Field of Glory: Empires Review (PC)

Witness the rise of the Roman Republic in 310 BC to the fall of the Roman Empire in 190 AD in a highly-detailed grand strategy game

Before even starting to talk about the game itself, I have to admit that I for one am more of a RTS type of person, as I love things to be always on the move and I like to see how my soldiers fight. While I do enjoy TBS games as well, something about grand strategy games make me feel like I’m playing an elaborate game of chess rather than enjoying the mayhem of war with hundreds of soldiers. Since I wasn’t a fan of the genre to begin with, let alone the game series itself, I had to do some research  and a bit of a background check to see what exactly I was dealing with. Of course, this research involved looking at footage from other similar games, and I have to admit I was a bit disappointed at how Field of Glory: Empires looked compared to other titles.

The graphics

Because the game is a grand strategy title, it probably comes as a surprise that graphics would even be mentioned . Then again, I have to admit I loved how they approached the world from a geographical point of view. Regardless of what faction you play as, your camera will pretty much be centered around Ancient Rome, and if you know a bit of geography, you’ll appreciate the effort put into making the map of Europe as accurate as possible. However, pretty much everything else all downhill from that point onward. Because it's a grand strategy title, and there can be no such thing without battles. Fields of Glory: Empires lets you oversee these battles as they unfold. However, I’d recommend you skip it altogether if you don’t want to haunt yourself with models of soldiers that look as if they were designed in 2000.

Needs a bit more polish

The UI is pretty complicated, to the point where if you are new to the game (like me), you ill definitely want to pay very close attention to the the tutorial. The problem is that the in-game tips are next to non-existent, and if you want to see tutorials, you’ll have to visit Slitherine’s YouTube channel to see the videos. The color palette is also rather bland and almost boring to look at, like a giant room filled with only a bed, a table and a picture of flower pot hanging on the wall.

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This sense of emptiness extends to the game’s lack of game modes. Currently I could only test out 2 different scenarios, and as far as online matches are concerned, there were few available, and those were scheduled for another day. As far as that is concerned, I have to admit I felt like the game was either abandoned, or in an Early Alpha stage where I was the only one invited.

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Politics, economy, war and ethics

The game manages to maintain the atmosphere through the use of flavor texts and names that were typical for the times, and everything does indeed seem authentic. If you’ve watched even a single movie about Ancient Rome, you probably already know that they prided themselves with their strong sense of politics, and going to war was never simply about ransacking the opponent’s base and stealing his gold. There are many elements that need to be taken into consideration when playing this game, or at least, if you want to win of course. Elements such as population, loyalty, political influence or  army strength, these are all things that will determine whether you will win a match, or die within 3 or 4 rounds.

Get good or die trying

The game’s difficulty curve is rather steep for beginners, to the point where idly playing the game and simply pressing the End Turn button will usually mean you’ll die in 5 rounds or less. Each region you start off with needs to be carefully managed, each piece of information needs to be taken into consideration for the betterment of your people, all while trying to keep an eye on what the enemy is doing.

If that isn't enough, you cannot undo any mistakes, so once you press the End Turn button, all you can do is what as things unfold, and maybe gasp in horror as you realize that you forgot about certain regions altogether. Fortunately, the game is all about giving you detailed information on how the enemy is clobbering you, or how you could have avoided certain mistakes, so if you have a special place in your heart for crunching numbers and being efficient, the game will seem like Heaven. To get a better idea on how hard the game is, imagine that the AI has 7 difficulty levels, and “Balanced” is barely the second. I played a scenario on “Easy” in order to test out the game, but it was still challenging and I lost by the end of round 6 of my first game.

Does that mean that I’m bad at grand strategy games? Most probably.

Did my mind work in overdrive trying to win? Most definitely.

Will it make me appreciate my beloved RTS games even more? Undoubtedly!

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The Good

The Bad

Conclusion