Anyone played Lost Empires?

[iceboy]

What do you think? Is it any good? Comments?

http://www.polluxgamelabs.com/lostempire/

[Ed Kolis]

Dunno, never played it, but the human race portrait looks an awful lot like a character from X2: Beyond the Frontier... were both games made by the same company, or did they use the same character animation software or something?

Also the Alkiths remind me of Darloks (MOO), the Megalanians remind me of Altarians (GalCiv), and the Horde portrait looks vaguely familiar... Galciv minor race maybe? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif

And that Triton ship reminds me of some SE4 worldship or other... maybe the Sergetti one, or one from Atrocities' Tholian set?

edit: oh, and the second of their downloadable wallpapers... Don't you remember a nearly identical scene from a MOO2 wallpaper that was included with the game??? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/stupid.gif Not like I'm accusing them of plagiarizing or anything, I just find all these similarities amusing http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

[Will]

Never heard of it until now... looks like it might be ok. Definitely seems like it would pale in comparison to any SE in terms of mod-ability. Graphics looks like a clunkier version of SEV plus cutscenes, unless the clunkier screenshots are just from the game running at lower quality. Ship design looks like a direct rip-off from SEV. There's definitely more manpower behind it than SE... snooping on their site looks like there's five full-time programmers and four full-time artists.

Costs $30, but appears to be download-only. Reviews say that the documentation may as well be non-existent, and some parts of the game are not intuitive... and I didn't see any kind of demo link. So I probably wouldn't buy.

[Ironmanbc]

I've tryed the demo... I'd say it's cool but when ya fight the computer justs seems to rush troops at ya and you just can't build fast enuff... and I think it shoud attack in smaller groups like 10-15 NOT 30-50 at a time

The buildings look cool but it doesn't show ya much in the demo, and ya can't build 4-5 before the computer (who KNOWS right where ya are) sends like a mass of troops at ya http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif

oops i was talking about the wrong game http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/confused.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/confused.gif

this is what i thought you meant:

What Rise of the Lost Empires Is About:
Several centuries have passed since the Empire of Light defeated the Empire of Darkness and destroyed the gates of Hell...
more »

Platform: Wireless

Genre: Strategy, Real-Time

Rise of the Lost Empires Special Features:
•

A true game of strategy: colossal armies to lead, cities to build, and resources to manage.

2 campaigns –
• One with humans, the other with Orcs –
• And no fewer than 20 missions.

Easy to pick up and play: build a city or lead an army with just a few clicks.

More than 20 units to control and 20 different buildings to construct.

6 heroes with tremendous strength and magical powers that will lead your armies.

Digitized voices: hear your troops respond to the call of their master.

Credits:
• Developer: Gameloft
• Publisher: Gameloft
• Distributor: UNKNOWN GAME DISTRIBUTOR

[PsychoTechFreak]

- Pacing: We have worked a lot with the pacing of the game. We wanted to make a 4X-game where you quickly expand and start building fleets and do battle, thus players will find that Lost Empire is quite fast-paced for a 4X-game.




It hasn’t been that difficult to make the AI quite challenging in Lost Empire, because there are so many choices for the players to make, and the AI is faster at analyzing the best strategies for its planets and fleets. For example, when building ships and researching the components to put on the ship the AI is better at analyzing the almost endless available options there are to optimize planets and fleets to specific situations. We have some pretty hardcore gamers here at Pollux, but the AI can still beat us on the toughest difficulty level. Thus we believe human players will have a hard time beating the AI on the toughest level. Further, in order to make the AI seem more human we have programmed it using Fuzzy Logic.



5,000 unique solar systems, multi-threaded, multi-level science tree... very interesting. I will definetely take a closer look at this.

[Tim_Ward]

The turn-based strategy market is a viable market which is currently underserved.



Quoted. For. Truth. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/mad.gif

[Raapys]

Yah, turn based rock. Might have a look at this myself, a 4x with challenging AI isn't something you see every day.

[Romulus68]

Ironmanbc said:
I've tryed the demo... I'd say it's cool but when ya fight the computer justs seems to rush troops at ya and you just can't build fast enuff... and I think it shoud attack in smaller groups like 10-15 NOT 30-50 at a time




Where Did you find the Demo??

a good review: Lost Empires Review (http://jaguarusf.blogspot.com/2007/07/lost-empire-review.html)

[Dkanre]

I would recommend Lost Empire, the AI is very hard to beat and isn't very predictable. Also, components automatically upgrade in space so you don't have tedious retrofitting.

[Ironmanbc]

I had to edit my msg reread my post http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif

[StarShadow]

Sounds like it might be good, I'll give it a try when a demo comes out.

[PsychoTechFreak]

There are 5,000 freaking stars in the universe, but no drop-down menu for selecting known planets, displaying habitable planets, or anything else: you have to scroll through each of your stars and actually mouse over each newly discovered star to find appropriate candidates for new colonies. As I mentioned earlier, the icons don’t change with zoom level, so it’s impossible to find any ships when zoomed out, other than using the scrolling list that goes through every single ship in the universe. This isn’t that big of a deal in the beginning of the game, but when you are at war and have a large empire to run, finding anything is hopeless. It gets to the point where the game is simply unplayable late in the game; it’s fortunate, then, that the game typically ends near turn 300 (which happens a lot quicker than you think).



A big NO in this case. I'd rather start another MOO3 session.

[baby_arm]

Behold our recent review (http://www.tacticularcancer.com/content.php?id=39).


Considering that Pollux Game Labs is a total newcomer they showed that they are able to create a very fun game. The only thing left for them to do now (regarding Lost Empire, that is), is to actually finish it! I found many things to criticize in this review, but nearly all of them basically result from the game being released in an unfinished state and unpolished. Therefore, in its current state if you really need a new space conquering game, I think you will get some enjoyment out of Lost Empire. For all others I recommend to wait for the announced remake Lost Empire: Immortals, apparently due to be out rather soon in Q1 2008.