MartinD81

Just play it! O.K, to elaborate a little more, the new expansion takes the base game to new strategic heights. Along with the 1.5 update, it expands AoW III with new diplomatic, building and economic options, two new races, 1 new class, 3 new specializations making it possible to play the good, the neutral, or the bad guy, tons of welcome balance changes aimed to differentiate racial units even more, improved AI, nice changes to the UI, new structures, new dwellings, a new victory condition, new music, and last but not least a new way the game can be played with the mentioned Necro class, which is so cool to play. As said before elsewhere, EL makes AoW III a complete strategic experience the series fans have long been waiting for. In addition to that, the devs continue to actively analyze the community's feedback on the new content, and will be adding more stuff, further balance changes and quite possibly some other long-planned gameplay mechanics. The future of this wonderful series is secured. Now go get the expansion and have no mercy on anything living!

First off, I can call myself an Age of Wonders veteran. I have been with the series since its inception back in 1999. Age of Wonders III, like its predecessors, is a TBS game with a fair amount of RPG flavor set in a wonderful world of magic and adventure. Like before, the fourth game in the series is a meticulously mixed blend of MoM and HOMM, with greater emphasis on global strategy and warfare. Mind you, it is not a full 4X experience as some believe it to be. Some folks over on the the official AoW forums keep comparing the game with Civilization V, which is really not fair IMO – Age of Wonders III and its older siblings are significantly more combat-oriented. Some have criticised the game for being rather basic in diplomacy and for its supposedly simplistic city development. In my opinion, both these elements are fine and work sufficiently for the game’s purposes despite being a little austere in their appearance and functionality. But then again, this is not a Civ-level empire building and diplomacy. The game mechanics are solid and can stand on their own and they are clearly more fleshed out in comparison with HOMM and some others in this regard. Anyway, the game’s foundations lie in a progressive empire building and managing your cities. A city serves as an essential economic unit here, and without a properly managed city your armies may not prosper as well. You can also do research, level up you heroes, who make their hard living by killing monsters and hordes of opposing armies. Unlike HOMM, the AoW series is an actual strategy game, encouraging you to plan ahead and consider you next moves carefully in the context of a bigger picture represented by your developing realm. As mentioned above, the core element of the series is warfare, and the new game is well-prepared for that. It sports an improved tactical combat that rewards clever tactics and puts a strong emphasis on unit positioning. Every unit on the battlefield has unique abilities you need to take into account, and exploiting them in the right way is a key to success in any encounter. Plus there is flanking now, which the AI likes to use against you when you expect it the least. The improved combat also encourages cooperation of your ranged and melee troops and there is a new scissor-rock-paper formula introduced (pikemen, cavalry, infantry units with their strengths and weaknesses). The game itself plays very smoothly and familiar, so if you have played an AoW game before you will easily slip into these new and shiny pants. The class system is cool and classes themselves varied enough to secure a very solid replayability. The level of leader customisation here is beyond all you have seen in a TBS game. You would need so much time to explore all the possibilities! If you are not an expansionist type you can effortlessly adjust your experience through many various RMG settings to suit your play-style. Here lie infinite hours of fun for everybody… The only downside to the new game that I see ATM are some unit and resource balance issues, though not serious, but they can sometimes be annoying, particularly in late-game. Not a deal-breaker in any way. The devs are currently hard at work to deal with these and are ready to send more updates, features and new content in our direction. The AI could also have been better, sure, it does not but at a strategic level it does a decent job of keeping you on guard, and so does in TC. There are some minor changes that seem to have already upset some core fans, namely mountains are passable now by practically any unit, fliers land in TC and can be attacked by any unit, only six units allowed in a single stack etc., but they do not by far distract from an overall great and rewarding strategic experience. In fact, these changes were made to keep the game balanced as possible, and the „six units in a stack“ change particularly contributes to a more strategic approach when it comes to composing your army. Well, I seem to have left out a thousand other things that come to mind when thinking about AoW III, but firstly there is not enough space to put them here and secondly, and more importantly, I have been engaged in playing it for more than 25 hours and the joy of doing so has not by far worn off. And I honestly believe that I will enjoy the next tens of hours as much as I have until now, the game has so much to offer! By the way, have I made a mention of a lovely cloth map like the one in Fallen Enchantress? Or completely unique class units and spells? An excellent in-game manual/encyclopedia called Tome of Wonders? My recommendation for this game is quite simple: if you want to immerse yourself in a beautifully crafted world of magic you can feel at every step (even with wizard towers gone this time), you like to engage in epic battles for the fate of your empire, you have played some HOMM but found it shallow at global strategy then this is the right game for you. And it has rogue dire penguins!