2404 - PC Gaming - Strength & Honour Preview

Strength & Honour Preview

Posted by Dan Stock June 21, 2004

Strength & Honour, the newest title from Magitech, is due out later this year. The game is a combination of the strategy-based games “Medieval Total War” and “Romance of the Three Kingdoms”. Your role is to lead your country to domination over the known world by winning various campaigns to unlock new campaigns. When I initially started playing this game, I found it quite difficult to get a handle on all the aspects that you are required to manage to control your empire, not to mention the absence of a difficulty selection. Magitech, however, has provided you with an automated city manager. Each city has 6 choices for management:

• Direct Control
• Direct Control (Automated : All Priorities Equal)
• Direct Control (Automated : Focus on Economy)
• Direct Control (Automated : Focus on Military)
• Direct Control (Automated : Focus on Culture)
• Self Governing (The Appointed Governor is in control)

The automated control certainly makes controlling a vast empire much easier, but I must admit that I found it difficult to see much of a difference when I had it on. Because most civilizations cannot conquer the world in your leader’s life time you are required to obtain a spouse and have a family that can take over leadership after your demise. In Total War, you had to wait for a spouse to appear to you, which can be quite difficult and annoying, especially when your leader comes to power at age seventy-five and has no kids. Magitech has addressed this issue so that you can announce to your citizens that you are looking for a spouse. Generally, options to buy appear within the first few turns (which are three months long); however, buyers beware! Not all of the women looking to become your spouse want to hop in your bed! I had the unlucky experience of accepting a spouse, which my advisors approved of, and the very next turn the old maid decided to assassinate me! Talk about a sad turn of events.

The battles are also quite intricate. You can either lead your armies yourself or have the computer automatically lead them for you. I myself decided to go through a few historical campaigns to make sure that I understood how to control my troops. When you start a battle you are able to place your individual generals and their troops in different formations and locations on the battle field. Magitech has included hints or notifications to advise you what the enemy troops are doing, as well. For example, they always kept warning me that that the enemy was trying to flank me; however, it is important to note that it is not possible to pause the battle once it has started. This certainly adds quite a bit of realism to the battle.

This game certainly has the potential to give me many, many sleepless nights as I try to conquer the world. Nevertheless, I believe that it will ultimately be the documentation for the game that decides its fate. There appear to be many complicated interactions in the game which currently are still a mystery, for instance when I set the game on automatic and it started playing with out me. I for one look forward to seeing this game released and I can easily see many LAN parties where we fight for control of the world.

Pros:
• General/Character personalities provide limitless events
• Amazing battle tactics
• Control of virtually every aspect of your cities

Cons:
• Currently no tutorial mission
• Large learning curve