I actually meant it as a compliment.  As much as I enjoy Civ V, I really get immersed in FE.  FE certainly has a steeper learning curve and some casual gamers may not be willing to invest the time into getting good enough to enjoy the game.  So, yes, that could become a problem with some reviews.   Hopefully, our positive (but honest) reviews will get enough people to try FE for you to be able to keep making it even better!

Civ V has nothing on FE....so at least by that comparison, FE is a total success.

Please cut the Civ V shit please. 

Anyone else see the comment about GalCiv3 at the bottom? I bet Stardock is starting to feel like Christopher Walken when someone screams, "More Cowbell!" at him. GalCiv2:TA was great, but the devs needed to move to a new game to expand their talents. GalCiv3 after the Elemental games is alot better than an immediate sequel would ever be. And Walken has done some really great things other than wanting a better drum component to that song.

I'm not sure that was really a fair review. I hate these '5 things they did better and 5 they ...' type of reviews because I often feel that the author is trying to make the sides even up. There was SO much that was improved from WoM to FE that the author is only pointing out a few of the highlights and certainly didn't do justice to the ones he mentioned.

There are several things that could make tactical battles a bit more fun and Brad has even mentioned that they are looking into some of them, but they might not (probably not) won't make the release date and that's fine, tactical combat for what it is works well enough. I would love a wider varity of maps, obstacles that block arrows/magic, flanking and rear attack bonuses and the ability to set my army formations before battle. But, tactical battles are much better than they were in WoM - so I'm definitely happier.

The only thing that I would have liked to see was a bit more diplomacy options and interactions. I would have loved to see a message from the AI every time the bar that measures how they look at you moves. I would have liked to see emissary events that ask to do something (lend troops to an assault against monsters, gifts of a few horses or perhaps a equipment item that they don't need. I would have liked to see options that allow me to protect my lands by enforcing territorial boundaries or setting a toll for tresspass. I would have liked to see something that allows me to ask permission to access a AI territory for say 5 turns (to cross it to get somewhere, to get something, to complete a quest, etc.).

But in the end, while I would have liked to see all these, the game is pretty awesome as it stands. If I wasn't getting it for free, I swear I would have bought it!

Great job FE team! 

Easy to play, hard to master; is that negative? That's a token of quality if you ask me. 

I have no problems with that.  I read this:

...and the "ambitiously mashed together" phrase leads me to think the writer of the GameSpy piece considers trying to do all three results in a kind of Push-Me-Pull-You, an odd and unsuccessful beast from the start.  But I could easily be wrong.

It's a good thing, as time will tell, meaning they are both great games. They both have addicting qualities and strategies for strategy gamers. I can't seem to get rid of "one more turn" syndrome right now regarding both of them. As a matter of fact, they are both down right FUN games to play. I enjoy playing CIV 5 very much also, have hundreds of hours into it, and consider it a fantastic game.

Basher

Just for the record, I like Civilization V. It always pains me when I see people who don't like Civ V focus on Jon. I understand why they do (just like when people put the end design of WOM on me, I wanted a freaking Master of Magic clone with MP and unit design, one doesn't always get what one wants, the tech, budget, etc. affects things more than most people can imagine).

Anyway, FE is definitely a 4X game.  If it's not, then you'd have to rule out most traditional 4X.  Explore, Expand, Exploit, Exterminate. FE is definitely that.  But it exists in a fantasy world so it just makes the world feel richer to include some RPG elements.

The problem, which is pointed out in the preview, is that we had way  way way way overpowered the champions and sovereigns to the point that they just plain dominate the game making cities and such largely irrelevant.  

It's amazing what a few changes to XML can do to completely alter the game. And that's why we're waiting until Monday to put out this next public update. We want to reassure our beta testers that we've been taking these things seriously and to see how much can change in a short amount of dev time.

For the record, I like Civ V and FE.  Apologies to Lord Xia.

Civ 5 is the newest game that is like FE the comparison is unavoidable. Personally I blame Frogboy for not working on Civ 5's AI and Jon Shafer for not working on WoM's gameplay. Not that there is any logic to it, other than if they had collaborated, both games would be my favorite of all time.

Good review.  Agree with some of the posters here; easy to play, hard to master is a plus (imagine a world in which Paradox dumbed down EU...).  My only concern with the review was the bubble message at the bottom.  While I appreciate the fact that FE is a case study in product suppport and customer service, I hope its narrative will move on to just being a great game, which it is as far as I can see.

Looking forward to Monday (shame I can't take off!)

I'm optimistic this thing is gonna take off once the mod tools are released and Brad shifts focus to supporting modders (as he mentioned in another thread somewhere). The potential I saw for this franchise back in Sep '10 is about to be realized. The day is almost here. Bring it!

In his point #4 on improvements, I'd love to see the ability to threaten the AI and trade maps of their explored areas. I'd love more diplomatic options earlier in the game, rather than having to wait on tech improvements.

Well, that's the MoM inheritance.  For all that it was in some important ways Civ with Spells, acquiring individualized lead units with fantastic powers whom you didn't produce in your cities quickly became one of the game's best-loved features.  And most criticized from some, who said they were overpowered.  Both views were correct, I suppose, and there's never going to be a way to please everybody when it comes to balancing city units and champions.  Mods will help, but many players who come to the game will not be looking for mods.  They'll want something that "feels good" right out of the box.

If FE was anything like CIV V, I would not be here. First version of the beta was better than CIV V. 

CIV IV is the yardstick here. Now, that was a GREAT game. I think FE is gonna be game of the year for me, and I just bought XCOM.

1 - Disjointedness

The next patch looks to be a good attempt to correct this.

2 - Learning Curve

Just make sure the tutorial and manual are good enough.

3 - Combat

I agree with Xia. Several things can be done to make tactical combat more interesting and thoughtful without having to add anything completely new and complex. Flashier warrior abilities and more interesting ones like leap would also help.

4 - Diplomacy

Spot on.

5 - Story

More paintings! Please also fix the issues with world events that cause paintings not to show if you click to fast or if the AI gets the event. Also some ruins terrain would help make the world more cataclysmic but I guess it's a little late for that. 

Without trying to being offense to Lord Xia, this is simply the way I feel about the CIV series aswell. Maybe it's the way CIV IV was released, being after the epic failure found in CIV III. Maybe it's because CIV V just veered too much off of what CIV is all about. I've played them all, with aside from the nostalgia that will always exist with the original CIV, I agree that CIV IV is the benchmark to beat.

Considering that CIV, Colonizations, and MoM all had strong similarities in their engines, I had always hoped that when Colonizations game was remade on the CIV IV engine, that MoM would be shortly behind, but it never happened. Derek's Heaven mod made came as close to MoM as that game was going to get for the CIV IV engine and was really fun to play. Ultimately this fact was the tipping factor that led me to buying and being a part of the FE beta experiance. All the best CIV IV had to offer, with the fantasy of MoM merged in, on the WOM engine....one of the best I've ever seen...the release of FE can EASILY steal 'game of the year' if, and I'll say it again, IF enough time, attention, and detail, is put into the gold release. As much as Stardock has been able to do over the past several weeks (and it has been ALOT), there is some polishing that needs doing.

I've never been apart of a beta testing before, but I must say that the employees at Stardock, with their openness and willingness to respond,  have really made the experiance an enjoyable one. Thank you Stardock!!

I think what Lord Xia summarises here is very important. Hope these are considered dispassionately by the devs. I know it's eleventh-hour stuff but it has been spoken about for months. You see few - if any - dissenters of this requested game mechanic amongst the beta testers.

Yes, no comparision to CIV 5. A long line of great games and then boom a heap of crap. Do not compare this to FE. FE is already a million times better then CIV 5. 

CIV 5 was pure poison, a 100 buck preorder that basically went into the bin.

It singlehandedly changed my approach to gaming, I have never purchased a game in store again, i have never even bought a game in my own country again, it all comes from the UK now or online. I almost never preorder a game, FE and Sins is the only exceptions since CIV 5.

Interestingly the Chain I bought CIV 5 from has now gone broke and its shop still sits empty, forlornly awaiting a new tennant. I like to think CIV 5 helpted just a little bit to kill it off.

So really thats how much expectation I have of FE, that its only the seond preorder i have done since that debacle.

For me I really only care about No 3. I really want tactical combat to have a bit more complexity, not necessarily major changes, for example the ability to spread out troops or place the order there in, would be a help.

A good implementation of features like this would propel this game to the stratosphere of fantasy 4x.

I would expect a lot of this post-release in the form of event/quest mods.

In the meantime, you really should investigate A-Sharp's King of Dragon Pass.  Over 600 plots, some short, some lengthy, some of which pop up only in relation to other things you've done as you lead your tribe:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dqA-K2Zw0tI&feature=relmfu

http://a-sharp.com/kodp/iscreens.html

Unfortunately, Stardock won't get ratings based on post-release mods.

I have to agree that Civ IV BTS is the gold standard for TBS games to this day.  It's really hard to follow a "genrebreaker" game, and I've seen this with many of my all-time favorities- you eventualy run out of iterations- you can't make Super Civ IV Turbo HD Remix.

Civ V-  I'll just say I wonder how many things were forced on the developers by the publisher.

As for FE- I think it has potential to approach that gold standard, but it will need an expansion of similar quality of Warlords+BTS to do so.

I lurk far too much and hardly post, but I felt I had to add my name to the list asking for a bit more to be added to the tactical battles. As others have said, I don't think it needs much.

I've played a fair amount of Age Of Wonders:SM and I reckon FE could do a lot worse than take a few lessons from it's tactical battles, particularly it's use of terrain and buildings and the defensive or offensive benefits those can convey. Even at this late stage, I'm not sure some of that can't be added in fairly quickly (but then I'm not a developer so what do I know).

I've not looked into the modding side of things, but is the tactical aspect something that could be modded or is that not likely?