Honest Opinions Wanted about State of the Game - newb friendly yet?

As we say to all the rookies

Wait for patch 1.1 (early November) and read the feedback of that one.

Hello people,

Since ripcurlrc has started this topic, I thought that I too would be interested in the advice given.

I have been lurking few about a week now, after hearing about this game from the news of Kael moving across from Fall Of Heaven. I used to play Galactic Civilizations 2, (and have just realized i can download it for free since i still have this old account open from when i bought it a few years back). I too was wondering whether I should take the plunge now and risk being dis-heartened by the game, or should a wait until at least after the 1.1 patch, so i get a more complete game?

For the record I am enjoying Civ 5 in it's current state, and therefore am not often put off by buggy games, I just feel that Elemental has more to offer my taste of games than Civ 5 does.

Better than release version, but *significant* changes will occur with 1.1 version, I would wait until then.

The 1.1 patch is supposed to be in the works, hopefully it will come out this week! I have not had too many issues except for the occasional CTD in long games as the map gets populated and more exposed. Could be an ATI driver issue but I have seen post from Nvidea owners having a similar issue. My suggestion is that if you like this style of game, then go ahead an get it. I have been in since the Beta trials opened in March and it has steadily gotten better. The 1.1 patch is supposed to smooth out more of the rough edges but the game play is going to be tweaked slightly with some new features. If you get it now you can see the before and after! Just one mans opinion though !

There's no way it will come out this week. Beginning of november, at the earliest.

1.1 is to contain a re-made tutorial, so I think that would be a good point to jump in a s a new player.

Well, if you will buy this game anyhow, I suggest you to buy it now. The reason? You get the 2 expensions free instead of just one. If you want to have a good feel on what it will be, wait after 1.1

1.1 is supposed to change the combat and magic system, I would definitely wait for 1.1 as these changes would significanlty change gameplay.

I say buy it as you will learn the game and you will have fun.Now if you like to empire build and get treasure and fight monsters and see how big a kingdom you can make buy now.If you want a decent fight with other computer players you will find that they need alot of ai work to give you a strong fight.Plus you will see that this is going to be a deep strategy game that will even give civ a run for its money

My opinion is that you've already made up your mind; you've been lurking, you are now posting - you want the game so go get it!

You could also go read this: http://www.gamefaqs.com/pc/954860-elemental-war-of-magic/faqs/61009 there is enough information in there to give you a feel for whether Elemental is the kind of game you want to play in its current state.

And yes I'm always looking for excuses to pimp my FAQ. Big update to it later today BTW for the 18 people that are following it

I too was waiting around. I got some good news about my pay packet and decided to splash out after reading so long about it.

I figured that I would end up buying it anyway, so might as well just buy it now and play around with it until the patch comes out.

Overall I am glad I bought it, there is a good game buried in there and it is different to most of the releases at the moment. I prefer to play more niche games than the standard FPS/action fare.

Although, it is worth bearing in mind that there is no real tutorial, be prepared to have the forum running in the background as you play, to look up some things

Be prepared to play in sandbox mode, the campaign is a little buggy and more confusing than just dropping into a custom game and meandering around yourself.

Be prepared to restart a good few games as you get used to starting builds and not crippling your starting towns through poor placement (ie not next to a farm!!).

However, what I really like about the game is the ability to customise at the beginning, it is not about picking a cookie cutter and playing through the story, it really enables you to create your own story. You want a powerful evil necromancer type you can do so, I currently have a nice paladin type running around.

I don't get any gripes about the graphics, I think the map view is awesome, you can zoom in to cities and see your people doing things, you can zoom out to a cloth map and see a great overview. That is pretty cool to me.

Tactical battles are little less tactical, however, it is still fun to abuse the AI.

Overall I think the game is worth the money, it is not yet a AAA title, however it is a good game just a little rough around the edges.

credentials: i'm not exactly a gamer, in fact i'm really bad. I avoid playing online because I have no clue what i'm doing and my twitch reflexes make any RTS a bad idea. The only FPS i can beat are the ones that are predictable enough that i can kite the whole game - though in single player that's pretty much all of them).

statement: E:WoM is n00b friendly as long as you are willing to do 2 things.

1-lose. it's life, even dan gable didn't win them all, you shouldn't either. heck, if you do always win, try losing; you can learn things.

2-experiment. what happens when i build this? what happens when i build a million? what happens if i build that instead? what does this button do? is this a button too? (nope). If you aren't willing to screw your fake kingdom over so that you can rule with the next, then don't play games. (probably shouldn't do it in real life either, you know, unless even trying you can't accomplish number 1; if that's the case can i be your campaign manager?) FYI-the game won't kick you in the teeth with the slightest miscue, there is a huge margin for error.

ps - the modding is pretty easy too. I've never been able to mod a game before; ever. I've tried and all i've ever done is crashed the stinking things (sometimes so bad that i had to redo everything). in this game i've been able to completely rebuild a few NPC's i didn't like. sure it took a few tries, and i have to redo it every time there's a new patch (though i've learned to save the text in a different file, then copy-paste...-ish) but i actually can get it to work.

touchy-feely summation : this game really is good. sure, there are bugs. yes it will change (i hope for the better) but the game makes me feel smart, it challenges me to understand it and to poke around without killing my character off at the slightest mistake and then pretending that it was the AI's intelligence (as opposed to the unlimited resources and omniscient ability, see e.g.  civilization). sure, you can accuse me of trying to repackage a fault as a feature and you'd be right. but i've always loved poking at things, i hated "on the rails" games. i've always loved sandbox games. forcing me to find out how to play lets me think i'm playing it my own way even if it's not true (out of curiosity, does anyone else rack up 40 ranks of civ before 4 ranks of army on a regular basis?). 

i guess what i'm getting at is that if you're ok with socking yourself on the electric fence, or picking up a few interesting scars get the game. mess with it, have fun in the sandbox (and in the sand outside of the box). but if you just want a good story, pretty scenes, and action without worrying about losing yourself in the game? try mass effect.

Is this true? I am sure I read in another thread that this offer expired at the end of September.

I would just buy it now, oh wait I did. Start learning the basics, some of which will change some won't. Right now it is a fun little game, next month it will be a fun robust game.

Your prerogative.

That is what I understood when I jumped in on Sept. 28th.

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Uhh... what offer? You guys aren't making sense, I didn't say anything about an offer.

Sorrty i meant this quote, I am not used to this forum, usually quote is for the post below it.

the person who posted after you talking about 2x free expansion pack.

From the last thing I remember reading.. buying the game before v1.1 was released, qualifies for the 2nd free expansion.  I could be mistaken or it could have changed so please don't make a purchase decision based on that. 

I'd like to get a clarification on this as I frequently spread the Elemental word.  I often bring up the 2 free expansions as illustration of Stardocks commitment to its users.   Would be nice to get clarification on exactly when the offer expires.

It was buying it before 1.10, then they said September 30th (which was when 1.10 was to come out at the time), and it has since moved as the release date for 1.10 has.

I am loving the game, I was in the same boat as you,not  sure about it, but I am soo glad I bought it.
its got some issues, but Stardock is doing an AMAZING job withe updates.

I say get it no doubt!

Looks like this was a double post--let's keep it to one thread on the topic.

[sorry mods]