For those who don't know, Warlock: Master of the Arcane (or W:MotA) was a game created by Russian studio Ino-Co a year or two back. (http://warlockmota.wikia.com/wiki/Warlock:_Master_of_the_Arcane_Wiki) Its getting a sequel. While the map instantly caused comparisons to Civ5, and there are some similarities, the game was quite different. Each building for a city occupied a hex in the city radius as opposed to a city tile, unique resources on the map allowed you to buy perks for different unit classes, and a randomized "tech flower" allowed you to research spells as opposed to technology. Oh, and multiple races you could blend into a single hybrid empire, and gods to appease/manipulate. Also Lord/Hero units. (I really enjoyed it, though the AI wasn't much of a challenge. I got a lot of fun out of using tiles in an optimal fashion, exploring other planes, crafting powerful artifacts, etc.) Anyway, the point of this post is that Warlock 2 is set to come out in April, published by Paradox. A Canadian Youtuber (http://www.youtube.com/user/quill18) has received an advance press copy of the game, and is doing a blindish let's play. Afaik, it is the first such sustained source of gameplay footage. (So far so good, and the game hasn't collapsed due to bugs. Which is important to note, because Paradox title.)
I'm.. highly skeptical. Warlock 1 had a LOT of balance issues and many of them were only fixed in paid DLC. This is on my no-buy list unless they build up a LOT of word of mouth goodwill.
What balance issues did you feel were fixed with the paid DLC? I'm curious as to your opinion. The game never really became challenging in my view, although I suppose the Armageddon DLC on Insane was the closest it came. The Lords and artifacts were added in a free patch, as were the base resource impacts on tile production. Same with terraforming spells, iirc.
Oh god, it's been ages since I played it and I don't know if I remember the game well enough to give a real explanation anymore. Anyway, I'm just going to wait and see.
Armageddon is what made the game click for me. As you said, the AI mages weren't very dangerous... but the dremer provided a significant challenge, even if they're predictable once you know how they work.
I've actually noticed the game seems to have disappeared from store fronts over the past few weeks. It was on GamersGate and Steam, but it's not on either now.
http://store.steampowered.com/app/205990/ Still seems to be there for me... unless you mean for prepurchase. I didn't think it was available for prepurchase though.
The pre-purchase scenario for this game is odd to me. Buyer's can't pre-purchase until the 20th of March, even though there is a firm release date of April 10th. If there is a firm release date, why the hell make people wait to pre-purchase? Is it like a marketing thing? You can't have the receipt for the thing that doesn't exist until later, ergo you will want it more?
No, I mean it was in the 'Coming Soon' list and then it disappeared. It still isn't there - or wasn't last I looked (earlier today).
I have seen games cease to exist for a few hours at a time on Steam. Presumably they had to update the Steam page in some way that required them to take it down for a while. If you had them owned on Steam they would remain in your Library, but sometimes they could not actually install. If they were installed they could play fine regardless of if Steam acknowledged them or not.
Anyhoo, Warlock II is now out on Steam. Pre-release early access technically, as the editor and manual aren't required to show up until formal release on the 10th of April.
I'll be sure to pick it up once I see it on sale... anxiously awaiting the PC release of Dark Souls II, picking anything else up seems unnecessary when I'll probably be playing that for months straight.
After playing a bit of the pre-release build (official launch is on the 10th of April), I would say wait for a patch or the modding tools. I like large maps, and the devs have implemented a city limit and an upgrade cap per special resource. Both could be fine ideas, but the limits don't SCALE WITH MAP SIZE. So a small map has a starting optimal city limit of 5, and a XL size map has an optimal city limit of... 5. Yeah. Anyway, the modding tools that come out on the 10th will let players edit such things.
i got warlock 1 and just couldnt get into it,ill give warlock 2 a chance when its on sale and bug free. found "Fallen Enchantress: Legendary Heroes" to be a much better alternative that i enjoy to this day and its still being supported by the devs.
I have a special place in my heart for Elemental... sure they've got their problems, probably more problems than good things, but they're more than the sum of their parts.
The devs are still doing things with FE:LH? I thought it was essentially wrapped... what are they planning/releasing? (I haven't seen a patch or dlc in awhile.) Also, the editor for W2 released on April 10th- the official launch day. It is pretty intuitive, though a little tedious to sort through all the units or perks when looking things up. You can also disable that damn city limit if you want, should you think it takes away more than it adds. I'm having fun playing without city limits.
