I wish people would stop using that click-bait term. Millenia wasn't a "Civ Killer", but damn I do enjoy the game-especially the Alternate Age system. Humankind wasn't a "Civ Killer", but damn I enjoy that game-especially the starting as a Neolithic tribe thing *and* the changing cultures throughout the eras (even if the latter could have been implemented better). Old World isn't a "Civ Killer", but damn I love that game, especially the use of the Crusader Kings "multiple leaders over time" system. Expecting a game to be a Civ Killer I suspect is what leads to people having unrealistic expectations going into these games.
He can say whatever he wants and this may very well be a Civ 7 killer for all we know especially with the stupid pricing Civ 7 has and its many weird additions like changing civilizations
I liked Humankind too. And they fixed a LOT from launch (the cultural transitions are a lot less jarring with the leaders as the focus). However, war becomes a slog late game (moving 20 units 3x a turn is NOT fun) - and the ability of just one unit to block production of one or two megacities and hide on the outskirts of the battle area. while forcing me to waste rounds or whole turns chasing it is also not fun.
No game will be a Civ killer, just civ has diehard fans that will play only this game and rarely something else. Just like no game killed WoW. Content creators should really stop using it. I enjoyed Humankind more than Civ6 but 2nd one still was more popular by a huge margin.
Overwhelming is right. I haven’t had much time to play but usually I get to the 2nd era and start over. It always feels like there’s something I’m missing and I could do better.
@@Lyzander911 you gotta respect a game for having proper ambition, devs are super whole some and engaged with the community too believe it or not. vouch for their chat, and so much more. killer vibe with these guys.
So civ 7 is like, "we want to reduce the tedium as much as we can". ARA instead is like "ALL THE TEDIUM! You will make 300 decisions per turn and like it!"
the problem is that in Ara you don't make that many decisions. Later in the game you just repeat over and over the same goods and upgrades for the same buildings you just built.
I am about 8 hours into the game & I have seen zero performance issues, bugs or crashes. Seen a few graphical bugs but nothing game breaking. There is a tab in top right for each city that allows you upgrade buildings and put items into buildings. I can agree with the UI needing a bit of work. There is formations for military units so you don't have to deploy them one at a time. Formations can get more strength by having their correct mix of units (2 melee & 2 archers for example). Overall I am enjoying it though, I think the steam reviews have been a bit overly harsh.
I also have a dozen hours on it, maybe nearly 20 hours, and the only problem I have with the UI is I wish the little case where you put the improvement (hoe, tools, wheels, etc) be green if you have it available, it's a chore to click on all of them, even inside the city improvement screen (you don't need to click each building individually). Except that, the UI seems pretty good so far.
@@ChristDuqueYou should be able to reserve a certain amount of goods / income for whatever long term projects you have, and automatically stuff the rest into whatever building slots that can accept them.
Same here no performance issues no crashes, I think these guys don;t have good SSD drives that why all these problems , they jsut get the most expensive VGA and think or thigns should work now...
@@migi847 the game works fine for me with absolute minimum requirements hardware (ryzen 2400g) and installed it on a basic HDD too. The FPS is not amazing but it works pretty well and stable considering.
Uh you don’t train one unit and deploy them at a time. You can create legions or battalions whereby you can deploy up to four at a time… and I’m sorry but the filters in the production menu are not all that tiny.
Yeah I was gonna say, I didn't learn this until my second day of playing (so I get why he didn't know), but Jumbo jumped the gun with how he presented the unit deployment system and straight up accidentally spread false info. There are a lot of elements that just needed a more hand-holdey tutorial to get players fully introduced to the systems of the game and how to quickly get through its menus. Yes, it desperately needs a customizable automation system for adding items to buildings and to upgrade buildings themselves (something like Distant Worlds 2's automation would work for this feature), but it's not as clunky as clicking them each individually on the map to upgrade them - there are menus where you can just see a list of all the buildings sorted by what region they are in, which is still clunky because it requires too many clicks per building, but it is still far more efficient than how it is shown in this review.
@@predalienmack Yeah, perhaps understandable. The reason I clicked to it was because I was figuring out why they were bothering with a “reserve and deployment” system for the units. I agree with your other suggestions about accessing certain info more easily as well 😊
@@chrisregimbal2073 Does not seem so at the moment, unfortunately. Seems like a weird decision or a glaring oversight - I don't know which one is worse...
This game has huge potential if the devs support it more than Humankind got supported. But on realease, its a 6/10. Was expecting better AI and UI. Also I was expecting more of a combat focus but it seems to gravitate towards more production line and resource management with Religion and combat feeling less realized.
Looking back, one thing I can say about Humankind is that the combat system that many hated, was in fact the best one yet up to date in the civ genra. Here, you see the basis of something great with the various formations you can deploy your army into.. but then it felt short as you don't really use them in combat. A separate battle screen like in the Total War series where you have more control would have been awesome... What I was saying with Humankind?? Total War is definitely the best combat system of them all ! I'm dumb or what!
I think Civ 4 players like me would appreciate this combat system more. I think the better word for what you are looking for is tactics, as opposed to strategy. A point of attraction of civ 4 for many of us was that you are not a general who has to micromanage units on battle field. ARA is at a mid point of civ4 and 5.
first, you can have the entire build option listed in the first tab, however the list will be super long late game. second you can deploy multiple units using different formations which allows for larger armies. The end of act wiping is a nice breath of fresh air, besides they mention you could disable this option. The UI does have much room for improvement, however currently there are some templates which can help with lategame such as the City> Zone/Improvements UI which could let you see the entire city zones for building or Improvements to switch upgrades/slots. If they could combine the "Crafting" UI which shows entire same type buildings productions then it would be better. An Upgrade All building type button should also exist i think, more automation near late game.
@@aduboo29 I’m not directly trying to compare Ara to HK, but both were compared to Civ and RU-vidrs posted clickbatey titles that they were Civ killers. That being said, having now played a little of Ara, a decent amount of HK and a LOT of Civ I will say the games are not really comparable like… at all? Back in the day people went back and forth about Halo, CoD and Battlefield but like… they are all very different games with different goals. Just because they are in the same genre doesn’t mean I’m gonna buy one over the other.
UI does need some work; trying to supply your buildings is super tedious. Not having a next unit keybind is wild also. Negatives aside, I am enjoying the game. Haven't had any graphic issues or crashes yet.
Have you found the list of all zones, improvements, crafting and harvesting drop down menus? You can go to a city and simply run down every building in a list format to check what is equipped and equip new items, change your harvesting and such. I almost never see a streamer use those.
@@MhantraxThis is what a lot of people are missing. I didn't realise it myself until I saw it on a video. The tutorial is very poor on this game unfortunately.
@@XxXTMillzXxX Yeah, I come from a time in gaming when there was literally no tutorial (friend's family owned Pong, my first was Atari 2600). So for me, ut is natural to clicked on everything and see what it does, to learn by true exploration of possibilities and to recognize that the responsibility of learning is on each of us, not the developers. We found others playing the game and taught each other. The same is true for music. Pick up an old guitar, find someone who plays, they teach you a new chord, you practice that, and back and forth, you swap knowledge. This probably sounds like I am harshing newer generations, but I am not. There has been a shift in how information, more than just game information, is given. And it generally doesn't require a deep desire to learn in one's own, but instead to wait for the information to be given, and blame the outside source if it is not. I am not better than you, you are not better than me. We are both a product of our era. But we can learn from each other. So I hear you, and you are correct. The tutorial could be much clearer. And here is a chord I can share: it feels very, very good to take responsibility for one's own learning. You learn much more, it is learned by doing and organically and it is far more rewarding.
God, not another game ruined by bad AI. Its ironic that we live in a literal Ai revolution, yet our grand STRATEGY games are plagued by dumb as rocks AI that have only gotten more shit over the past 20 years.
Enjoying the game, figuring it out as I go - but performance has been a bit annoying - and I have a fairly robust system. I run an i9 CPU with a recently upgraded (faster) SSD and a new 4070 GPU - the old one was a 2070TI. These specs are way in excess of the recommended, and yet with the default graphics settings, the temps were higher than I 'd like - and GPU fan kept kicking on and off (which as never happened before). I lowered a number of settings and it seems to be fine now, but I can imagine someone with less computing power having issues. I also thing all that visual computing power is wasted - over done . Yes drilling down and seeing individuals moving about is cool, but is it really worth the system/performance restrictions that engenders? It's pretty but it's not core to the games mechanics.
I did also notice the game suddenly lagging badly after about 2.5-3 hours of straight play. Quick restart fixes this, but should not have to do that . Sounds maybe like a memory leak.
From the player base, it sounds like they definitely need to do some optimising, I think. Though I'm playing with a GTX 1080ti on medium 1440p and surprised how well it's doing. Apart from one crash, I've also noted what you think might be a possible memory leak thing after a long session. I'm also enjoying learning the systems and enjoying the economic sim side of it. Hopefully the devs give it a lot more love and promptly.
The devs are working on a global crafting management system which will be a free update. This may include a more streamlined way of adding supplies to buildings.
There is something about the art style... I love the idea of a much more detailed CIV that shows what a god-level view of a civilization might actually look like. This though, it's not it. It is detailed but It's just so blah. It needs more style/intentional design.
All civz seem to also look the same to me, but I didn't play many leaders yet nor did I pay great attention to buiilding details, but the buildings of each civ should feel really different like with a Asian style and European style, you should see the difference at first glance.
I totally agree. Civ V is one of my favorite games from a design perspective - the Art Deco style is the through line that ties the entire thing together. This game needs an overhaul in look and feel; as it currently stands it just feels cobbled together. The map looks good, but the units look uber cheesy. Some menus look ok, but the font choices are questionable. The light-blue gradients are not working for me either - I could go on. I'm not very far into the game, but visually it's not very immersive. I'm playing Japan and my scouts look like Sacagawea and my swordsmen look like Nordic Vikings - and nothing about my cities say 'Japan' to me. WTF?
Anyone else remember when Civilization came with an encyclopedia that taught you the game mechanics & also history about the different civs, and buildings & units?
when your first learning the game it is that way but by the time you have 3 or so hours into it, its very much a click end turn simulation game. there is no real depth, just the facade of it. you put your tools in, plows, rope, pots, wheels etc and then assign your experts and really just click end turn until the next tech comes out but even then its minor changes. love how they made regions and zones in the world but the way units function and the whole creation system is just lacking. it looks good on the surface but its missing the interaction and immersion.
Millenia is simpler and more streamlined. I And from that perspective better game in long run. The beginning of ARA is more interesting… but the amounth of micro will explode later and Millenium wins the end game hands down…
Producing units is covered in the tutorial. Don't whine that the game doesn't explain things when you haven't even played the thing that teaches you the game. You also don't have to deploy units one at a time. You can deploy them in formations. Also in the tutorial FYI. Hate to do it, but this video gets a thumbs down. I think at least a basic level of knowledge of a game is advisable if you're going to review it.
This is not civ, and that is good. The game plays quite differently and realises amateurs speak about armies, professionals speak about logistics lol. Other than some ui improvements all your points are just you being too used to civ or similar. This game may not be for you, but it seems like something I can enjoy far more than Denuvo invested Civ 7. I'm off to do the pass and see how the emperors new clothes fits.
The performance issues surprise me. My computer is decent, but several years old, and I have had no performance issues with it at all. It loads and runs faster than any comparable game I can think of.
Ok bro, it just has to be embarrassing as a gamer to be, "moving in and out of each building," still, then making an entire video harping in that when you are showing yourself the entire video sitting on the city screen, where on the right side there is a drop down menu that you never clicked. Had you clicked it, you would have seen multiple other categories: Zones (where you were stuck), Improvements, Crafting and Harversting. From there, you have an entire list of each of those buildings in the city and can change equipped items, what is being crafted, and even add a specialist. It is so easy and amazingly efficient. So efficient that I consider it one of the best designs for mass city management I have run into. This game is very, very deep and requires a love of research and learning.
Yep. People complain about the UI and not being able to find things but they don’t use the zone improvement tabs. You even have harvesters and crafters. I see complaint about not knowing what resources and good they have lol. Easy. The Crystal and the crate on the top right tell you everything you have ,gathering and using. People are so lazy they don’t even take the time to learn the game.
Well, CIV 7 is still 5 months out.. kind of a moot point. I mean, sure, you could have preordered CIV 7 with that money but rightly I think everyone should wait until we have more info on the preorder tiers to make that decision.
@@ComradeGrimmGames I love Firaxis.. ever since Sid Meier's Gettysburg I've bought every single game and DLC they've done. For Civ 7 I'm gonna wait for sale, because it's not really doing anything I can't get out of AOW4
Surprisingly I like the crafting system and the economy management. It's not the micromanagement of the Econ I have issues with tho, I just wish the menus and UI was better for ease of use. It took me a while to get the hang of it but once it clicked I gotta say... it's addicting. The way turns play out simultaneously or quickly helps too. Loving it so far. Great visual presentation, I love the look of... everything. THE little people walking around! etc. Great side-grade to Civ at the very least.
@5:00 my frustration is the bad optimization, I could look past some of the other issues with the UI being too bloated, lot of wasted space, too many sub-menus when crafting items to build things with. Plus clicking is annoying and not satisfying, doesn't give you a satisfying, "yes you clicked this, accepted" You do a weird toggle and have to back out of the menu weirdly. The menu is just way too complicated too, and annoying. But again I could probably look past this if the optimization was way way better. The exploring is excellent, the region/zone control theme is great, I got into combat a little and it felt fine, nothing special but fine.
I already bought CIV7...and still reading comments about ARA and Milleniiaaayooo.I wont buy them.This is about trust.I dont trust theese kind of companies which trying to create an alternative political universe :) I am not into that unrealistic materials about human history. An ARA employee said that "Battles are not about tactics, not about how you control units" Are you kidding ? That was enough for me to avoid that game.
I love the game but I do agree the UI needs some improvements. There should also be a way of handling upgrades on mass. I dont mind the streamlined combat given I can go to Civ for that type of combat.
The UI needs some work, yes, but having multiple options to do the same thing differently is a good thing, not a negative. Also, the civ culling afaik can be disabled. So having an optional feature in the ugly section is just stupid. It's also stupid to complain about the AI using just 2 enemies when declaring war - ON EASY DIFFICULTY SETTINGS?! Like what? You also do not need to click on each individual improvement to change its shit, there's a menu for that that lists them all.
Jumbo, nobody of any import has claimed that ARA is a "civilization killer" and certainly not the developers who have gone out of their way to avoid direct comparisons. You're better than this, just making things up for click/rage bait titles. That said your review is spot-on. ARA has a lot of potential but it feels very half baked and what I'm seeing in early release footage isn't much different from what I played in the technical alphas 2 and 3. I hope Oxide Games has the opportunity to tune it up and fix its glaring issues.
I don't think you did the combat system justice. The formations you pick absolutely impact the way your army fights, especially if you end up facing counter units. Have to agree with the UI issues though. It definitely needs a lot of work and feels barely serviceable at the moment.
I think, a little more detailed option to micromanagment the army and have some deeper tactical aspect so that fight between nations become more body. And more automatic funktionality for the building micromenagment. At least a little bit more glimmer, to give feedback if you reach a goal that leat you be a part of the story of your nation throught history. Maybe a slighty more organic view in the late game: IT WOULD BE AN OVERRWHELMING 4X EXPERIENCE.
The crafting system is pretty interesting and could be amazing, however I think the implementation keeps it a bit too obtuse and too dense. The UI doesn't help it at all, It makes a system that is already very task heavy; even more task intensive. Not to mention I feel like it's very ugly, that blue makes me think of apps akin to the early 2000's or the first few SIMS games. Hideous. The combat is super crap; for all the shit I gave to Humankind, at least they had one of the better Combat systems. The rest of the mechanics are very shallow and not innovative, diplomacy, religion and culture are nothing to find memorable. Overall it's kind of like the main designer had some interesting ideas but executed them poorly and the dev team feels kind of stuck in the early 2000's era. I didn't make it to ACT 2 in my 5 or so playthroughs, I just couldn't bare myself to do it. Oh well, Civ VII has even more hype to me now than ever. Really good take on Ara though Jumbo.
Pretty much summed it up, glad to have added it to my collection but def needs some improvements, building upgraded improvements is a pain in the ass and not being able to filter what improvements you want to find. They should, unless I missed it, add an upgrade improvement button on the building when you are viewing them, I would also appreciate an alternating crafting queue, like I need rope and tools and i will always want rope and tools. My options are take up more space with multiple crafting buildings each set to make those infinitely or repeatedly set limit builds on them and constantly reset the queue every other turn to alternate between crafting options.
Cumbersome is my first thought. I played for a few hours a d I couldn't help to notice how bad the UI is.i can't believe I'm saying this, but milliuem did a lot these systems better, especially the chaine production
Wtf? The last player loses automatically when the age changes? Well if they were loosing anyways why kick them? Let them be, maybe they'll come back. What do the devs hate underdog stories? The devs of this game are the only people on earth who hate underdog stories?! Also in every single strategy game I've ever played there's a dichotomy. Do I focus on the early game and try to snowball or do I risk overlooking the early game, go this other route that only pays of in the lategame, if I survive. This game just says LOOL, gtfo to half the archetypes. Everyone's zerking in this game I guess. Everyone's got to be using the same strategy in this strategy game..
Ara is honestly overpriced, particularly for a game that still needs a lot of work and yet the developer is already charging for extra content, and it looks to me like it'll be the same kind of story for Civ 7. There are too many developers focusing too much effort on trying to cash grab as much as they can instead of focusing on making a well designed game. The reality is there are plenty of excellent games available for less than half the price which are significantly better. My advice for the Ara developers would be to dig deep and significantly redesign the game, Paradox style, look at that they did with Stellaris and make these kind of drastic changes and optimise the game before you even think about releasing further paid content. You need to have more respect for your players, when people already pay a premium for the base game the standards should be better. This kind of cash grab developing is killing gaming.
Excellent job and well said. After a bit over 30 hours of game play, I'm pretty much of the same opinion. While I see (as you mentioned) a considerable amount of potential in ARA, there are a few things that just don't work for me at this time. Since we've already seen one minor patch, only time will tell if this is a sign of how much the devs are going to keep us updated. Here are a couple of things that I've had issues with so far: -Resources & production queues are difficult and require a significant effort to work with. insane scrolling in later game. -No ability to manage resources at a global level. no option to view just one product, no way to manage expended resources when low, only the most granular approach (focusing each resource or structure). -Battle progress is unclear, battles that occur over multiple turns must be assumed. there is no turn counter visible to the player, nor management/maneuvers/tactics interactions available to the player. Likely by design. -Making enemies, is far too simple, no negotiation, no notification, peace will be denied in some cases for unknown/veiled reasons that are never exposed to players. -Dog-Piles, when you make enemies (or more correctly, when they decide to declare war), I have had too many instances where other nations (who also have little to zero contact with the player) will join in declaring war. IMHO, this only effects the player and does not seem to effect NPC's. Frustratingly overwhelming and obtuse mechanic that is bound to "force quit" many players, I feel. There are some concerns with the UI in more in-depth ways (as you mentioned) that also lead to a feeling of little to no control over production/diplomacy/growth/units & general management of your realms. while in it's current/released version, my opinion would be a pass for today (having already forked out the full bean). I will, however, reserve the right to change as time passes. I won't review it on Steam just yet. For me (the only one I can talk about with any level of accuracy), ARA has some "great bones", yet there are many frustrating aspects that might turn players off within the first hour. I, however, am the guy who spent a thousand (+) hours in CS2 since release. So, I might not be the best to gauge general player frustration because apparently my feelings have become desensitized and vestigial. Thats just my takeaway. Thanks for sharing your thoughts, they are appreciated!
I'm playing right now and the default filter on the production queue is "all" including military units? Not sure if im missing something but seems like a weird critique as it feels extremely similar to civ in this regard. Sake with rearranging the production queue, also just... not difficult to do. Also youve complained about the empty map, civ culling and difficulty... There's a reasonable amount of customisation on game start for these, including massively increasing the # of civs. I guess it feels empty to you by default settings (a valid criticism), but if your preference is for more density you can set a map up with massive number of civs and small size. Some weird critiques, it sounds like maybe you missed some of these options altogether which I would suggest is part UI issue and part not looking for what is there. I'd be very interested in seeing a follow up vid as I've been tired of civ & looking for a good alternative, I think this is one...
I think the reason why they call it a Civ-killer, beyond the fact that it's a turns-based 4x game, is because 4 out of the 5 founders of the game studio (Oxide Games) worked at Firaxis before. Their offices are also 15 mins away. It makes it feel like they've set out to create a better Civ game than what they could do at Firaxis lol. A Civ for those really enjoy the minutiae of empire building.
First of all, you need to stop pushing this narrative of Civ Killer. It happened to Humankind and it plagued people from even trying the game. Please stop doing this. This genre of 4X games only suffers when you do this to them. Also, I can tell you didn’t do the tutorials because you didn’t understand the system for combat and units. Yes, you have to wait for them to assemble and muster, but you can put multiple units into a formation to muster. Not just individually selecting them for squad. You can say that the UI design didn’t assist you in interpreting that which I’ll agree with you there, but you really should play these games first with a tutorial, then on your own to get a better feel for the game. I’d make the argument that the tutorial itself kind of bothered me in how hands off it was or how it was not obvious if I completed the task it was asking of me since some tasks in the tutorials would not clear the on screen message. I appreciate your reviews of games a lot but this review left a sour taste in my mouth. It’s a great game so far, most importantly, for those PC game pass holders that are looking for a practically free 4X game to introduce themselves to. I will mention that I had to pause the video at the combat and units section so I could type this, so I’m gonna finish the review and hope that it doesn’t feel as ignorant as this section does.
People gotta stop with the whole “Civ killer” I hate the garbage Civ has come out with in the last two games but there’s no way that I brand new release is gonna be able to compete, let along “kill” a franchise like Civ that has been around since before many of us were even born. I believe this game has potential but the unrealistic expectations and sense of “disappointment” when the game doesn’t deliver what the community expects is on the community ITSELF to blame.. NOT the game in question.
Good fair review. I'm going to give it some more time. I've played through most of Act 1 without encountering any outright bugs, but agree with the UI criticism. Some of the unintuitive stuff I'm seeing comments below addressing where I may have missed things. But other UI issues, like the "tool tip" info boxes extending past the edge of the screen were an annoyance and make it feel like an unfinished or amateur game.
Couple UI update, a couple mechanics polised, Battles should be nicer, AI improvement and it can be a very nice game. Even the first big patch make thing so much better. I was a day 1 Stellaris player XD I know if the basics good XD
With this game having a 'Technical Alpha' not too many months ago -- this year -- I didn't think it could be ready this fast. I'll wait for some patches/updates before buying. Thanks for saving me the $60 Jumbo.
While I am enjoying this game and I can see myself putting many hours into this it also reminded me how good Civ is for turning what could have been bloated and super complex into a streamlined and well-paced game. Some people might find Civ too casual but to me who don't have the patience to be meticulous about every single detail Civ is the perfect balance between deep strategy and easy playing. I mean Civ is by no means perfect but playing Ara reminded me how everything was so easy and well-designed in Civ. I was initially turned off by Civ 7 when it was first announced but I feel like Ara has made me appreciate Civ more lol.
Your point in the middle of the cumbersome UI segment doesn't seem entirely accurate to my experience with the game, if you had selected "Select Project" at the bottom of the production queue, it will bring up a long scroll of all the options you can produce, including units and gathering wealth. At least on my version of the game, I don't have to go to a separate UI to do that. Maybe they updated it since this video? There are some valid criticisms here though, and all I can say is that the devs have seemed very receptive to understanding and addressing these issues as soon as they can. They are supposedly funded for the entire next year. So we will see how much they actually do, but I am cautiously optimistic.
Thanks for the video. I appreciate your perspective. I'm enjoying the game immensely and it's vaulted to my favorite Civ style game - I don't think it's close. It's got room for improvement, but for a vanilla launch, I think it succeeds in giving us something unique like Old World and Humankind. Hoping Xbox and the devs stay optimistic bring out the greatness in this game. Loving it.
The combat is a little more in depth than your showing here for example you can deploy three units together as a single force and which formation you choose when deploying the force changes what their strengths and weaknesses are. Also you can use ranged units to indirect fire into an ongoing battle to help shift the tide in your favor or speed things up. As well there's a bit of the usual rock paper scissors thing going on. I do think the fact that you didn't know some of this when you made the video probably lends itself back into the bad UI thing tho because despite doing the tutorial first I didn't realize you could deploy units in formations together until I got to the iron age of my first playthrough after the tutorial. Also tbf a lot of people will straight up not play civ 5 with you unless you have 2 major dlc's so civ 5 wasn't even great at launch with these games always need a little bit of time to see their true potential we've just grown more impatient since civ 5
Thanks Jumbo ! In my opinion, Humankind has been so far the best contender however the support after release has been pretty thin. One of the strenghts of Civ games is that the vanilla is generally meh but after the usual 3 dlc it becomes a masterclass. Humankind, Old World, Millenium are following the same steps at release but they have not been correcting the downside through the years and the big question will be the same for Ara... How much the producer believe in its capacity to become a serious contender ?
I'm gonna do the same with this that I did with Millennia and Humankind. I'm gonna wait until they fix the glaring issues with the game, only to see that those same glaring issues caused poor enough sales to have the developers abandon the game before having time to fix the issues.
For the building buttons, the first one allows you to see everything, buildings, settlers, and units combined. But it's also good to separate them because the list becomes huge the more you play. Deployment unit is also a good thing because you don't need to do them "one after one" per se as you said, but you can create armies with various formations, like a triangle formation, that has 1 soldier at the front and 2 archers at the back, or more complicated formations the more you advance in the game. Those grouping formations are obviously stronger than deploying units one by one ( that you can also do ) So, those 2 are not necessarily bad points. My main complain is that compared to civ, you don't really feel you play a specific civilization. No matter which leader you play, you end up playing the same and the little bonus the leader gives you doesn't impact the gameplay in the end, while in civ 6 for example, if you play Spain or Korea or Germany or Alexander, the whole gameplay is different. The lack of minimap doesn't help have a feel of your empire either. This is the main thing that kept me into civ 6 for thousands of hours, the fact that each civilization is unique and you can replay it again and again and again and it always feel different.
sadly this game is a massive disappointment. the pacing is horrid, the interaction with the world is completely lacking and even on the largest size, the world map is incredibly small. making it have only 1 real win condition is another major issue. you can say everything goes into prestige but it doesnt play that way. game needs some serious help. really want to enjoy it but its not good.
Am really looking forward to trying this, CIV7 looks like it is being dumbed down I could not believe my eyes even the map looks dumbed down cities are 3 hexes apart, the number of cities are limited and it's a low cap etc. This game ARA looks meaty & complicated
Yikes. The UI makes me think this will be the kind of game where you have to spend a day re-learning how to play after every time you put it down for a while. I'm not surprised or even disappointed by bugs and performance issues because of course there are bugs and performance issues. I'm sure those will get addressed eventually. I can still muster some disappointment at yet another complex strategy title where the AI doesn't know how to play the game properly, but that doesn't *surprise* me, either, as that's basically a given. The concept of a game of empire musical chairs where the slow kid can't play anymore repulses me. I don't want AI factions disappearing from the game, nor do I want large, empty-feeling maps. As a Civ player I always cram in extra AI so borders collide and there aren't large wilderness spaces in the late game. Unfortunately, this seems like a core concept so I don't expect it to disappear. I'll check this game out in 2027-8 when it's done, has extra content, and is on sale.
Finally a review with a verdict. Most of reviews I've watched were content creators playing. It's great watching but it doesn't tell you how it feels playing or anything...
I was very hesitant to get this off Steam as it's full price and I don't know enough about it yet so was happy to see it on xbox gamepass. Although I struggled to download it because it was flagged as "outside my age restriction" and wanted an adult to verify the download, even though I'm in my 40s! I had to sign out of xbox and windows store and reset my DOB in the MS account a few times before I was finally able to download it. I am just curious as to why a city builder is age restricted...?
I think with time and future updates which fix the mentioned performance issues, this game could improve substantially. In particular, I hope people are able to develop mods that make changes to its UI (which I don't think is bad, but having mods provide options is always good).
First good review! I tried it on gamepass.. i quited after act 1 and lost intressed, it was already super slow. Bad UI, but the micromanagement itself is too fiddly, there are so many slots for things, and each item is a gamechanger... It is hard to see how much wheels you are needing to fill all buildings etc..i also dislike the lack of cultural distinction and meaningful leader bonusses, the quality of these bonuses is very imbalanced too. For example: 2 extra merchants will not change that much while one city cap is huge.
Not going to challenge your overall complaints at all. But one thing bugged me watching your footage and you did call it out as a bad feature, so it clearly didn't explain it very well. But did you discover that units can be deployed into formations of more than one units, it is only squads at the very beginning. The later footage of your warfare is a series of squads not battalions or legions.
Even Civ isn't the "Civ Killer" anymore. Usually it takes several updates & expansions after release for each Civ entry to really hit its stride. And for any 4X game to get within a mile of Civ on its first try is amazing. If it also goes through years of iterations & expansions, it has potential to be special.
I tried it on game pass and I think the thing that put me off is that they did clone a lot of things from Civ, but it clearly wasn't trying to be a Civ clone. It made me confused about what it was trying to do. In the end, it just wasn't grabbing my attention enough from the multitude of other games I have to play.
I got the opportunity to do some of the testing of Ara, and almost all of my feedback was about the UI, I really enjoyed the goods systems but it needed some improvements for even early game management of production and consumption. Unit movement is also confusing
If Ara can fix up its flaws and had some MUCH needed quality of life features, it could go down as something really, really special. Nothing wrong with the game isn't fixable. Its a fantastic start for the game.
To me it looks to much of a click simulator then anything else, my fingers already hurt when i see these menus EVERYWHERE... 60 euros is way way to much, more 30 ish range..
Pro Tip for Performance: Under the graphical settings under Shader quality, choose the upper one "direct shading". Helped a lot for me. Now it runs a lot better.
Such a strange game. I am surprised that you thought the economy system was the good part. To me that was a total mess, or rather the UI for it. It is like they made a builder game and then mid development decided to make it into a civ game instead. It is nightmare to keep track of which production chain that need resource x or where it could be used better.
Hmm... I don't deploy that many forces because there's a cap and I use formations. So doing it manually a few times in an act (maybe 2-3 times every hour or so) isn't too burdensome.
It has potential, so much that civ doesnt have. Main problem for me is that it kills my PC. Having to run on a lower graphic setting to actually play and it kills my game :(
Totally agree that the UI needs a major rework in some areas. But to me the game feels like Stellaris a few years back - terrible UI but good gameplay. And since the game is mostly good - the work needed to make it a lot more fun should be fairly easy to implement.
I’d like to try the game im a fan of Victoria so this seems interesting. I’d love to see a game of this “civ genre” also include some pop simulation as well. In a lot of ways this seems to be the game paradox should have made instead of human kind which is much closer to civilization from what I’ve seen
I love this game it addresses many issues of depth I find with other games , I just done and to be fair combat is basically the same as other turn based games except for the tactical humand kind but that was just too much over a few turns.
Thanks for the great coverage. It is a real shame that the current state of the game is not terrific. I would be happy to play a more economic slant to the genre. I will keep an eye on this, but it sounds like it's not quite ready yet.
I think there are some things that need improvement on sooner rather than later. Main issue i have is that you cant combine units into a battalion after the fact and you cant send units back into reserves. Also didnt know how to settle a city for a while since i never noticed fhe settler option. AI also seems pretty agressive on the easiest difficulty
It's definitely not meant to be a civ killer, like humankind and Millennia. It's a new take on a beloved genre, and innovates in cool ways. That being said later in the game it can feel a bit exhausting to play. I look forward to see what they do with it.
I feel like the game would be a lot better if it didn't have a whole bonking 60 bucks pricetag. It's seems pretty nice with some potential, but it also seems that this game will at no point in its life be worth 60 bucks
i mean the shit leader model animations alr are red flags for me to begin with, so i'll just see if it gets completely redone over the years if the devs bother. Well, this being just one of the other jarring problems this game shows.
I play civ games as a pacifist, so I love that the battle is stripped down, so that I dont have to bother with it that much. But I understand that for a lot of players this will be a downside.
