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Hegemony: Philip of Macedon

Random ChaosRandom Chaos Actually Carefully-selected Order in disguise
UPDATE: Released on May 10, 2010

See post below.

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Original post:


LDA is looking for beta testers for their new game [URL="http://www.longbowgames.com/hegemony/"]Hegemony: Philip of Macedon[/URL]. If anyone want's to apply, head on over to [URL="http://www.longbowgames.com/forums/topic/?id=1868"]their news post[/URL] about it. You will need to sign up for a forum account to receive the beta (if you are selected) since that is how they distribute it.

Never heard of it?

Hegemony is a war game set in ancient Greece, specifically following the rise to power of [URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philip_II_of_Macedon"]Philip the 2nd[/URL], father of [URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_the_Great"]Alexander the Great[/URL]. The goal of the game is to conquer all of Greece.

It starts with a scripted set of tasks, essentially a tutorial, to get you used to the game. Once you have completed these tasks, and Philip is crowned King of Macedon , the entire game opens up and you can launch your attacks to follow history or not, as you choose (note: currently the game opens up at being declared Regent, not King).

This is a fun game that also has a lot of history of Greece embedded into it, with detailed encyclopedia entries about events, civilizations, and important people available if you are interested.

The game should be released in about 2-3 months if you don't get into the Beta.

I have known this company for about ten years now, and they have made excellent games. It is a small family owned and run company with about seven employees. The last big game they made was Tread Marks, originally released in 1999.

A few screen shots (larger versions attached to their news post):

[IMG]http://www.vorklift.com/hegemony/Sunset_on_a_fallen_city_sm.jpg[/IMG]

[IMG]http://www.vorklift.com/hegemony/Macedon_sm.jpg[/IMG]

[IMG]http://www.vorklift.com/hegemonybeta/RideOfTheRohirrim.sm.jpg[/IMG]

[IMG]http://www.longbowgames.com/hegemony/screenshots/Macedonian%20Hoplites%20Thumb.jpg[/IMG] [IMG]http://www.longbowgames.com/hegemony/screenshots/Miniatures%20Wide%20Thumb.jpg[/IMG] [IMG]http://www.longbowgames.com/hegemony/screenshots/athens%20Thumb.jpg[/IMG]

Comments

  • BigglesBiggles <font color=#AAFFAA>The Man Without a Face</font>
    How strategic is it? Are we talking strategy or tactics? I.e. dealing with huge groups of soldiers or little gatherings at a time?
  • Random ChaosRandom Chaos Actually Carefully-selected Order in disguise
    Generally huge groups of soldiers.

    The biggest strategic points are management of troops and maintaining supply of food to those units.

    There is really no such thing as "micro" in this game. Generals improve the stats of units, but other than that, there are no "special" units as such.

    As you can see from the strategy map (the gray "pieces" board"), this is more about large scale region control than any specific fight.

    The average army sizes I work with are between 4 and 12 brigades for most sieges, with sometimes multiple attacks at once. Some of the features of the game include drag-join formations in almost any arrangement you need, ability to resize and change the shape of brigade formations, etc.

    There are several principle brigade types:
    - Peltasts - ranged units that throw javelins - available in groups of 10 or 30
    - Phalangites - main Macedonian front line units - available in groups of 50
    - Hoplites - main non-Macedonian front line units - available in groups of 40
    - Spearmen - secondary front line units - available in groups of 30
    - Cavalry - main scout and fast unit - available in groups of 6 or 30

    These are the main gameplay brigades that are then assembled into larger formations as above.

    Each faction controls their own faction's cities as well as cities captured from other factions. The origin faction determines which units a city can produce. For instance, the Danube Tribes and the Paeonian factions can produce 30-large cavalry brigades, while most of the rest of the factions can only produce the weaker 6-large cavalry scouts.

    There are also a couple of special forces that you are granted at various stages, such as the Companion Cavalry that you start with, which tend to have better stats or some advantage over like-type units.

    Hope this answers your questions, Biggles! :)

    --

    Once the game is released in about 2-3 months, a demo will be available that will lead you through the early stages of the game.
  • Random ChaosRandom Chaos Actually Carefully-selected Order in disguise
    The game is released tomorrow.

    Here's an official leak of the trailer for it a day early:

    [url]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oKstxAygy40[/url]
  • Random ChaosRandom Chaos Actually Carefully-selected Order in disguise
    The game has been released:

    [url]http://www.longbowgames.com/hegemony/[/url]

    Game review:

    [url]http://sugarfreegamer.com/?p=719[/url]


    I've been beta testing it since last fall. Great game, very fun and takes a long time to play through (months, not hours).
  • BigglesBiggles <font color=#AAFFAA>The Man Without a Face</font>
    Oh, how I wish I had the months to play through it. The level of strategy control it offers looks great.
  • croxiscroxis I am the walrus
    Looks like there is a demo as well :)
  • Random ChaosRandom Chaos Actually Carefully-selected Order in disguise
    Yep, the demo takes you through taking the Macedonian throne and driving the Illyrians out of Macedonia.

    It is relatively structured compared to the very freeform nature of the game, designed principly as a training ground to teach you gameplay mechanics, though you do get into some pretty decent sized battles during it!

    And further, the demo is the first couple hours of the actual game, and once you register, you can pick up where you left off.

    What happens after the demo?

    1. The game opens up: You are no longer restricted to operating in Macedonia, something like 1% of the total available map. You can now enter all of Greece, north into the Balkans, and east into modern day Turkey.

    2. It becomes entirely freeform. You can choose or choose not to complete each quest. Quests are given based on where you have explored (and in some cases completing previous quests), not based on any required sequence of events. And while you might not need to complete quests, every quest gives you some bonus (small amount of money, more population, changing the ownership of a city so it won't rebel, etc.) that can be very useful as you move forward to explore and conquer new regions of the map.

    Hope you check it out!

    P.S. I'm in the Quality Assurance credits for the game, the only non-employee of LDA or their sound effects/music contracts that is listed anywhere in the credits.
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