When Ino-Co announced that it was going to make the online mode in Majesty 2 at least equal to the single player campaign, we choked slightly. Is it a joke to create strong multiplayer in a project with indirect control? In the first part, of course, everyone played with pleasure, but several times a month, just out of curiosity. And here in the plans the level, though not an e-sports, but somewhere nearby. And just three days ago, the developers told us that the network part, in principle, is ready. We sent our strategist on reconnaissance so that he could watch, play and be sure to defeat at least someone.
Take a look at all the esports strategies. How long does a game last? No longer than half an hour. You can fight a dozen battles per day. This allows you to constantly try new tactics, look for interesting solutions, make mistakes and repeat all over again. In the original Majesty, you had to fight each other for two to three hours or longer. Sometimes you can have fun, but it is difficult to imagine that thousands of users were playing something like this and the servers were constantly packed.
However, this is far from the only thing that raised concerns. Therefore, let's not get ahead of ourselves and analyze the network mode one by one. So Majesty 2Is almost a classic real-time strategy (RTS). We build a base, buy an army, fight the enemy and try to destroy his main building - the castle. The game can easily be compared to Red Alert or StarCraft.
As you know, there are stumbling blocks in RTS, for which the battles take place. In the C&C series , these are the fields of tiberium. The Dune - Spice. In projects from Relic (Company of Heroes , Dawn of War) - key positions that bring victory points. In Majesty 2 , trading posts play this role. They can be compared to mines from Warcraft... Only instead of a dozen workers only one slow donkey goes there, which is easy to kill.
However, the spirit of competition is not alive by donkeys alone. The second sticking point is places of power. They are located mainly in the center of the map, and players will fight for them so that the enemy cannot build a temple there. After all, this structure allows you to create very strong heroes who are head and shoulders above their ordinary colleagues.
This, in general, is the basis for confrontation. Money and strong troops. But this is almost standard, and now let's talk about the special in the gameplay of Majesty 2.
The beginning of the party is the construction of the first guilds and the recruitment of heroes. As soon as they are published, they immediately go to swing. There are plenty of monsters around, each character will find a creature to his liking.
With each level, the heroes become much stronger. And if the opponent develops the army better, then it will be very difficult to resist him. It seems to me that after the release there will be dozens of tactics for quickly pumping the army for each map.
No other RTS has this kind of development and nowhere is it more important than here. Yes, in Warcraft we raise the levels of the hero, but he is there - one. Here, all the soldiers improve (or rather, here all the soldiers are heroes). Someone might say that in both C & C3 and Red Alert 3all fighters get new levels. But after all, experience is awarded there only for killing an enemy; in Majesty 2, our units can become stronger or weaker even before the first meeting with the enemy. Moreover, it is very important to understand when it is necessary to stop pumping and attack the enemy.
Development is generally a very interesting thing that I immediately liked in Majesty 2. It is very diverse and with its own tricks. So, for example, at the very beginning it is not worth building watchtowers, since they will kill monsters, and the heroes will not be able to pump on them.
On the contrary, I tried to have more opponents in the district. Therefore, he immediately erected as many buildings as possible, and due to the growth of the population, a sewage system appeared in the city, from which rats climbed. We kill them, we get experience. You can also immediately order one ranger, put a reconnaissance flag in the depths of the map and wait for this character to finally go there. The Pathfinder loves to explore the area, and therefore will quickly find himself at the enemy base. He will be killed, and a cemetery will appear in the middle of the kingdom. Skeletons often run out from there. We kill them and again we get experience.
And let's not forget that we play with indirect control. That is, it is impossible to frame all the fighters and send them to the monster. You have to motivate everyone, and for this there are also a huge number of tactics. All in all, this stage is just amazing.
A magnificent tower that knocks the enemy to the ground. Helps both offensively and defensively. She also perfectly kills peasants who are trying to repair buildings.
However, the matter is not limited to the development of fighters. While the characters are running around the kingdom, we are building a city. We are building new guilds, improving them, ordering various skills for soldiers there. We study goods in the market, we ask you to make good things in the smithy. All this is spent money, which is replenished by caravans, taxes and the heroes' shopping trips. It is beneficial for us to have expensive potions on the market - the characters are overstocked, and their money falls into our wallet.
If, for example, you develop a market to the last level, build an alchemist's shop, and then build an elf guild, then the income will be huge. These heroes buy up all the goods until their travel bag is filled to capacity. I think there are hundreds of different ways to make money. It's just that even the developers don't know about many of them yet. But the players will find them.
In general, the economic component is not very difficult, but it is creative, or something. In other RTS, there are a lot of algorithms, but here, due to indirect control, we are never sure of anything. The same actions, performed for the hundredth time, can have a completely different effect. Before that, in twenty parties, the hunter went to the market as soon as he left his guild, and now he accidentally noticed a wolf, chased after him, opened a den of bears, and all the heroes ran to help him. Instead of making money, we received pumped / dead characters.
Directly, the battles between the players also look unusual. We are already used to the fact that microcontrol in RTS is a must. Well, how can it be without him, because the soldiers need to run from the enemy, lure him into traps, bypass the towers, crowd attack one and hide behind the backs of weak fighters. Here, the heroes can come to the enemy base, fight for 5 minutes with the tower, finally break it... then turn around and go to the market, because the restoring potions are over, it's time to buy new ones.
The battles of the heroes are also interesting in that the opponents have a different set of armies. Someone relies on archers, someone loves gnomes who are excellent at breaking buildings. One has hired temple characters, the other hasn't had time yet. Here you will have to watch the enemy, adjust to his actions, correctly respond to changes in his tactics.
If you look at the map, you can see that more than two opponents are currently fighting. Moreover, one of the players is in the center. It's not as bad as the classic RTS. In Majesty 2, each battle gives experience, and those with higher levels are stronger.
So we found out how the local multiplayer works. If we talk about personal impressions, I liked it. I would not even go through the campaign, I would immediately go to him. Not because the single player part is bad, it's just that the other players are a lot of fun to fight.
However, the network mode still has some drawbacks, in my opinion. Perhaps they will not be in the release version, but I think it is necessary to say about them now.
Above, we described that battles here should go for trading posts and places of power. But the developers are not very eager to play off the players. The cards that I saw are symmetrical and each opponent gets an equal number of caravans. You don't have to look at the enemy at all, each of them has self-sufficient kingdoms.
Yes, even in esports RTS they do not hesitate to make these kind of cards. The recent Red Alert 3 was similar. But there it is much easier to attack other people's mines and crush the enemy. In the second minute, I usually sent a demolition probe to the enemy, which did not allow the opponent to normally extract resources. Here, such sabotage and even open attacks are more difficult to do, and therefore you need as many disputed territories as possible - in order to sit in your half and develop peacefully it was unprofitable.
There are places of power in the center of the map, but at the same time they are sometimes found right at the castle. The longest fight I've had was an hour. And during this time I have erected only one temple. And if the games, as planned, last 20-30 minutes, then who will need the third point - somewhere in the center?
Let me explain why I am advocating controversial objects. Majesty 2 allows you to have fun without an opponent. You can develop characters, build a city and slowly scout the territory. What's bad about it? Imagine that the players spend half an hour like this, an hour, finally, they get tired of fighting the AI, and they go on the attack. The first battle, one of the rivals loses the army, the second runs to his castle. The loser of the skirmish may not have enough money to ransom his strong heroes from the graveyard, and therefore the enemy easily defeats him.
It's not interesting to fight like that. The battle with the enemy takes 10 minutes, development - an hour. Why then need multiplayer when single-player modes offer the same? It will be possible, of course, once or twice to measure their strength, but to constantly go to the server and look for opponents there - this is hardly.
Do not forget about the duration of the battles. If the players do not attack each other, then the battle will drag on for a long time. The first is waiting for the construction of the next temple, the second decided to defend at all and built up the territory with towers. And both have nowhere to rush. You can wait at least two hours until someone takes a risk or makes a mistake.
In all good RTS, defensive tactics are economically not equal to aggressive ones. If someone defends, then he gives the center to the enemy and allows him to extract resources there. In Majesty 2, it may turn out differently, but this will destroy what battles in network strategies are on. Oh, ino-Co walks along the edge, on the edge.
The material turned out to be large and partly too demanding for the developers. But this is no coincidence. In Ino-Co has a chance to make a serious and innovative network strategy. The potential of the game is huge. And it would be great to see GameReplays and Majesty 2.