Matrix Games Forums

So, aside from the game resolution, is the game fun? Are there interesting decisions to be made? What is the gameplay like?

There are some very misguided comments in this thread. This is a game from a one man indie team who we liked and wanted to support. Suggesting that the quality of our games has dropped is quite frankly ridiculous. We wanted to help a small indie developer get their game out and so we did. The same as we did with Qvadriga, VR designs and a number of others. We're releasing bigger and higher quality games than ever, but that doesn't mean we've forgotten our roots and have stopped supporting the small guys. Just because a game does not have widescreen support it's hardly a reason to forecast doom. Do you have any idea of the amount of work involved in making a 2D game with any amount of UI support multiple resolutions, especially if it was not planned from day 1, which it wasn't. You add many man months to the development time and when you have 1 guy doing everything that's clearly not an option. How about cutting him a little slack! I'm not saying its the best most fully featured game we've ever released but it is a good fun game. Hopefully Crasleen will be able to build on this and make something more modern looking as a future release.

Here is the recent release schedule:
Battle Academy 2
Lock 'n Load: Heroes of Stalingrad
Piercing Fortress Europa
Qvadriga
Da Vinci's War
Panzer Corps STEAM
Drums of War

And a small selection of the upcoming releases:
Distant Worlds Universe
Frontline : Road to Moscow
Close Combat Gateway to Caen
Buzz Aldrin's SPM
WH 40K Armageddon
Gary Grigsby's War in the West
Sovereignty: Crown of Kings
Brother against Brother
Close Combat: The Bloody First
Strategic Command 3

Hello Mr. McNeil,

We never talked about the little Guy. We talked about the technical Condition of the Software your Company released.
That is the Point of Discussion.

If i had bought Drums of War over the Internet Site of the little Guy as an Indie Title. There would be NO Complaint.

I bought from a Premium Provider one of his Quality Products.
And the Product lacks a certain Standard that is Common in 2014.
Like Support for 23" TFT Monitors with 1080p and more Resolution or even better something Trivial like Soundeffects in Piercing Fortress Deaf.

Years ago i work in Software QA & Marketing. No Sound would be the 1st Thing i would bring up.

Every single Developer that goes through the Ordeal in Creating Computer Art has my Respect.

And btw:

VR designs technical Framework & Design are flawless. Great AI, Great UI / GUI, Support for modern Systems. Great Products & Support.

Other Topic:
And Mr. McNeil what about the promised Patch for Fantasy Kommander? We are waiting now for 3 Month to finish the Product. (Load/Save Error)?

Best Regards from sunny springy Germany

ORIGINAL: toddtreadway

So, aside from the game resolution, is the game fun? Are there interesting decisions to be made? What is the gameplay like?

So Far I'm enjoying it. The Game Design takes it Roots from Langrisser and other round based Mega Drive Strategy Games of the golden Age of the 90'.

There are only a few screens:
You get the Text Screen that shows the Story.
You get the Army Screen: Fitting & Hire your Army, buying Stuff like Potions.
You have the Map Screen: Here you select your next Mission.
You get the Mission Screen: Here you have the Briefing and Mission Targets.
Last not Least the Battle Screen and the Victory Screen.

The Missions so far are small Affairs with a play through under 15 - 20 Minutes.
The AI plays really good and will punish you.
The Battlefield is interactive. Meaning you can manipulate a lot of Things.
There are Modifier for Night and Day Conditions. You can light up the Battle Field to hinder
dark Creatures. You can man & shoot a Ballista to support your Attack.

I like it. It's easy on the Mind (Beer & Pretzel) easy to handle, the Rules in the small Manual are clear to understand & transparent.

Only Concern is that the Battlefield are a bit small for tactical maneuvering. And the LOS are hard to see.

Hope that Helps a bit, best regards

ORIGINAL: toddtreadway

So, aside from the game resolution, is the game fun? Are there interesting decisions to be made? What is the gameplay like?

Well, bad first impressions have given away to some appreciation of the game and some frustration over what it could be.

As Richtschnur says, it is an enjoyable enough, simple little game. Controls are intuitive and uncomplicated and the combat is straightforward and basic, but does have some neat features such as facing, weather effects, and the aforementioned manipulation of terrain, whether it's the intentional (or unintentional) burning of trees and other objects or the freezing of water to make quick bridges.

The campaign stories are acceptable, if a bit generic (as is the units and the world in general) and the simplistic art style of the background images for the briefings has grown on me.

Overall, as a work of primarily a single person, I feel it's a decent to good game. What's frustrating is that it could be so much if a bit more manpower and budget were allocated to it. The additional factors in combat like facing and lighting and dynamic terrain modification beg to be expanded to make the tactical combat richer as they make this game stand out against games like Battle for Westnoth. The editor and/or modding capability could've been opened up a bit more to provide a longer life of community created content (there's so much that's tantalizingly available to modify from the resource files, from portraits to sounds to the campaign map, but what you can really change for a custom campaign without affecting the base game seems severely limited).

This game really needs a demo, or more realistically, a good video play through to show it off so people can make a better informed decision. As much as I'm not sure it's worth the asking price (although these days $20USD is the new $9.99-$14.99) and can't recommend it without reservations, I really would like to see it do well enough that perhaps someone would give the developer some better resources to make a more fleshed out version down the road.

ORIGINAL: Southpaw Samurai

I really would like to see it do well enough that perhaps someone would give the developer some better resources to make a more fleshed out version down the road.

+1

deleted post after re reading what i wanted to say, didn't sound right but still don't agree with thread tbh

only a few bits i agree with,

There are some very misguided comments in this thread


and that's about it.

give the indie lad a chance

ORIGINAL: zakblood

There are some very misguided comments in this thread

give the indie lad a chance

Dear Sir,
Please elaborate on the misguided Comments.

And of course will we give the Indie Guy a Chance... He was not mentioned with One Word...
It was the Input of Mr. McNeil that put the Spotlight on him.

Our Comments on the Creator Mr. Konstantinov are so far Neutral, because he has done nothing Wrong.

And from the Interview
http://www.wargamer.com/article/3545/in ... ating-loud
He seems to be a nice Person.

Back to Topic:
Please elaborate

In Anticipation i bid you a nice Evening

I took a chance and glad I did. Full screen graphics seem fine to me and fit the game well. A bit hard to distinguish between enemy units, but that passes, plus you just right-click. When I think of the lousy Harpoon series graphics - that are still lousy - I don't dare criticize DoW. The terrain graphics are also functional enough.

Gameplay-wise there is more going on than in Wesnoth. (Yes, Wesnoth is free). With DoW, you don't get that kill-the-cannonfodder repetition, which burned me out on Wesnoth. Tactically, richer than Eador and better than Fallen Enchantess LH's tactical module because the fight is longer and mission based. Also, the units have more weapons and skills up their sleeves. UI couldn't be simpler and campaign creation is easy; with Wesnoth you really need some skill.

There was a game I wasted my money on with the initials SST. It advertises a realistic tactical (space-themed) experience. It truly is bad, imo, and has been understandably dead for years. I don't like to be harsh, but that mistaken purchase really set me off. It was also more expensive than DoW. For $20, I believe you are getting a lot for DoW. I can easily see a modded WWII tactical game at the extreme end. Only in my third mission, but you really do have to think before you move, as there are lots of character stats, weapons, magic, etc. to consider.

I am playing Wasteland's Fall Weiss right now (love Time of Fury), but find myself just moving counters pretty aimlessly. Nothing you do in DoW is aimless. Plus, you get the progress and perks to keep you going. Also, if you suck at the game, the save game file is easily editable [;)]

If I discover any not-so-good things, I will surely report them. But I believe the game has "LnL-level light" potential in the fantasy genre and hope it is supported here at Matrix.

[/quote]

But I believe the game has "LnL-level light" potential in the fantasy genre and hope it is supported here at Matrix.

I think I will give it a try! Thanks rosseau! [8D]

For anyone considering Drums of War, I would seriously recommend trying the old DEMO first. It's an early build, but it's not far removed in overall appearance and general play. It's of course limited in its features and missions and lacks the editor, but it should still do its job in selling it or making you save your money, whichever way you may fall.

Trying the demo for yourself is probably better than listening to any of our opinions.

Moving on here... I'm a long-time supporter of Matrix and Sliterine but the last few releases are worse than most indie titles. Sub-par fare at best.

ORIGINAL: Richtschnur

What Matrix need is a common denominator in the Tech Department.
Like Ok dear Devs:

We only Accept Games with a scalable UI / GUI from 1366*768 to 1080p.
Oh you have no Knowledge how to do that?
Well let us help you.

I totally agree.

It's bizarre to continue to talk about 'widescreen support' as if widescreen monitors were still some exotic piece of kit only hardcore gamers might own, rather than the de facto standard for any home PC for the best part of a decade.

I'm sure the developer is a really nice guy, and a talented designer, but to release commercial games at commercial prices you need to be able to code in a language/package appropriate to the task in 2014. If he can't do that, help him out by pairing him with someone who can.

We are a publisher not a developer and do not get involved in the actual development. Ever game has a different code base and different language. This one actually uses somethign called Game maker which is something none of us have ever used before so know nothing about it. We have helped developers port their games but this is very different. We're here to guide the developer and tell them what is best for their game. We told him it would be better with wide screen support months ago but he was not able to add it. Developers all do their own thing and we cannot demand anything of any of them. These are their games and we can only give advice. Sometimes they listen and sometimes they don't. Sometimes because they don't agree and sometimes because they are not able or don't want to. There is no magic wand we can wave to make features just appear in a game and no way to get someone to help out. You can't just ask someone to take a look at the code and fix it in half an hour. You're talking man months of development time to learn the language and then learn the code base and we simply don't have the resources to do that - nor would any other publisher. It's simply not the publishers role. The only real control we have is to either publish the game or say to the developer your game isn't good enough and cancel it. He's been working on this for years and we do not feel that this game deserves to be cancelled. It is not the best game ever released but it is good fun and I'm glad we've released it and look forwards to people enjoying it! Your view may vary of course.

Does the developer plan on posting on this forum? I really appreciate a developer who responds to his customers and fans.

I am leaning towards getting this game, because I love the genre. It would be great if the developer was also here, to hear feedback, and discuss possible future campaign additions.

Frankly, I just don't understand the comments about widescreen support being a requirement.

I'm using a 24" widescreen monitor, always have my desktop resolution at 1920x1080 and I have no problem with black bars on the side of the screen in a game as long as the rest of the game functions well. Maybe you're all using even bigger monitors which wrecks scaling in some way.

It sounds a bit like how every wargame "needs" NATO counters (and only those), because people are used to playing with them. How about talking about whether the game works well and does what it's supposed to do according to store page, the developer and the manual, instead of whether or not it fills the entire screen.

If it scales really poorly or messes up font size for middle aged wargamers, you have a point, and maybe I'm just lucky with my monitor not having issues, but it seems like an issue of secondary importance.

As to the game, I enjoyed it whilst beta-testing it. Sure, it doesn't look like a modern game, but being able to change the environment in a meaningful way is a nice extra dimension to the gameplay that similar games lack. Your core units are also more likely to die than in, say, Fantasy Kommander.

The catapult mechanic was something I didn't entirely like as it felt too random and could lead to an ugly 1-2 punch in the enemy turn with the enemy hitting one of your units with the catapult before killing it with other units without you being able to do anything about it. As long as the catapult just wounded your units, it could make a battle more intense as you needed to make sure the unit(s) wouldn't be hit by regular units.

Enemy units becoming stronger, together with units being able to equip artifacts also added just enough variety to keep the campaigns interesting.

I missed the last part of the beta as there were some issues with the Slitherine beta forum access suddenly being revoked, and the start of the beta was also somewhat chaotic, but as a first effort on a limited budget, I enjoyed playing the game.

in reply to Iain McNeil only,

thanks for the info +1 agree,

with a little searching i found the program he used to create the game if your info is correct, after searching there forum a little i came across this

h88p://gmc.yoyogames.com/index.php?showtopic=490562

h88p://gmc.yoyogames.com/index.php?showtopic=449614

h88p://gamemaker.info/en/manual/302_02_resolution

h88p://gamemaker.info/en/manual/302_01_graphics

h88p://game-maker.wikidot.com/global-game-settings

seems there is a way without to much trouble involved to resize screens etc, as it's been done with other titles, don't know the in's and outs of the program tbh and not 100% sure either what version he is using as the latest ones, Master Collection should work, if using other version it may not, and the cost is high for the version i know

h88ps://www.yoyogames.com/studio ($799.99 plus tax) and shipping etc

ORIGINAL: Iain McNeil

We are a publisher not a developer and do not get involved in the actual development. Ever game has a different code base and different language. This one actually uses somethign called Game maker which is something none of us have ever used before so know nothing about it. We have helped developers port their games but this is very different. We're here to guide the developer and tell them what is best for their game. We told him it would be better with wide screen support months ago but he was not able to add it. Developers all do their own thing and we cannot demand anything of any of them. These are their games and we can only give advice. Sometimes they listen and sometimes they don't. Sometimes because they don't agree and sometimes because they are not able or don't want to. There is no magic wand we can wave to make features just appear in a game and no way to get someone to help out. You can't just ask someone to take a look at the code and fix it in half an hour. You're talking man months of development time to learn the language and then learn the code base and we simply don't have the resources to do that - nor would any other publisher. It's simply not the publishers role. The only real control we have is to either publish the game or say to the developer your game isn't good enough and cancel it. He's been working on this for years and we do not feel that this game deserves to be cancelled. It is not the best game ever released but it is good fun and I'm glad we've released it and look forwards to people enjoying it! Your view may vary of course.

Thanks Mr. McNeil for an honest Answer. I really Appreciate it, because it's not a Marketing Answer.

And btw i'm now 5-6 Hours inside the first Campaign and the Fun out-weight the technical Issue.
It's worth every Penny so far, and very polished in the Mechanic & Framework. No obvious Bugs so far.

Best Regards from stormy Germany

ORIGINAL: jglazier

Does the developer plan on posting on this forum? I really appreciate a developer who responds to his customers and fans.

I am leaning towards getting this game, because I love the genre. It would be great if the developer was also here, to hear feedback, and discuss possible future campaign additions.

In the Slitherine Forum for this game he has posted a reply. Maybe we should try some of our questions over there.

I am also leaning towards getting this game because I, also, like this genre. Looks like a nice, light game that I can easily pick up and play at my leisure.

ORIGINAL: Franchot

ORIGINAL: jglazier

Does the developer plan on posting on this forum? I really appreciate a developer who responds to his customers and fans.

I am leaning towards getting this game, because I love the genre. It would be great if the developer was also here, to hear feedback, and discuss possible future campaign additions.

In the Slitherine Forum for this game he has posted a reply. Maybe we should try some of our questions over there.

I am also leaning towards getting this game because I, also, like this genre. Looks like a nice, light game that I can easily pick up and play at my leisure.

Vladimir, the developer, has been following both forums of course. I have been in contact with him, and he will get more involved in the discussions, but the combined effects of a busy schedule, and a kind of "in-between" time zone he is in is making that a bit hard at the moment.

But rest assured that both us and him are keeping a close eye on the feedback and questions.