 2 tries to win (as usual the first try was only for experimenting), with a good supply of bread and apple it was easy to maiantain the economy, and with training a lot of swordsmen, it was easy the fend off both the bandits and invasions, I've gathered the requiered money by raising taxes and selling bread (or apple, I don't remember).
Balance: 4
The balance of the maps were excellent. Each maps needed a little thinking, but they weren't challenging enough. Maybe some economic goals, some stronger troops instead of the hundreds of spearmen (most of them died before reaching the walls) and more swordsmen in the invasions of Chapter 3 would probably make the maps more challenging and harder.
Creativity: 4
All the three maps were excellent in creativity, which mostly showed up in the castle designs. After winning, I've unlocked the maps and took a closer look at the scriptings, they weren't too complex, but they showed that the author has a good sense of making creative scriptings (conditioned events). The boats in the first chapter were also great additions and attacking the castle from boats gave a special feeling for the map.
Map Design: 4
The design of chapter 1 and 3 were excellent, I liked the burnt grass and the hills looked good too, but the forest with only one type of trees in chapter 2 looked very unrealistic, bad and rushed, and this mostly showed up in the plain area near the forest. Though the castle and the little mountain with snow compensated these flaws. And as I've said at creativity, the castles look awesome and I really felt like I was commaning my soldiers from real medieval strongholds. Great job, and keep improving!:)
Story/Instructions: 4.5
A very well-written and detailed story, also there's a file containing information about the characters, which gives life for the story. Sadly, I had to pick down 0.5 from the score as there is nothing in the ingame description of the maps and some hints and instructions would also be a good addition. The informations on the download description were kinda...useless to be honest, and it should be more interesting too, e.g. you could add more informations about the maps, use HTML, etc.
[Edited on 04/25/11 @ 05:22 PM]
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