As for the game itself, it's real in many aspects. For example, you don't control individual units, but need to form them into groups (120 infantrymen, 45 cavalrymen) before you can fight the enemy effectively with your boys. Once formed, they can have a drummer, banner carrier, and an officer attached in order to increase the morale and damage. Yea, morale. Each group has a morale bar in addition to the health bar, and when under fire or physically exhausted, the soldiers' morale drops and if it drops below a level the company disbands and you lose control over the survived troops (who run back to base). Also, the rifles are effective only at range of about 20-30 meters, which requires you to maneuver the companies carefully. There are also cannons, whose case shots wipe out infantry like in real life and whose cannonballs cut through enemy ranks, but a gun can change ownership if you eliminate its crew. Cavalry also decreases the morale of infantry companies when it slams into them.
It's a strategy game and there is also the base-making element. Well, here half the effort is building, another half is controlling villages around the map, which send (depending on the type of village) one of 4 (of all 6 different resources) resources. In addition, you need to always make sure you have enough Food (or the soldiers will start dying) and coal (if you thought the game wasn't complex enough already, whenever a troop reloads, you lose some coal) in order for your army to function.
And, hell, the armies can be big. I've seen battles of ~8000 men involved. To quote this guy (http://hammondsntrains.deviantart.com/a ... e-64456620), "The casualty list at the end of a 5 minute skirmish can outnumber the entire count of units in play for most other RTS's. " It's a huge pressure on one's nerves to control ~20 companies +cavalry. Thankfully, there is a pause button.
This is why I think it should not be classified as a game, but a war simulator.
Did I interest you?
Any1 played it?
