Saga - MMORTS
By: Reed Bertrand |
Tuesday July 31, 2007 |
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Kingdom Management & Combat |
| Coined as an MMORTS (Massively Multiplayer Online Realtime Strategy Game), Wahoo Studios believes that you will enjoy a game whose main focus is kingdom management and combat with elements of collectible trading card games and traditional MMORPG elements. At the time of this writing Saga will be a MMORTS without a monthly fee as it will be supplemented with the purchase of booster packs for the game. Saga is set in a traditional fantasy setting rife with the traditional fantasy races. Players are dropped in a world filled with war that is created by five competing Gods whose associated faction is unique in its own ways. Currently, your choices as a player are: * Magic (Dark Elves), * Machines (Dwarves) * Nature (Elves) * War (Orcs) * Light (Giants) Factions share hatred with other factions an example would be Nature being in conflict with Machines and War while being neutral with the other two. The uniqueness of each faction gives players flexibility in play styles and even city layouts. Kingdom management is a simple but important element in the world of Saga. After choosing a city layout for my kingdom I was given the basics: a town hall, a temple, a mailbox and a few houses. From these buildings I could build my army, delegate tasks to my peasants, accept quests, and buy or trade goods. Other buildings are available for purchase that can provide services, create resources, or help improve your technology. Also available are wall fortifications and towers for combat with other players. Peasants can be set to a multitude of daily tasks from resource gathering to police work but be wary as they cost gold every day to keep them working. Army building can be done via the town hall and you are capped based on how much housing you have available in your kingdom. The complete status of your kingdom is available to you at the click of a button alerting you to shortages in resources and the well being of your people. Keeping your subjects happy is an important aspect of the game as unhappy people will desert, or worse, riot and create chaos. Thankfully, since the world is persistent, you can access the status of your kingdom from the website so you log in to make changes if things take a turn for the worse. Combat in Saga is split between player vs. enemy and player vs. player elements. At no point in the game do you have to fight other players. There are quests that are available at your church to complete that offer the chance to earn extra resources, and for you and your troops to gain levels. Player vs. Player pits your kingdom against another players’ kingdoms. If you do not wish for your kingdom to sustain damage there is a scrimmage mode. Fighting on the battlefield works much like a traditional RTS with a couple of caveats. First, you are limited by the amount of units you can field based on your combat points which you can raise by gaining levels. Secondly, you cannot mix and match units, as similar units will stick together. Lastly, all buildings can be captured which can yield certain advantages as being able to earn you resources and get your units around the field quicker. Saga shows a lot of promise for an MMORTS, but I didn’t see much of it when I played the closed beta. The players on my server preferred questing as opposed to warring and selling off their units to the highest bidder. They also had a tendency to compare their height and weights amongst one another in some attempt to see who were the better man as well as sharing their stories of failed relationships. Hopefully with more people in the open beta, player vs. player will be more readily available. Back on topic I can see the trading card aspect to be very promising, as it will offer new content that can be traded or used to the player’s advantage. I would like to see them add some kingdom management to the website so that way players can make adjustments if they are not near a client to log on. The open beta began on July 5th and I would suggest giving it a look if you are an RTS fan. Saga Dragons Saga E3 Saga Animation Test |
