The convoluted story behind the development of Rise and Fall: Civilizations at War is for another time and place. But one can’t help but think that the failings of the game are mostly due to the original developer – Stainless Steel studios, the creators of Empire Earth – shuttering its doors 6 months ago, prior to the game’s completion. Midway turned the development over to one of their internal studios, and what should have been a defining game of the genre, from one of the better developers of Real-Time Strategies, instead turns out to be a limply conventional RTS with one major gameplay twist that hardly makes up for its lack of polish.
At first blush, Rise and Fall is a pretty straightforward RTS set in the classical period of history, with gameplay that mimics the core mechanics of other classic RTS franchises, especially Age of Empires. You build town centers and archery academies; workers mine for gold and trees; you upgrade your technology by spending your resources, etc., etc. It even throws in some added levels of complexity with Civ-like advisors who give you added bonuses and special units like ladder crews and war elephants. But what Rise and Fall does different becomes apparent once you start playing around with your heroes.
Drop that Zero and Get Yourself a Hero
In addition to your standard upgradeable melee, ranged and mounted units (not to mention siege units like catapults and battering rams), Rise and Fall allows you to create heroes to lead your troops into battle. Both of the campaigns available in the game lock you into using one hero, either Alexander the Great of Greece or Cleopatra of Egypt. Playing in skirmish mode though, more heroes are available to you, including those of the other two civilizations represented in the game, Persia and Rome.
Once your heroes upgrade to level 2 – by spending the “glory resource, something you obtain through fighting battles or acquiring certain upgrades – they can by controlled more directly in battle. Double click on their icon and you’re thrown into a third person camera, and with standard keyboard/mouse shooter controls you are now in control of your hero as you slash your way through the oncoming hordes. It’s a pretty cool little trick, and breaks up the monotony of dragging boxes over legions of units and fervently clicking on the map. But once you’ve destroyed an entire army by your own sword-wielding hand, it may seem like it was a little too easy. So in an effort to balance the game out – i.e. keep gamers from simply rushing through in third person mode in an orgy of blood – you’re not allowed to use the “Hero Command” mode when your stamina goes down. That’s fine, but how do you replenish your stamina? Smashing jars that are found scattered around the level. I’ll take non-sensical game clichés for $200 please, Alex.
Woe is Me I’m Having Problems
This really becomes a problem in certain levels that begin with you in the Hero Command mode and are intended to be played throughout that way. Once your stamina depletes, there’s nothing you can do but run back and forth with no control over your weapons. Since you can’t pop back out to the overhead view, there’s absolutely no way for you to destroy a jar you might see. This is a big, level-stopping problem.
It’s not the only major oversight of the game. Things like including only two campaigns – albeit well fleshed out ones with actual storylines and cutscenes – shallow tech trees and the inability to choose different formations for your troops are poor design choices that seem related to the controversy behind the game’s development. But other, more technical problems are just a sign of ineptitude and shoddiness, or perhaps a willingness on the part of Midway to cut their losses and shove this title out the door. For one, the pathfinding A.I. is atrocious, often leaving units stuck walking into a boulder or tree while the rest of the under-manned army marches off to their doom. And I dare anyone to be able to land a ship and disembark the soldiers on it on the first try. Watching your Triremes (that’s oldtimey talk for a big rowboat that can ram stuff) try to negotiate the shore is like watching a blind man parallel park. Though less entertaining.
If you ever run into one of the erstwhile developers of Stainless Stell Studios, you should probably buy him or her a beer and let them cry on your shoulder; it’s gotta hurt to see a game you made that obviously started out with a lot of potential get released in such an unfinished state. Rise and Fall has it all; nice cutscenes to tie the campaign stories together, multiplayer fun, a skirmish mode and even a powerful map and scenario editor (so powerful you’ll need a Ph.D in computer science to figure it out) to give RTS fans every reason to enjoy it. What it doesn’t give them is a finished and final product that they shelled out their hard earned money for. It’s like buying a Mercedes, minus the lugnuts.
Review By: Tom Price
Video Produced By: Michael Benson
