Battle Realms
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Everybody (sort of) was Kung Fu Fighting
Liquid was one of the tragic losses of the RTS world in my opinion, as they did something no other RTS did at that time. They put a -lot- of effort in animation of each unique unit, as you can see in another game that will be mentioned here: Lord Of The Rings: The War Of The Ring.
The result of this investment in animation? Every fight, regardless of the amount of units, feels like Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon come to life.
Sidesteps, acrobatic kicks, jumping around the battlefield makes combat feel like martial arts movies merged in a video game. Every unit alters the animations at random, making every fight seem unique and fluid, even when multiple similar units are fighting at the same time
Another thing that sticks out is the feel of each clan. True, there are only four to pick from, but each of them is so different from one another, that it is almost impossible to draw similarities between units when it comes to appearance, role and usage and off course, animation
If you thought that was it, the game offers even further customization to each unit in the form of "upgrades" or "enchantments" you can bestow upon them. Those enchantments, called Battle Gear, further customizing each unit, making even two armies of the same unit, have wildly different uses.
The four factions are only united under which philosophy they embody. Are they using the dark energies of Yin? Or are they forces of good in this world, utilizing Yang? Throughout the game as you fight you will accumulate pips of the respective energy, which you can either use to upgrade your units, or stockpile to enlist and empower your heroes (called Zen Masters), or specific units (Samurai and Ronin). How are the factions split? well easy
Dragon and Wolf: Yang (The good guys)
Serpent and Lotus: Yin (The not so good guys)
(Author's note when it comes to selecting faction: Yang. Obviously always pick Yang)
But seriously, how does this game looks and sounds like?
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Unfortunately, when all is said and done, the game has its ups and downs. It has a lot of excelent ideas masterfully executed, but unfortunately it does not offer enough of a kick to truly let those mechanics shine. For starters the low resolution means that more often than not you are stuck with a limited field of view, with the UI taking a lot of space. On the other hand, with a zoom feature you can easilly extend to a more 3d-ish view of the battlefield, and enjoy the combat and base building a lot better. But lets take it apart one step at a time
Sound: The sound of this game is a mix for me. The music is -so- bland and uninspired I strongly suggest you just turn it off and blast your own music to match your clan of choice. Voice acting? Passable. It is there, for sure, and it is not cringeworthy, but it is not something you will remember.
Strangely, what the voice acting and music fail to do, the rest of the sounds capture perfectly. Sound effects, battle noises and sounds of nature are so perfectly captured that they draw you into the entire universe way better than the voice and music.
From splashes when you are crossing shallows, rain drops,thunder, forest birds, even different sound effects for when your units walk through the forest while it rains etc, the game -really- draws you into what your surroundings. The best part?
Forests not only have different sound effects (rain sounding differently, leaves and twigs crunching under units etc) but they actually tie into the mechanics as well. Have your units run inside a forest and you risk disturbing birds, who will fly up to the sky while making loud noises. This is followed by a ping on the minimap to -all- players, as well as temporary vision there. Your expert assault behind enemy lines just got foiled because your Samurai just stepped on a pidgeon's tail.
Visuals: A mixed bag here as well. Though bellow average, even for its era, visuals make up for it in animation and faction design. With low resolution options and a bit larger UI than needed, you will be struggling to keep all your units in the same area so you can better choose them, more than you would struggle against your enemies. The option to zoom in helps a -lot- as it tilts the camera, giving you a bit more line of sight in the third dimension.
Where the game truly shines, is in its unique world design and faction design. Every single unit, building and detail is unique to each clan, and the lighting on buildings by the enviroment (fire, magma, rain and snow clouds etc) give an excelent grasp of the world around you and make up for the sub par graphics.
I will not even mention the animations, a second time. Unlike most RTS's of that time, sending units in battle and then just ignore them and focus on something else, or micromanage them is no longer the case. You are -annoyed- when you have to draw your eyes away from combat. Sure, micromanagment may be required to a great extend. Especially if you have a lot of varying battle gears, but personally I found myself wanting to watch the fight play off. The animations were awesome, the blood work was awesome, the sound effects were awesome. It felt painful, brutal and exhausting, and with blood sticking to weapons it was fun to see that new recruit survive battle after battle, becoming a gruesome veteran.
That is good and all, but how does it play?
The gameplay is standard RTS. Build a base, recruit units, kill the other guys. Simple, easy to understand, been done a million times we all saw it comming.
And yet its not standard RTS in key features.
The game has a very interseting approach to recruitment, training and world interaction.
Recruitment and Training
Unlike other RTS's you do not recruit your worker villagers. They spawn after a set amount of time, that increases for each unit you already have. Then how do you train units one would ask? Well, you will have to take said villagers and put them IN the combat buildings to train.
The more buildings a unit trains in, the higher its tier, and the closest to your "elite" you get.
However, the game does something I have not seen done in many RTS's and that is unit effectivenes. When you place your cursor above an enemy unit the sword icon will change to show your effectiveness against it. Bronze sword means your attacks are innefective, silver they are normal, gold they are effective. This means that a tier 1 unit, when fighting a unit they are effective against will -always- win in a 1v1 situation.
So why do I called some units elites? Well because they are the units I have found have the least weaknesses, or they attack everyone with normal strength (except buildings) etc. For example an army of werewolves (not swearwolves or therewolves) are not effective against anything, but they do manage to deal normal damage to everyone except buildings to which they are not effective. At best I think they might have one or two units they are effective against, but the bottom line is that when you unleash twenty werewolves against the armies of your enemy, nobody is safe.
Where in a similar situation with Samurai, there are a few units that will both either have an easier time against Samurai, or just manage to hold them off until you overwhelm their allies.
World Interaction
The selling point of this game to me. Despite all of its flaws, this is why this game is worth talking about. Simply put, throughout the game there are ways in which you are either called to, or have the option to, interract with the world around you, with various effects
With forests and shallows being a hindrance to your movement speed as well as giving audio/visual queues for your enemies to spot you easier, approaching an enemy has more forethought than other RTS games of a similar style
Do I cut through the woods, for a surprise ambush, but risk alerting him to my plans?
Or do I choose the safe route around the forest, knowing however that when I attack, even with the element of surprise, I will have to face all his defences?
This happens because elevation also plays a key role in the game. The higher a unit is, for example say, on a watchtower, the longer its range, and the more it can see. Placing towers is actually fun to do and requires some forethought into it.
With so many factors limiting movement speed and vision, ambushing becomes a key component in the game. After all, crashing your entire army in an enemy that has the majority of his troops still crossing the river, gives you a significant advantage
Finally, my favorite element of the game, its weather. As there are only two resources in the game, water and rice, weather comes into play with various fun ways. Rice, is a resource that, as you collect it, gets depleted. It grows back, sure, but you will have to manage the growth to harvest ration carefully, unless you want to end up without a hefty amount of supply to rebuild and retrain.
With rain giving rice a growth acceleration, and snow (in the expansion) cutting it significantly it gives you more to think about when playing. A well timed pillage run with Serpent raiders to burn the rice fields prior a blizzard is extremelly devastating, yet the same tactic is nearly useless if done before rain.
TLDR
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Battle Realms is an overal average RTS that offers however unique gameplay mechanics, factions and units to give you lots of hours of enjoyment. With two campaigns giving you an interesting story worthy of a martial arts film, it is truly a game worth playing.
With its mechanics favoring clever use of your faction's toolkit and thinking outside the box, it is one of the games I really wish I had more people to play with against the AI, or each other.
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