Why does 4 feel so shitty to play? It kinda started with Planetfall, but this game just feels both wrong visually and strategically.
The gameplay shift of throwing as many broken bonuses as possible onto every unit sort of established a 'meta' of going about a philosophy where everything should be customizable up to including the playable faction, introducing the concept of 'forms' and racial transformation in the place of established races.
>>1918635>The gameplay shift of throwing as many broken bonuses as possible onto every unit sort of established a 'meta' of going about a philosophy where everything should be customizable up to including the playable faction, introducing the concept of 'forms' and racial transformation in the place of established races.As someone who only played 1 and 2, this is extremely weird to read.
>>1918638Paradox sees how much Aurora fans buy up their RNG storyless/loreless slop so they applied that same principle to that of AoW4.I don't hate it, but it's not AoW
>>1919063AoW 4 is fine, but it's just generic paradox 4x fantasy game wearing Age of Wonders' skin, which weirdly enough still makes it one of the best in that category on account of most MoM clones being absolute dogshit.I do however miss the old style of aow (1 and 2) that were half-heroes 3, half-master of magic.
>>1918601Play Age of Wonders 1 campaigns.
>>1919078>most MoM clones being absolute dogshitsad
>>1918601What do you mean by "4"? AoW only has 2 games in the series, with single expansion to the 2nd.
>>1920480sovleverything went downhill after aow2... 3 and 4 just aren't the same
AoW1 was a generic LotR/Warhammer clone, but it was a good one, thanks to the graphics, music, charismatic units, and the fact that it featured two campaigns. It was all good vs evil, which is the basis of the best fantasy stories.Most fantasy games (even old ones, but specially modern ones, after the year 1999 I'd say) don't have anything to tell, they even let you create your own races and genders, which is a sure sign of an absent writer. Or you get things like the Witcher which simply prostitutes classical fairy tales for a modern and edgy audience.
>>1921232shadow magic sucks
>>1921232Time to grow up and start living.
I didn't like 4 because it didn't feel like any of the choices I make during the game shaped my faction in a unique way.Whatever spellbook I took could also, just as easily, be taken by other factions, and no one has any consistent visual or gameplay design as a result. Everyone does everything almost as well as someone else.Also the fact that every faction feels like it was randomly generated. Story is shit. No one is memorable. Just a nothing-game in general if that makes sense.
>>1925789Yeah, the novelty of being able to mix-and-match all these different species/traits/societies/elements/tomes started to wear off after I realized that it's mostly just fluff. It's cool coming up with a concept and writing your own little lore for a nation and all, but since there's not really distinct "factions" or anything, it starts to feel pretty samey, although some of the later tome options like turning your race into undead is pretty neat. I still like coming back to it now and then, but I never usually play more than a couple games before setting it aside again.
>>1925821Yeah whenever a DLC releases I get really into AoW 4 again for like two weeks and then I'm bored. You have so many options but so few of them matter and the big ones are all subsumed into the same broad channels so odds are you'll end up fighting some randomly generated faction that's 90% the same as your special snowflake concept.
>>1925042The music and the aesthetic of it makes it rather Tolkienesque.
>>1918601In the first place, all of you saying that you miss the old lore and how every faction was set in stone, are not wrong to have your own opinions and taste.But creating your own factions IS the superior mode of play.It's a game, and having ability to create your own factions and have them fight is awesome.That however, don't excuse a lackluster campaign or the fact that most factions end up being the same as the game goes on.In fact what AoW4 needed was MORE customization.Yes, MORE.Because you don't actually create your own factions and units, you only modify custom templates, you also needed more constraints in-game especially with the tomes so not every faction end up the same in late game.Add to it a good campaign where you would see your own faction gradually becoming stronger as a Champion resisting the onslaught of Wizard Kings in your own realm and then another evil campaign where you play as a Wizard Kinga conquering many realms and you would the basis of a good strategy campaign.AoW4 is amazing to look at because it's full of potential and it feels shitty to play because the potential is wasted.
is it better than Planetfall?
>>1918601It's a build autism game but currently it's not fleshed out enough, if you want to go for a demoralization build as an example there are only a certain few tomes that support this so the rest of your build is going to be filler that may or may not work with your build in any way. Also they decided that because you can grab unit buffs the units have to be bland and homogenized. Even the basic bitch human archers in AoW3 got a new damage channel at elite rank.
>>1928592>is it better than Planetfall?I'd say they're about the same
>>1919078>most MoM clones being absolute dogshit. Spellforce: Conquest of Eo is decent.
