I moved on from Avalon Code and started Generation of Chaos for PSP. This one doesn’t have a good reputation, and in fact after a few hours with it I’ve put it back on the shelf, but it’s kind of interesting. It’s a strategy game where you control one of ten nations and set out to conquer the rest of them. You do this by moving commander units around a board game-ish map, taking control of and improving territory, and fighting when you encounter enemy commanders. The fights are real-time with up to sixty units between the sides, though this is one commander each and 29 much weaker grunts, most of whom tend to die in each battle but are readily replaced through recruitment if you’re in a city. I know the usual strategy/tactical RPG abstraction of having an army consist of six individuals or whatever is ridiculous but I kind of prefer it to having a horde of expendable nobodies die in each fight. Also, these sixty person fights are slow. Occasionally I was able to fire off a super move at the start of one, wipe out everyone except the enemy commander, and have my 29 soldiers gang up on and destroy them, which was pretty good, but otherwise it’s slow attrition.
Actually everything is slow. The world map is turn based, and it takes forever to move around it. Upgrading a town takes multiple turns. You can only move a few units each turn. And everything is complicated. You have tonnes of units, they have heaps of stats, the towns all have stats, there are a million menus, most of the menu options are reduced to three letters so you have to press select to see the info box if you don’t remember what “PRS” means (it’s prisoners, and it lets you see enemies who you’ve beaten and captured, allowing you to release, execute, or attempt to recruit them - I was delayed in trying to recruit because when you choose that menu option and decide which of your units to have attempt to win them over, the menu option to confirm your selection is “execute”, a strange choice given capital punishment is also an option).
I get the feeling if I knew this game inside out I could have a really good time with it, but I don’t and I don’t think I’d enjoy the effort required to get there. My PSP’s analogue stick drifting like crazy doesn’t help matters, either.
Actually everything is slow. The world map is turn based, and it takes forever to move around it. Upgrading a town takes multiple turns. You can only move a few units each turn. And everything is complicated. You have tonnes of units, they have heaps of stats, the towns all have stats, there are a million menus, most of the menu options are reduced to three letters so you have to press select to see the info box if you don’t remember what “PRS” means (it’s prisoners, and it lets you see enemies who you’ve beaten and captured, allowing you to release, execute, or attempt to recruit them - I was delayed in trying to recruit because when you choose that menu option and decide which of your units to have attempt to win them over, the menu option to confirm your selection is “execute”, a strange choice given capital punishment is also an option).
I get the feeling if I knew this game inside out I could have a really good time with it, but I don’t and I don’t think I’d enjoy the effort required to get there. My PSP’s analogue stick drifting like crazy doesn’t help matters, either.
