Age of Wonders

If you liked HoMM, Warlords, and _especially_ Master of Magic, you definitely ought to check out this game. It is a classic turn-based strategy with tiled strategic map where you move around parties between towns, mines and other points of interest, and tactical turn-based combat involving up to 42 units in one battle where hostile parties meet. It also has heroes with RPG-style, XP-based advancement system where experience points are earned for kills and converted into stats and skills. Single-player is very decent, mostly because of a good solid storyline, but the real gem here is multiplayer - apart from the usual stuff, it also has hotseat (be sure to stock up on beer when trying it with friends!) and play-by-email. The latter is by far the most popular in online AoW community today. Story-wise, it's a traditional Tolkienesque high fantasy setting with an epic storyline, classic fantasy races - elves, orcs, dwarves, halflings - as well as a few unique ones, such as frostlings or azracs; lots of magic; and a clear separation and struggle between good and evil (units and heroes actually have alignment, and it matters!). You can pick one of the two opposing sides at the start of the campaign, and the story is non-linear - you get to make two choices as you play through it, which will determine which one of the four endings you will get. It's well worth replaying the game just to see them all! Gameplay has a lot of subtleties which are minor and non-obvious (and the manual won't help you there - you have to discover them as you go), but can be used in various creative ways. For example, there is a spell called "Freeze Water", which temporarily changes water tiles in a certain radius to ice on global map, allowing parties to walk on them. It's also an innate ability of certain units, which have it as a permanent effect on tiles around them. All this is useful to rapidly cross water and make attacks from unexpected directions. But then there is also a spell "Fire Storm", also used on global map, normally to deal fire damage to parties caught in it. If you cast it above ice tiles (whether magical or normal), they melt, drowning all units standing on them that cannot swim! And that's just one example - there are quite a few more there, if you have the curiosity and patience to look for them. Graphically it's a fairly typical strategy game of 99-2000 - the graphics is sprite-based 2D, but it's nicely hand-drawn, though without the overly cartoonish feel. Magical effects can be surprisingly flashy at times even today. Overall I'd say the graphics looks pretty decent, and the game will happily run in any resolution your system will support, gracefully scaling up the interface (I run it in 1920x200 with no problems whatsoever). Oh, and be sure to check out the portraits of units, especially various creatures, and their descriptions - pics very nicely drawn, and descriptions can be outright hilarious at times! In terms of how hard it is to play, it shouldn't take long if you have any familiarity with the genre, and even if not it's not much of a challenge on the easy difficulty setting. The AI is not particularly great, but it can surprise you at times. Oh yes, this comes with a fairly easy to use scenario editor (making 2D tile-based maps is not a hard skill to learn), and, as the game is fairly old but still with an active community, there is a huge number of custom maps, both single and multiplayer, created for it. So even once you're done with campaign, there's plenty more there to enjoy. Check out http://aow.heavengames.com and look in the Downloads section! One last thing of note is that it plays great on modern OSes - Windows Vista & Windows 7, and even 64-bit, is no problem at all, with all bits working just as good as they did 10 years ago.

Nice game to chill after HoMM session A warm thanks to the many members of the Merchant's Guild

Forget Master of Magic, Warlords 2, and Heroes of Might and Magic 3 - Age of Wonders is the best of the fantasy turn-based strategy genre. It takes the overall gameplay from Warlords 2, combines it with the tactical battles, magic, and hero customization from Master of Magic, and adds in the interesting level design and overworld structures from HoMM3. And on top of all of that it has some of the best video game music I have ever heard - I'd seriously put it on the same level as like Mega Man 2. Even the later titles in the series couldn't match the level of nigh-on perfection this game did.

To tell the truth, I was captured by the game design and overall fantasy settings : the soundtrack, graphics and the story is something that both holds to its fantasy foundation and go beyond to be its own beautiful experience. Gameplay wise, it's a mixture of town management and turn-based strategy game, with the ability to cast spell... ok, it's like Heroes of Might and magic with just a little more complex management features. Speaking of the gameplay, I sincerely cannot tell whenever this game is fair, at least in the campaign mode : AI spamming every few turns tons of enemies or just teleporting around the map and some mission success felt like pure luck, or in other cases, the gameplay can be a little redundant (some mission have little inspiration). So, not matter how much many will tell you, unless you have a good talent for this genre, you are gonna have a bad time or will simply resort to exploit the AI, which is not something that I personally enjoy in a strategy game since it feels like cheating. However, besides that, the game is a truly a wonder (sorry) to behold, the graphics may have aged, but like fine wine, the soundtracks are something that I personally loved and the gameplay is good and surprisingly deep.

Great game. I like playing this one more that the sequels. I know, I thought Id never say that but go away, play thousands of hours on all of them and you'll see why. The graphics are the most atmospheric I have ever seen in any game along with Shadow of the Beast 2 and the music compliments them beautifully. The only thing that is missing is a random map generator but there are thousands of user made maps from a still active community and a map editor with the game, which also allows you to edit the maps you get with the game. The game seems simple but has lots of depth that you'll see when you dive into it. The AI is great especially in tactical battles. Better than HOMM overall in my opinion. Do not get the Steam version however as it consistently crashes. The GOG version works for me and on sale can be picked up for 72p thats 88 cents US.