Warlords
for Amiga (OCS/ECS)
Also available for: PC (DOS)

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Mr Creosote:Popular Vote:
4.5/6
Company: SSG
Year: 1990
Genre: Strategy
Theme: Misc. Fantasy / Multiplayer / War
Language: English
Licence: Commercial
Views: 29403
Review by Mr Creosote (2004-08-19)
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Warlords is a very basic game. Some parts of Empire mixed with a little bit of Risk and finished with a fantasy touch. Up to eight different fractions are struggling over supremacy in Illuria. Illuria is a relatively small country with 80 cities which is completely flat and apparantely has some kind of impenetrable borders - this is where the map just ends.

The races living in this land fulfill typical fantasy stereotypes: brutish Giants, Elves, Dwarves, noble Knights, fiendish Orcs and also the ultimate evil Overlord called Bane. Each fraction starts with one city where at least one race specific unit can be built. From here, expansion starts - or is supposed to start.

As mentioned, each fraction starts with another (then) exclusive top unit production ability. This isn't ability isn't bound to the races themselves, though. It's rather inherent of the respective city, so if another player conquers it, he/she will get this advantage.

Production is scattered across the map relatively logically. You'll find dwarf and giant units mostly in the mountains, cavalry on plains, elves in the woods and so on. Standard units like heavy and light infantry can be built basically anywhere. These production abilities of the cities can't be changed throughout the game. That makes it very important to conquer/hold key cities.

Another pretty unique element of Warlords is the heroes. Every player starts out with one. These strong units can't only fight other armies, but they can also search ruins and temples. In those, they usually meet some monster which they have to fight. Being successful, they're rewarded with either large amounts of gold, magical items to enhance their own abilities or so-called allies. Allies are particularly powerful units like for example dragons which can't be built anywhere on the map. Yet another important strategical factor...

One of the biggest advantages of Warlords is probably also its biggest problem, though: the map. The map of Illuria where the whole game takes place is great! It's very well balanced, yet still structured into very different parts which all require different strategies. Hours, days and weeks must have been spent to fine-tune this map - and it shows. And now the downpoint: it's the only map. There aren't any other countries to conquer, nor is there an editor or even a random map generator. It's always Illuria, and even the greatest map ever can't hold the player's interest forever, in spite of its eight different starting positions.

There are a few other 'shortcomings' of the game, but those have to be blamed on the genre, actually. Warlords is just a wargame, and nothing more. There is no big economic part (just keeping an eye on the upkeep of your army), there is no proper diplomacy and so on and so on. You're just leading your armies into battle. That's really fun for fans and even newcomers to the genre (thanks to the easy controls), but it doesn't go very deep.

Comments (2) [Post comment]

Herr M.:

From a very recent replay I can totally agree on the game's wonderful simplicity: There are a couple of rules which are easy to learn and it is very comfy to get into.

Yet they lead to a fascinating complexity that can make the game difficult at times or lead to some really tense and exciting situations. E.g. sneaky units that you simply did not have on your radar, lucky strikes in battles, finding one of the more powerful artifacts and changing the tide with it.

So, still worth the one or the other game even today. If it were not for the dusty graphics and the somewhat clunky interface you might even say it is somewhat timeless.

One strange thing happened to me though: While conquering the island in the NW corner of the map, I summoned all my heroes and best units (dragons, demons, ghosts) and tried to conquer one of the last three remaining castles. The heroes were no nobodies: They had increased strength, some of the strongest artifacts, all of them attacked at once… yet they were vanquised by a two simple heroes a dragon and some infantry. Must have been some kind of bug or I simply do not know how the combat system works.

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