Combat Arms Review: Pt 2, The Game

In my previous post “Combat Arms Review: Pt 1, Nexon and the business proposition” covering Nexon’s online First Person Shooter (FPS) game Combat Arms (CA), I covered the general economic model and the attraction for playing this very comprehensive of “free games”.

This 2nd part of the review is looking now to the game mechanic and the strengths/weaknesses of the platform and community. Specifically:

1. Is the gameplay any good?
2. How good is the user interface?
3. What is the community like?

Background
I’ve been playing first person shooters for a very long time, albeit I don’t profess to being particularly good at them. I still have a zipped up version of the original Wolfenstein and Duke Nukem for a historical laugh. Similarly aged FPS players like myself have a chuckle that as we upgraded our machines from 386 proccessors to 486 architecture, we would turn off the “turbo” button to slow the computer down so that they could comfortably play the game in its original game state. A whole new world was unveiled with the arrival of the Pentium Processors of the day. I’ve been in businesses which played networked versions of Doom, Counterstrike, different versions of Quake, Unreal Tournament 2004 & 2007.

Ironically enough I never got into Call of Duty or the Battlefield 1942 type of games, being what I class as just a “casual gamer”,  I just never quite had a computer “fast enough” to run such heavy duty graphics and support the game play comfortably and always seemed to be 2 versions of Direct X behind what was current and more to the point what my computer and video card could support.

Recent times, though I’ve managed to get a laptop with a solid state hard drive, which has made a huge difference in terms of my gaming ability, connected to a decent external monitor. This led me to my search for different first person shooters that were free and had reasonable graphics and gameplay which would entice me to play on a semi regular basis.

Is the gameplay any good?
If you like Counterstrike, you’ll like CA. Set in modern times, there is an array of maps and assorted weaponry which is accessible to all players. The ranking system is modeled after the US Military, with some variation at the upper echelon ranks. As discussed previously, as you progress through each rank, gaining experience you are allowed access to different maps and more importantly, different GP (Gear Point) based weapons of varying types and capabilities.

When you first start off life in the CA world, you are the rank of T = Trainee, having to go through the mandatory training and orientation battles. When I joined a couple of years back, they didn’t have this orientation, instead throwing you in the deep end into the battle servers instead. There are an array of servers available – at the time of writing, I’m playing on the US based servers and I tend to spend most of my time on Server West. Within Server West, there are a number of different servers groups – Alpha, Bravo, Foxtrot, Black Market and Papa – each with an array of game play servers underneath that you can join. Access to these servers is based on either your rank or your KDR = Kill Death Ratio or in some cases both. Starting off life as a modest T= Trainee and than graduating to P = Private, you start with a KDR of 1.00. KDR is calculated by your number of kills divided by your number of deaths (yours). So if for example you manage to kill 20 people in a game, but die 15 times, your KDR = 20/15 = 1.25. If conversely you kill 15, but die 20 times, your KDR = 15/20 = 0.75. Really, anything above 0.85 is considered pretty good.

Gameplay itself is simple – you pick a room, with the appropriate game mode you want to play and join it. With up to 16 players (multiplayer) in the same room, games in general are surprisingly lag free. I play at home over my home wireless and ADSL and don’t have any problems. In game, graphics is fluid, and very much focused on rapid, real time decision making, skill and good representation of graphics. This to me is the appeal of CA – the gameplay is very enjoyable, as on the whole, everyone is there to have a good time. In game chat options are 1/All 2/Team or 3/Clan, which you can interface with via either keyboard or voice microphone/headphones.

On the whole, I spend the bulk of my time playing Elimination, as I find that, particularly when you are playing with some friends, it is the most enjoyable from a casual gaming perspective, as you can work together.  There are a number of game modes:

Elimination: Which is you and a group of team mates against an opposing force of similar numbers. The game has a target number of kills e.g. 140 and its the first team to get there, which wins. Each time you kill, it adds to an overall game tally of “kills”, each time you die, you re-spawn about 5 seconds later and continue on, accruing a “death” = hence the capability to calculate a KDR. Probably the most popular of the game types.

Elimination Pro: Tougher. Again, you are separated into teams, but if you die, you don’t re-spawn – get a second life until the round ends. The game lasts as long as a team has a player in the field, who remains alive, with the winning team that which has the last player standing. Games on big maps can last for ages, as you run around “hiding” and trying to get a clear line of sight with the enemy, without them getting a bead on you. Much less forgiving of mistakes and tends to be played by better KDR players, who fave higher powered weapons i.e. shotguns, sniper rifles or have particularly good aiming accuracy.

Fireteam: You verses the computer and hoards of either a/ Zombies or b/ Computer controlled players. There are limited maps being available in this mode, those being Cabin Fever, Desert Storm, or Desert Fox. Team work rules the day here – much harder to play as a lone gunman, you will get over run and swamped by the opposition in a matter of minutes.

Quarantine: A variant of Fireteam, you have a time limit to destroy all the Zombie hoards attacking you from all points of the game – played on a limited set of maps, you have the opportunity to “hole” up in specific places. Again, a heavy emphasis on team play to defeat the enemy overall. My least favourite mode.

Capture the Flag: 2 spawn points, 2 flags, get the oppositions flag and return it to your spawn point. Simple.

One Man Army: As the name suggests, everyone to themselves. Weaponry and skill rule the day here.

How good is the user interface?
When you log into the platform, navigation around the servers is pretty straight forward – there are different areas where you can gather on the server to take part in community chat, there’s a section to look at your game character and fit out the weapons you accrue over time. In the 2 or so years I’ve been playing the game, the Nexon guys haven’t rested on their laurels – every 6 months or so, they update the game interface, based no doubt on analytics of what people are looking at and where they are spending their time. Each time they have upgraded the interface, I’ve been really happy with the evolutionary changes and incremental functionality introductions/deletions – it’s all very logical and straight forward.

In game play, user interface is the classic FPS keyboard/mouse combination which can be specifically configured to your own requirements i.e. invert the mouse so that forward is up and reverse is down or change the firing keys etc. Sensitivity in game can also be altered too in game which is nice, when you want to tweak your settings to a sniper type game where you want slow movements verses a Close Quarters Combat (CQB) battle with high sensitivity.

Game play is full screen and the array of information around the screen is clear an unobtrusive. I think this is where Nexon really got it right in the game play – I’ve since downloaded and tried a few of the other games that are available in the space like  Operation 7, Cross Fire etc but they just don’t have (In my humble opinion) as good a user interface in terms of design or usability. It makes a serious difference when you’re running around a map and someone is taking snipes at you, how easy it is to read and interact with the user interface.

What is the community like?
I’ve mentioned that games can have up to 16 players in them – if you play regularly enough, you often get to know players by their call sign, as they tend to log in the same time as yourself and you can get chatting to them. If you find a particularly good bunch of people to play with, you can join a “clan” which is a collective of people who play under the same team or clan name. There are some distinct advantages to this, not least of all co-ordinated game play. The camaraderie that occurs during a clan match with like minded team mates is also a lot of fun. Clan War’s between 2 opposing clans, with both clans communicating on their own private channels to each other during the middle of a game takes the gameplay and complexity of the game to a whole different level – it is fantastic, the blend of tactics, skill and thinking involved.

A by product of clan wars, is that clans are sectioned off into levels – Level 1 can have a maximum of 10 players, Level 2 = 20, Level 3 = 30 and so on. With the accrual of each level (by way of clan war matches) the clan members can access different weaponry and armament which is wholly unavailable from the store or via ranking up through the levels as an individual.

I’m the member of a clan which is quite small – only 8 members, but because we are all based in Australia and play at similar times, each time we log on its nice to have people around. It’s an adult clan – we’re all got kids and mortgages and chat about real world things over voice chat – with the common thread of interest being the game itself. Playing a clan war in a co-ordinated way is a whole lot of fun, particularly on the bigger maps and in the team mode maps like capture the flag etc.

Overall, if you like FPS – I’d highly recommend giving this game a go, particularly if you have an office environment where there are network games on a Friday night – it’s great fun.

Combat Arms Review: Pt 1, Nexon and the business proposition

As part of my ongoing research into online communities, I spent some time earlier this year looking around for a First Person Shooter to have a go at. I've always been a fan of FPS games, although I don't profess to be particularly good at them, I do have fun. My preferences were relatively simple -

• it had to be free
• it had to have half decent graphics

So I searched around and found one that looked like it would fit the bill: Combat Arms, created by Nexon Games. In their own words:

Surpassing the two-million user mark before completing its first year of service, Combat Arms excels by offering players a variety of combat styles and game maps, complete with eye-catching graphics, customized characters, and more. Combat Arms also features a high level of socialization with its Buddy Lists, Community Support, In-game Clan System and more. This essential mix of elements represents a truly unique offering in the world of first-person shooters: a dynamic, ever-evolving game that encourages both friendly competition and individual expression.

Some questions I had been asking myself before I got in were:

1. How on earth does Nexon make money, given that the environment and full game play is free?
2. How good is the user interface?
3. Is the gameplay any good?
4. What is the community like?

I downloaded the game files (around 2Gb Compressed) and installed it on my home laptop to have a go. The attractions to have a closer look were driven around the structured setup of its non game environment – a very established You Tube Community Channel, numerous fan sites which feed in particular aspects to the game – weapons reviews, map reviews, interviews with players are all prominent activities which are heavily focused upon.

Addressing the first question – How on earth does Nexon make money, given that the environment and the full game play is free?

At time of writing, there were some 3.5 million registered players.

For a framework, the game enforces a ranking system upon players which reflects the US Military e.g. Trainee, Recruit, Private, Corporate, Sergeant, Staff Sergeant (3 levels), Sgt First Class (3 levels), Master Sergeant (3 levels), Command Master Sergeant (4 levels), Lieutenant etc etc. Playing the game you gain experience  and are awarded "Experience Points" which are calculated on the number of kills you gain in each match. Matchplay is classic One Man Army, Team Elimination with a set target of team kills, Elimination Pro, which is a last man standing team scenario, Capture the Flag, Search & Destroy, Bombing Run & Seize & Secure.

As you accrue more points, this contributes to your overall ability to "rank up". In addition, the game also allocates "Gear Points" or GP which you can use to acquire virtual in game weapons, armour, support items etc. If you stick entirely to the GP, you can have a competitive existence. An example is if you kill say 20 people in a game, you'll get around 200 Experience Points and around 150 GP. To buy a M6A2 SRT Assault Rifle for 24 hours, would cost you around 1,100 GP. This is a really good way to stay free and competitive, however Combat Arms at time of writing had over 150 different weapons, ranging across the different types including Assault Rifles, Sniper Rifles, Sub Machine Guns, Machine Guns, Shotguns, RPG's, Pistols & Grenades of varying types.

So this is how Nexon makes their money.

For these different range of weapons that are beyond the scope of being able to procure by way of the GP you collect along the way, Nexon lists a special set of weapons and upgrades and designates them as Rare, Restricted or only available by lucky chance (Hazard Cases, etc). As a consequence alot of these items are available to be purchased for varying amounts of time from one day up to permanent with REAL money, using the concept of NX, which is Nexon's Virtual Cash World. At time of writing, 30,000 NX = $30 USD, which you'd bill to your credit card via their secure gateway. As an example, you can buy usage for 24 hours of an M39 EMR Desert Sniper Rifle which would cost you 990NX.

Permanent ownership of the same weapon would cost you 24,900 NX. in real world terms, this is roughtly $1 dollar and $25 dollars respectively. Ownership of these weapons and other items is driven around that concept of personalisation – each player can tailor what they look like, what armour/uniform they wear, the weapons they carry, helmets, face masks, combat vests etc. If you consider purchasing a boxed software variant like CounterStrike, Bad Company 2 or Ghost Recon will set you back around $100, than suddenly purchasing unique weapons which you "keep" doesn't seem like such a silly idea, particularly because the game environment is constantly getting updated with additional maps, game modes and a concerted pursuit against hackers.

In the clan I've joined, predominantly made up of people over the age of 25, some of the guys have spent upwards of $1,500+ (!!!!) on weapons, uniform upgrades (armour vests, anti flash grenade glasses, goggles), character upgrades (restricted in game characters) and support gear (air strike designators, mines, proximity explosives). Believe me, Nexon make shed loads of money from selling these "virtual" items. Good on them. As a byproduct, the gameplay and interest for myself has been compelling.

This is part 1 of the review of the Combat Arms website http://combatarms.nexon.net.

100 Days of Evony

So I joined my first MMORTS – Massively Multiplayer Online Real Time Strategy – www.evony.com. This was for a number of reasons, including:

• I’m a geek at heart. I used to play alot of Age  of Empires and the appeal of playing a Real Time Strategy that was free, no less, was a powerful lure.
• I was actually interested in the notion of “community” which I had read about in several reviews, specifically when you joined an Alliance.
• The Advertising was just crazy. It has copped an enormous amount of negative press and criticism, most notably because once you got into game play, there were no references to the said advertising (sad for some). Coding Horror had a particularly funny blog post on How Not to Advertise about a week before I joined. That tipped me to have a look.
• 8 million users as at 3rd September 2009. When I joined in July ’09 – 5 million were active according to www.evony.net. That’s ALOT of people.

Evony Global View

The Game itself
When you first log in, you are confronted with a list of servers to join. If logging in in for the first time, you get automatically allocated to the most recent server which has space on it.  I got logged on to Server 41, and started to play. Each server can have up to 120,000 active players on it, before they create a new one. At time of writing they were clearing through Server 86. So lots of people online.

Essentially, Evony is a fairly static game from a visual perspective, in comparison to the sprawling armies which you command in Age of Empires. Progress is measured by the notion of “Prestige” which is a combination of building upgrades, technology advancements and conquests, by way of territory or battles. Game play is based around the real time  creation and improvement of your City(s) overall level and state of advancement from a technology perspective which consists of different types of buildings.

• Resource generation – Farms, saw mills, quarries and mines. These produce food, lumber (wood), stone & iron.
• Barracks – production of fighting units in discreet numbers, limited by your resources available and the number of idle villagers in your city. The higher the barracks level, the broader the range of units that can be created.
• Cottages – are used to house city population in turn allowing taxes to be levied which create gold. The higher the cottage level, the higher the population = higher gold generation.
• Technology buildings to enable improved states of play by way of game improvements ranging from unit strength, across to production capacity or production speed – Includes Academy, Workshop, Forge, Relay Station & Warehouse.

With the above variants, upgrading each takes real time consumption i.e. going from a level 1 barrack to a level 2 barrack takes 5 minutes. The kicker is that you can only do 1 upgrade at a time, in sequential order and you can’t queue this production – meaning an onerous amount of time can be spent online waiting for things to upgrade/finish, so that you can click the next one.  As you progress up to higher upgrade levels, the time to complete increases exponentially. For instance, at time of writing, I was upgrading my Archery at the Academy from Level 8 to 9 which entailed a completion time of 127 hours, meaning that I couldn’t cue any other technology research at that particular city. That’s a REALLY long time! What makes it tantalising at the start is that you get a set of supplied “Speed Up’s” which are cued almost to the second to assist in speeding up production time. Of course Evony don’t supply enough to upgrade your entire city to a level 10, just enough here and there at different times to keep you interested.

Game mechanics

Resources generation is shown in real time and measured in production output per hour e.g. To cite lumber/wood as an example 3,000 lumber per hour. The actual output is governed by 5 different attributes. In all the below, the higher the numbers, the better the net outcome on your production.

• Level of the lumber yard i.e. Level 1 to 9.
• The politics attribute level of your mayor (Hero given Castallan status at Feasting Hall).
• Magical assistance from items with defined time period of effectiveness e.g. Arch Saw adds 25% over 24 hours
• Capture of requisite valley local to your city which adds a percentage contribution to production i.e capture a Forest will yield a % increase production
• Level of research at your Academy for the respective resource technology improvement completed i.e. Level 1 to 10.

So what’s the aim of the game?

It is essentially about building armies and gaining territory.

In the early days of the server, whilst under 7 day beginner protection meaning I couldn’t attack or be attacked, I observed people typing/talking in “World Chat” and everyone was talking about completing the “Quests”. With the above in mind, I began to take the advice and start following the Quests which are little tasks which teach you how the game mechanic works and rewards you for completion of each task. Very quickly, my city and technology started to “level up”, I was getting promoted, my armies were getting bigger, I conquered my first valley, I won my first battle.

Fun. Addictive fun. REALLY Addictive fun.

Consumption of resources falls into 5 areas:

• Research Technology/Improvement at academy
• Production of Troops at barracks
• Levelling up of buildings and structures
• Battle – March, Camp, Loss of troops in Battle
• Being plundered by an enemy army.

Evony City View

Alliances, Leadership, Politics and War

With 120,000 potential competitors sharing space on the server, and the game mechanic geared towards having battles and contesting territory, one of the wider goals within the Quests where emphasis is placed is to join an Alliance, which loosely surmised is a collective of 100 people. The advantage of an alliance is you pool knowledge, reinforce and support each other with resources and can chat in the “Alliance Chat”, which is a private channel for Alliance members only. Structurally each Alliance is founded by a Host, with 2 Vice Hosts, 6 Presbytyr’s & 20 Officers enforcing order and discipline on the 100 members. When a Host founds an alliance, they can call it a suitably appropriate name. On Server 41, Alliance number 1 was “Paladins”. They had a 20,000 Prestige entry requirement. At the time of my looking into applying, I was a very princely 1,215 Prestige. Hmmm – quite a bit of work to do.

This is where the game started to get interesting. As alluded to earlier, I used to play Age of Empires, so citing the need for a suitably thematic alliance, I decided to bypass ones called “Kings, Elites, The Unit etc” in favour of one called 300. How very Spartan of me. I applied and they let me in, with my hard earnt 1,215 Prestige. From this point on joining 300, my Prestige started to go into an orbital trajectory.  2,000. 4,000. A week later 15,000. 3 weeks later 70,000…. The alliance people were helping me get higher, offering me suggestions, advice and encouragement. Over the ensuing weeks, I met some real characters in here – funny, helpful, informative. Initially everyone was feeling their way around, trying things out, offering advice and learning a hell of lot from each other. I hit gold in joining 300, as it seemed to be mostly adults, who had jobs, families, real lives. Some people got booted along the way, for poor behaviour, others for inactivity. Somehow, I got promoted to Presbytyr. Apparently for being helpful and knowledgeable about the battle engine, which I had taken some time out to learn and exploit by way of the Evony Forum’s. Life was pretty fun.

Then politics entered. Yea. I hate politics, both in my online gaming and in real life. Some people started to go away on extended leave, moved house, and so forth, so they left their account details with some “trusted” people. It went particularly badly when one of these people had control of 5 accounts, including the Host, Vice Host & 1 of the Presbytyrs. That’s when it all went south as suddenly you didn’t know if you were talking to the person whose account it was or the person “minding” it. It really got nasty when they started to threaten people in Alliance Chat and everyone got wary and couldn’t work out who was actually online. I left.

Evony Town View

I joined WAR IV, the 4th division of a very active alliance with about 15 others from 300 who were fed up with the poor outcomes of the account swapping fiasco. Was quickly promoted back up to Presbytyr again. Then it went south with the host of WAR I, logged in and started to abuse people in Alliance chat, for no good reason. I left again, with the same original 15 from 300 and joined SPQR with trusted colleagues from the original 300. This also coincided with my  leanings towards the Roman Legions being reflected in the SPQR name.

It was at this time, that Server 41 was starting to get tough. My prestige was now 180,000+ and the armies that were being commandeered were hitting their 100,000 limit (125,000 if they used a war banner), comprising of hordes of archers, swordsman, ballista, cavalry, scouts, the whole kit and kaboodle. I was starting to get hit by armies of 60,000 archers, 5,000 ballista and 35,000 warriors. There were a few occasions where I was online and I was able to scramble Alliance assistance to garrison at my Embassy 3 X 45,000 (135,000 total) archers and assorted other troops to defeat invading armies, due in part to my Level 10 Infomatics and Level 10 Beacon. Nothing quite like watching an enemy army of 100,000 units getting thumped by an garrisoned alliance force of 175,000+ troops. These times were quite satisfying as the requisite jump in Prestige and Honour were substantial. 1 battle alone, I recall getting some 630,000 Honour points. I had a happy hero on my hands which ended up costing me a fortune in salary increase. The problem overall though was that little SPQR with our 15 members was but a minnow in a very large and nasty ocean made up of Paladins, Kings, WAR and a few choice others who were dominating the server. The smaller (read 50K prestige) members of SPQR were getting chewed up. Badly. We ended up re-merging with 300 again, because we were just too darn small to survive out there against the big alliances. It helped greatly that the few malcontents who had made life unpleasant in the first place had since left 300.

A different Server. A new beginning.

So with the win’s few and far between, the server getting tougher and the lack of comaraderie that had characterised the beginnings on the wane, I decided to start another account on the newly minted Server 66. This served me really well, as I had the experience of Server 41 behind me and wouldn’t make the same mistakes. I logged in, reveled in 7 day beginner’s protection and promptly started to charge up my Prestige and my armies. To follow the same path, as the first server, I followed the quests and chose an alliance to join.This time they were called Storm, because the person I was chatting too (one of the Presbytyr’s) seemed reasonable and the other people I played online with when I logged in were similarly so. Until I logged on 2 days later. The Vice Host turned out to be of a social order that took its lessons in human interaction from rabid fighting dogs. Language, abusive tirades, a biting, sarcastic, framework of communications were what stemmed forth from their mouth.  Forget it, I wasn’t here to be somebodies punching bag for no good reason. I left.

I wandered around on my own for a few days, getting attacked and easily fending off the initial battles, as my army was some 2,000 spies and 4,000 archers , whereas I was getting hit by armies with 20 spies and maybe 500 archers. Combined with a forest of Archer Towers in my main city and other assorted surprises. Offers to join alliances were thick and fast, but the level of diplomacy and diction quality in the greeting missives and the subsequent dialogue left a lot to be desired. I stuck it out on my own having a bit of sport  with the local populace. If they attacked me and inevitably lost, I’d send them a polite message requesting truce and if they were rude (7 times out of 10), I responded back,with extreme prejudice. Wave attacks, 5,000 archers, then 5 waves of cavalry to plunder their population loyalty from 80 down to 40. They got the picture and quickly gave me a wide birth.

Then I get a lovely, well written, diplomatic and polite email from a host of an alliance called Angels. Angel 7 to be exact, which was the 7th branch of a 670+ member strong super alliance. And by lovely, I mean that the host of Angel 7 was female, which interestingly in the Evony world isn’t that rare an occurrence which adds a nice dimension to what could otherwise be the usual (so I have read) male dominated MMORTS experience.  The message to join Angel 7  was eloquent, polite and advocated peace and a fun, friendly environment. Suited me, as I was a bit over my warring ways and was looking forward to a more peaceful existence of being in an alliance which was more about the community side of things than the battles and stuff.

Angel 7 was fantastic. A bunch of really nice people from the day I joined, and anytime I logged on, there was interesting chatter about real world things. This may sound odd, but something I had noticed in the other alliances I’d been members of (and been promoted up) was that the conversations rarely deviated from the game at hand – battle tactics, target of the day, how to maximise resources, those sort of things. Angel 7 was refreshingly different – people talked about their hobbies, families, jobs, asked advice and received, on the whole, very good points of view and balanced responses. I spent 10 days in Angel 7, got promoted again to Presbytyr (what exactly am I doing to warrant these escalations of responsibility?) and life was nice.

Then I got tapped on the shoulder to start Angel 8. Nice one.

This is where the game got tough for me. Angel 8 was the 8th branch of a 670+ strong Super Alliance network of 7 other Angel branches, each managed by a terrific host. My remit was markedly different however. I was tasked to take the “tough, troublesome or suspect spies” from the 7 Angel’s branches. I had 35 applicants to start with and my job was to assess them each and everyone. So I marched off into the wilderness and did just that. Only 14 members came across. It was determined the other 21 were spy accounts. They just never appeared again.

So of my intrepid band of 14 members, I determined that they were a mix of young kids (say 15 years old) and a good slice of snot nosed, obnoxious and spoilt brat types. My interest in Evony was declining by the hour. From my perspective, I had gotten saddled with the losers, the people that the other hosts couldn’t or didn’t want to handle – maybe I was the first of the “losers” to get these guys. What countered was the sanity check of 2 key players who turned out to be fantastically supportive in our little fiefdom of 15 members and adding to the case against this dim and dark existence we were living as outcasts was the constant stream of information I got from the Angel network. Status updates of the target of the day. Encouraging emails from the Angel’s overall leader, encouraging messages from the Host of Angel 7 who had both recruited me and seconded me into Angel 8. All was not lost.

After 2 weeks of running Angel 8 and writing a number of reports, I tendered my resignation. I recommend on the whole that the 15 players who had come over weren’t spies – they were just either young, quiet or both. The quiet types ended up being some of the most interesting people who played the game – one was an ex USMC marine, who I had indepth discussions around topics like world politics, our respective families and other things that were influencing our respective lives. The other was a car industry type, who I obviously resonated well with. Leaving Evony and a 3 to 4 hour a day existence, wasn’t what I would call pleasant – I had played close to 3 months – 90 days – straight of this very addictive game, but it was time to end the relentless time commitment this game takes. I had a lovely – and extraordinarily patient – wife and infant son to spend time with. I had my mountain bike to ride. I had other things to do. Evony needed to take a dose of perspective and be rebalanced with my life.

The leadership of Angel’s took it pretty badly, which surprised me, as I had really been out in the woods when running Angel 8. I got offered to join Angel 1, the Elite Angels, as my battle experience was deemed to be highly valuable. When I responded that I couldn’t commit the time, I was asked to go to Angel 2 instead and assist in training the up and coming members to battle readiness. I acquiesced and joined for a couple of weeks. Whilst the people on here were nice, Angel 2 was all geared around training everyone to be battle ready and join the Elite Angel’s into their territorial push. It was all a bit too serious for me and to be fair, the Host & I didn’t quite see eye to eye in how to manage people. his style was “do this, because I said so” where as I tend towards being collaborative and explain the situation, using logic to rationalise my orders. To be fair though, I was by this time just over it – I was longing the absence of the Evonylised world and hankering for some real life interaction. What is not in question was the Host’s commitment to looking after the “family” and ensuring the best outcome for all concerned. In this the community aspect of Evony is quite extraordinary. The small point that it appeared I knew more than most people online about battle tactics and defense, only added to my dismay and inability to commit the time. My view is that my absence would only take up a valuable spot within the Angel 2 group. So I left.

I logged back in a week later, having left my defenses ready for assault. I had been attacked numerous times, but my defenses had held firm. 19,000 archers and 8000 archer towers will do that on a relatively young server. I had an invitation from Angel 7, from the original host who heard I had been cut loose. I rejoined and it felt like I was home. I only log in now about once a week for half an hour or so – mostly to chat to people, catch up, listen to a few stories and offer a bit of advice here or there. It’s working out pretty well.

Incidently upon writing this post, I worked out that near enough, I had spent 100 days in Evony. It was an enriching experience and I can certainly see why people end up getting their lives sucked into the vortex of upgrades, interaction and general time consumption. Having done this, I can truthfully say, now that I’ve had a taste of an MMORTS, I an see the allure and the appeal. I may return sometime in the future, but I don’t see it being a significant part of my life for many years yet.

A time line and thanks to the following players for making my time enjoyable:

Server 41 – i2adiant

• Joined 300, promoted to Presbytyr
• Left 300 to become Presbytyr WAR IV,
• Merged with WAR II, stayed Presbytyr
• Left WAR II to become Presbytyr SPQR,
• Merged SPQR with 300

King Awesome, EarthAxe, V3NOM323, Tonic, Tinkerbell, LordTitan, Mousey, FlippinSweet, Arbitable, Xoakie, McMission, Sir Donnie, ~LadyDelia.

Server 66 – Sabre

• Joined Storm,
• Left Storm and joined Angel 7, promoted to Presbytyr
• Left Angel 7 to form Angel 8 as Host,
• Disbanded Angel 8 and joined Angel 2,
• Left Angel 2 and rejoined Angel 7

Frosties, Meena, 350, Zet, TheDutch, Vincente, Imzadi, Chrisagon, The Inimitable Dark Horse,

Game improvements

• Battle map – War Reports diagramatic heat map showing hot zones of activity based on defence statistics from attacked city co-ords and depending on the level of infomatics, an origin of attack vector and timings would also add a totally different dimension to the game.
• Improved messaging for Hosts between alliances. Once you are in an alliance its very easy to get lost in the microcosm world of the other 99 players and lose touch. This is particularly challenging for Host and Vice Host whose job it is to promote diplomatic relations. I learnt this first hand when I was appointed host of Angel 8 on Server 66.
• Some animations for battles. It’s a small thing, but a structured set of battle results that are graphically represented by little soldiers fighting would add so much. Call me old fashioned – I love watching when two armies collided as in Age of Empires. An option to switch these off would be nice too.
• At the Rally Point in the Exercise Battle Practice Area, add in the ability to select City Fortifications and defences i.e. Archery Towers, Rolling Logs, Traps, Abatis & Catapults as part of the Battle Engine.
• Add the ability to trade resources for specific items like Medals. Server 66 was particularly scarce on medals being able to be found within Valleys. Annoying.