Birth of America 2 (Wars in America)

[GlobalExplorer]

Boa2 was released today, 4th of July:

http://www.birth-of-america2.com/ageod/eu/wia.php

2008-08-05: There is now a demo :

http://www.ageod.com/forums/showthread.php?t=10131

You should get yourself the demo and give it a lot of time. This is a historical wargame, plays different to games like Panzer General which are more like chess. You will not understand for a while what is going on but once you get into it it's wonderful. Plays out like history itself, not all predictable, often plans will not work out, you must learn to use terrain, supply, morale, leadership and so on. But with enough cerebral investment you will see your strategy unfolding.

I downloaded it this morning and I must say it is worth every penny. If you are craving for hardcore strategy with great graphics and huge replayability that's the one you should get. If you want something like Civ you'd better head off.

Ageods products are indy gaming at its finest.

[tedhealy]

The first BOA was great as is their American Civil War game. I'll definitely pick this one up at some point, just too many games on the table for me right now.

[stabiz]

I love indie games, its the future for us nutters.

[GlobalExplorer]

I played the Independence War campaign all day, absolutely wonderful, and I am still only at turn 25/104 or so. Like any v1.00 there are minor glitches, but nothing that impedes playability. First mini patch has already appeared, so far ageod always patches their games until perfection and then they patch them some more.

[CaptHawkeye]

*sigh* I only wish I could get into these games. Unfortunantly top-down text-box strategy games don't get my attention. I even tried Hearts of Iron 2. Total War has spoiled me. Now if only Pacific Storm would actually be a good game.

[Captain Vlad]

Are the demos of this and the Civil War game on that site? Couldn't locate them...

[GlobalExplorer]

ACW demo is here:

http://www.a-acw.com/english/main.html

About Boa2 you're right, a new demo has not yet been announced. There could be more info in this thread: http://www.ageod.com/forums/showthre...highlight=demo

Then there is still the old demo for Boa1, but it is several years old now:
http://www.birth-of-america.com/english/

You could also look around the ageod forums which have a wealth of AARs, gameplay tips and such.

[Sailor Steve]

I don't like these kinds of games.

(I know, "Why post just to say you don't like it? If you don't like it, go away and leave it to those who do!")

I love board games, especially historical ones. One of the things I like about them is being able to sit down at the table and play against a friend. Playing against the computer is fine if there is visual action going on, or if a real-time 'feel' is necessary.

So, to the reason I posted: do these games have an online option? Can I play against one of you? If so, I've just become very excited. If not, well, they still look pretty cool, and I'm glad they're there, even if not quite my cup of Boston tea.

[tedhealy]

Don't have this game, but I have several other AGEOD games and you can PBEM in all of them. I thought there was talk of tcp/ip play in this one, but I'm not sure on that.

[les green01]

New functionalities
• New in game Replay module allows to see the turn you played (or any other – exchange them with friends!)
• Updater module to check if you play with the latest game version.
• Play-by-email and TCP/IP ARES module
• Improved AI
• Multiple resolutions Interface
so i would take it you can play online with it

[GlobalExplorer]

I just finished my first campaign successfully, and forced the rebels to surrender to the crown. It turned out the british/german superiority in line infantry is too overwhelming. Next time I will play the (probably longer & more difficult) US campaign.

[PeriscopeDepth]

PM me if any of you are interested in a PBEM. I would prefer the 1776 campaign.

PD

[em2nought]

The BoA demo is as close as I've ever come to liking one of these types of games. The problem was that the battles felt like nothing was happening. Just a few different generic hex maps with units being eliminated as the computer calculations occurred could have made it soooooo much better for me. Since then it seems like AGEOD just adds more complexity to their games, and I definitely don't want that.

[GlobalExplorer]

Originally Posted by em2nought

The problem was that the battles felt like nothing was happening. Just a few different generic hex maps with units being eliminated as the computer calculations occurred could have made it soooooo much better for me. Since then it seems like AGEOD just adds more complexity to their games, and I definitely don't want that.

For me this is ideal because this is a game played on a strategic level, over a whole continent, you dont want to command individual battallions / soldiers. The already extremely time consuming campaign would become practically unplayable with a tactical level. Less experienced game developers have tried to squeeze everything into a grand campaign (Pacific Storm) and utterly failed.

With other games like Empire Total War you will get more tactical battles than you ever need, but not the strategic "complexity" you will see in ageods games. So instead of waiting for the game that does everything simultaneously play them side by side.

There is also the Take Command Series, that would be ideal to play that parallel to ACW, it offers exactly those things you want to see on the tactical level (it has multi-phase battles played in realtime over multiple days).

As a compromise between the two worlds, Shogun Total War was perfect, but the strategic level was extremely streamlined compared to the AGE games. But I admit I would like to see another game after the STW formula (no I am not talking about the new total war titles).

[GlobalExplorer]

For me this is ideal because this is a game played on a strategic level, over a whole continent, you dont want to command individual battallions / soldiers. The already extremely time consuming campaign would become practically unplayable with a tactical level. Less experienced game developers have tried to squeeze everything into a grand campaign (Pacific Storm) and utterly failed.

Just to explain what I mean here: Depending on your way of playing, a single turn will now take between 10 minutes and several hours, if you add to that the time for several battles as well as skirmishes every turn, you should see that you would quickly burn out on this game if it had tactical battles. No one wants to spend half a day on a single turn if a campaign has 100+ turns, even if it sounds nice in theory. If you disagree give me examples of a game where this concept works.