Ageod's To End All Wars is a grand strategy game set during World War One. Players will take control over one of the major powers that so desperately fought for control over Europe and to end all wars.
Mixed
189 Steam reviews
| LANGUAGE | AUDIO | SUBTITLES | INTERFACE |
|---|---|---|---|
| English | — | — | Y |
| French | — | — | Y |
| Spanish (Spain) | — | — | Y |
Very nice WWI strategic game. Old graphics and interface, but enjoybale, espcecially if you like tabletop wargames.
is ok
This game does not simulate the conditions experienced by both sides in WWI. The negative reviews of others are accurate.
This is a very poor product.
A very interesting turn-based strategy game for those who have an appreciation of history and military strategy.
One of my favorites.
Great game, turns are a bit slow but it is a very detailed and complex game which makes it perfect for me. I hope ageod will make the engine better or develop a new one and release the same good old games again. Their new games are not as good as the old ones.
To End All Wars is an older game from 2014. It's a venerable 10 years old at the time of this review, but really this looks and feels a lot more like a game from 2004, not 2014. And definitely not 2024. It's a military strategy wargame from "Paragon from wish dot com", Slytherine, but that's not necessarily fair because Wish has a reputation for being cheap. Slytherine would charge $200 if they got their hands on a deal to publish Minesweeper. To put it more finely, this is stupidly overpriced.
There's some cool stuff in this WW1 themed game, like a real thorough interest in historical accuracy... you can't have a situation where, say, Russia and Germany become allies and invade everyone else, etc. There's also some historical figures from the same time, faithfully represented, so I guess if you love 1914, there's some appeal here. For the rest of us, not so much.
Like many wargames of the past this falls into the trap of being impossibly obtuse, with somewhat needless levels of complexity. The convoluted game design can't be fixed by any number of friendly tutorials... which aren't present anyway. All of this packaged with presentation that looks so old it feels contemporary to the assassination of the Archduke that got us all into this mess. Remember, Slytherine wants top dollar for this.
From a technical perspective, the game doesn't meet basic minimum requirements that most PC gamers expect as standard.
There's no option to change the resolution and no useful graphics tweaks. There's no way to ensure this is running at the native resolution of your display. There's no guarantee this game will look right on any PC as a result of this hamfisted design decision.
The game features mostly static, barely animated 2D images, the kind of thing you expect to see in browser/flash games. While the artwork itself, while mediocre, might be considered passable, the visual presentation here is negligible, it might as well be a slideshow or a Youtube video. Pac-Man, Space Invaders and Asteroids had more advanced animation and visuals going on than this game does.
While not necessarily a deal breaker, the game does lack polish and a few elements are a little clunky/unsmooth, this is still rough around the edges. There's also some reports of bugs which may result in a negative user experience, and bugs towards the end of the game Your mileage may vary on this.
These technical defects push this game below acceptable standards for any modern PC game.
The game never really caught on with the millions of gamers on Steam, with a very low peak player count close to launch, and then just a handful of players launching this game every couple of days. This is undoubtedly caused by factors such as those raised in this review. It's always helpful with buying decisions to consider how popular and successful the product is, and unfortunately while this did accumulate a few participation trophy reviews, overall, people just aren't using it.
So, should you buy this game? Is this one of the best of the 100,000+ games on Steam?
To End All Wars has the completely unrealistic cash grab price of $40 USD, for which you could easily get any number of older AAA games. Given the defects and quality issues with the game, coupled with the unrealistic price, this is impossible to recommend. Serously, AAA pricing for a 10 year old game that looks 20 years old.
For comparison, the $40 asking price for this game could get you games like "Subnautica", "Deep Rock Galactic" or "Prey", in fact, you could probably get all three of those games for the same price as this. As a gamer I strongly believe in value for money, and this game doesn't have it.
After 10 hours playing for the first time it crashed, just like WoN, which crashes all the time. Not sure I'm even going to attempt to play this again after my experiences with WoN. These games are not fit for purpose and should NOT be sold
I started out wanting to like this game but it quickly became vary frustrating,
1 there is no front line trench warfare stalemate in this game 2 army's in the same zone will always attack each other causing one of them to retreat and leave the zone.
2 the battles can be vary unbalanced I've had to many battles where my army of 300k strong is attacked by a force 400k and I lose 20k they lose 50k my army falls apart and runs away taking two or three turns to recover
3 army's will brake orders and attack when they should have defended I've had army's lose a 100k men and wipe themselves out attacking when they were ordered to defend and give ground if they are losing
4 cavalry units seem able to pass through your lines and to fight them a army of 30k strong will lose 5k and the 1k cavalry unit may not lose any or a hundred or two on the attack or defense.
I really like so many things about the game but there are some big holes in it that that can't ruin so much time spent playing a campaign, I do hope they change a few of those thing until then save your money.
It keeps crashing during end turn and takes me to the main menu.
With the DLC, the 1916 campaign is very playable with no 'doom stacks' caving in the Western Front (although you still have to keep sending divisions west to keep your line viable).
its a great improvement. However, the thumbs down is fro the fact that 50% of the time, you game saves will never load. So unless you plan to play 72 turns in one sitting, wait for a bug fix.
It's the best grand strategy game on WW1. As others AGEOD games, you need to understand how the game works, after that you really apreciate what they have done. It simulates all the aspects of WW1 and there is not another game on operational scale like this. It's one of the best of AGEOD's games with Civil War 2. There is a beta patch, a hotfix, and a unofficial patch that make the game even better. I recommend installing them, there is a thread about on game discussion here on steam.
Too bad Steam does't give us the ability to give a score between a positive and a negative recommendation. This game is interesting to grognards only, to those who like complex, fully detailed war games with grand strategy and micro management. A lot of work has been put into this game, very impressive!
However, it's too detailed, too 'grand' and too slow to be a game I would like to play. It requires an immense amount of patience which I simply cannot bring to bear any more. It seems to be a complex board game instead of a faster moving computer game. I need to learn a lot of the basics in giving commands and knowing what the heck I'm doing when all I wanted was to test an alternative history of Germany not invading Belgium and focussing on the war with Russia.
Compliments to the developers for gathering so much information. Perhaps when the background research is given to Paradox they can make a UI and a game that I can handle.
Mit Rückgriff auf meine erste Rezession vom 21.05.2022 (= bzgl. Wars of Napoleon) inklusive Lösungsvorschläge bei Programmproblemen erweitere ich die Lösungsvorschläge ohne Gewähr bzw. ohne Garantie (= Haftungsausschluss) für das Spiel "To End All Wars" nunmehr wie folgt.
Fazit vorab:
In der (IT-) Technik gibt es keine Zufälle. Alles an technischen Störungen hat eine individuelle Ursache.
A) Abhilfe bei Programmabstürze inmitten des Spiels:
Den Ordner für die aktuelle „Spielstand-Speicherung“ auf der
Festplatte (C:) oder bei einer Festplatten-Partition auf der von Euch
selbst zugewiesenen Festplatte (D: oder E: oder F: oder G: etc.) suchen.
- Ordner „My Games“ öffnen
- Ordner „To End All Wars“ öffnen
- Ordner „EAW“ öffnen
1. Ordner „Logs“ öffnen
a. Unter-Ordner „AI“ nicht öffnen und seine Dateien unberührt lassen !!!
b. Alle durch das laufende Spiel automatisch „zugefügten Text-Dateien“
oder automatisch „zugefügten CSV-Dateien“ oder andere automatisch
zugefügte Dateien mit Namen wie zum Beispiel...
!Main log
!AILog
!BattleLog
!HostLog
Txxxx-Ressources
usw.
...innerhalb des Ordners „Logs“ löschen.
c. Den Ordner „Logs“ wieder schließen
2. Ordner „Saves“ nicht öffnen und seine Unter-Dateien unberührt lassen !!!
(Damit ihr das Spiel mit abgespeicherten Spielstand weiterspielen könnt)
3. Ordner „Scripts“ öffnen
a. Unter-Ordner „ ResSctReport“ nicht öffnen und seine Dateien unberührt lassen !!!
b. Alle durch das laufende Spiel automatisch „zugefügten Text-Dateien“
oder automatisch „zugefügte CSV-Dateien“ oder andere automatisch
zugefügte Datei-Arten mit Namen wie zum Beispiel...
ScriptPostParse
ScriptPreParse
ScriptReportxxxx
usw.
...innerhalb des Ordners „Scripts“ löschen.
c. Den Ordner „Scripts“ wieder schließen.
Im Anschluss wieder (in umgekehrter Reihenfolge)...
- Ordner „EAW“ schließen
- Ordner „To End All Wars“ schließen
- Ordner „My Games“ schließen...
...und zurück zum Desktop sowie das Spiel durch hochfahren neu starten.
Nachdem das Spiel gestartet ist, wie gewohnt mit der Maus auf „Spiel fortsetzen“ klicken.
Sollte das Spiel inmitten des „Hochfahrens“ einen Programmabsturz erleben, dann wie
folgt vorgehen:
B) Abhilfe bei Programmabstürze beim „Hochfahren“
- To End All Wars Spielordner öffnen (= siehe Festplatte auf der das Spiel von Euch installiert wurde)
- EAW Spieleordner öffnen
- Settings Ordner öffnen
- alle Dateien mit dem Microsoft-Editor lesbar machen
- General-Datei öffnen
Folgende Einstellungen vornehmen:
MemUsage = 100000
SplishDone = 1000
Um die vorgenommenen Änderungen/Einstellungen in der General-Datei dauerhaft zu fixieren...
sollte sie mit "speichern unter" !!! abgespeichert werden.
Der (durch das vom Programm automatisch geöffnete Fenster) vorgeschlagene Dateienpfad, Dateientyp und Codierung mit einem einfachen "speichern" bestätigen und mit einem "Ja" ersetzen. Die General-Datei wird nun als fiktive "neue Datei" überschrieben, ergänzt und somit innerhalb des Programms festgeschrieben.
Für den Spielbetrieb in deutscher Sprache folgende Änderungen/Einstellungen in der nun lesbaren General-Datei ebenfalls vornehmen:
Language = 3
Third Language = 3
(Im Nachgang war ich erstaunt, dass ich trotz conträrer Aussage durch Steam die meisten Textpassagen des Spiels auf Deutsch lesen konnte. Vielen von Euch ist diese Vorgehensweise mit der oben genannten Einstellung sicherlich schon bekannt).
D) Solltet ihr auf Eure bereits abgespeicherten Spielstände kein Interesse mehr haben, dann geht wie folgt vor:
1. wie oben beschrieben
2. Ordner „Saves“ öffnen und alle gelben Unter-Ordner (= die Spielstände der jeweiligen Szenarien) löschen.
3. wie oben beschrieben
Die oben aufgeführten Lösungsvorschläge A) bis D) funktionieren jeweils auf XP, 7, 8 und 10 für folgende Ageod-Spiele:
To End all Wars, Wars of Napoleon, Civil War II sowie für Thirty Years War
(die IT-Programm-Algorithmen der oben genannten Spiele sind gleich bzw. ähnlich).
Probiert die von mir vorgeschlagenen IT-Lösungen bei Problemen einmal aus und arbeitet dabei mit professioneller Geduld sehr sauber (= Ordner richtig öffnen und schließen, Dateien ordnungsgemäß löschen, Fenster richtig schließen, PC nach Herstellervorgaben runter fahren und neu starten etc.)
Ach ja.... Steam ist nicht Produzent.
Somit solltet Ihr... trotz der berechtigten Kauf-Enttäuschungen... argumentative Nachsicht üben.
Euch allen... "Glück, Gesundheit und Frieden".
A $3000 Alienware pc purchased in 2022 Nov doesn't help this slow moving game engine turtle. Turns easily take 20-30 minutes, with about a 1/3 of that time being done with naval units. Absolutely impossible wait for me.
Once you understand what you're looking at this game is fantastic. I bounced off it a few times before I really started enjoying it.
Really enjoying it.....March 1916 it crashed and unrecoverable......gave me a link to a critical error. My computer specs are good.....disappointed
This must be the ultimate strategy game. I have played war games since 2000 and spent thousands of hours playing the Paradox- , Total War- and Ageod games. Pluss a bunch of others. Top notch games all of them. But when it comes to realistic strategy, I think the Ageod games comes out on top. You really feel like a Field Marshall. And your AI opponent is smart and dangerous. And fog of war put you on the test each turn.
The complexity might seem intimidating at first, and the manual overwhelming. But it doesn't take much time before you get the hang of it. And you don't have to read the whole manual to be able to play, far from. Everything is logical, and all information you need is available. Your first game should probably be a test game though, so you can sort things out gradually when playing. And remember to right click bottom right to get the messages up again. That is very convient.
The interface is not better or worse than in other games, it is just a queston of getting used to. The F keys are important for access to unit overview, building units, "releasing generals" and more. The 1 - 9 keys are the mapmodes.
I can highly recommend this game to everyone that like strategy and war games. But don't expect fast pace and spectacular action. This is a slow game, where you have to think like a Field Marshall. But even so, it is very exciting. To follow the outcome of a battle is often nerve wrecking... Great fun!
To put it in few words, this game baffles me.
What I liked:
- Realistic unit deployment, mobilization and cost (recruiting units is costly and takes time, you can't spam armies).
- Complete but yet reduced map. It focus on the conflict in Europe and other areas are just little boxes in the corners, you won't be overwhelmed with it.
- Generals and other commanders of the time are present and have their own atributes.
- Technology progresion and new units/weapons as you play through.
- Supply and railways. Railways were super important at the time to get supplies to your frontline, you can destroy lines to leave the enemy out of supply and you have a certain amount of "trains" to use for troop deployment.
Now, that being said, let's go through the dislikes:
- Meager tutorial. It doesn't explain you everything you need to know to adequately play the game.
- Incomprehensible battle and occupation system that doesn't mesh well with the turn based style of the game. You have to literally study to play the game and 90% of people won't do it. And this influence my next point,
- Very noob hostile. As I said, you have to study the mechanics of the game before playing it. There is a manual, but I rather study my medicine books than that manual.
- Diplomacy and tech research are cards that you can put in some weird corner of the map.
- Historical diplomatic options only. You can't make countries like Romania or Italy join the Central Powers even if you spend all your diplomatic capacity on them.
- As you progress in the game, there is more and more chances for the game to crash. Crashes tend to happen a lot in late game.
As a WWI and WWII enthusiast I really want to like this game, it has a lot of things right but a lot more wrong and at the end is unplayable.
I love the early game......because that's all i ever get to play. Eventually the game crashes and you start over. Hey you developer fix your ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ game!
Yes, if you like Ageod style game...Then this game is for you..as the game is more of an (board-game tabletop) plus a beautiful mapping of the nations at that time in that era. I am ALWAYS looking for a historical wargame..As that is really hard to find now a days.)It is not anywhere close to anything like a "Total War" style of warfare...But, yet it has it's own style of a Ageod warfare... within itself. As you can see it only been about 39 mins of playtime...for me...the game has an manual to read up on it..as well as a starter game...along with a small tour of how to play a game...I tried just "jumping-in"on the game...But, won the first game as Prussia fighting against the Russian...But, will have to read up more and watch some U-tube to get a much better sense of just how it all works...I give it a 7 to an 7.6 out of 10...But, I am still wanting this to be an 10....till next time..out.
I tried to like this game but it always crashes by 1916 and impossible to finish. Still bugged out and not enjoyable.
Muy bueno, gran detalle de unidades , estrategia y táctica muy logradas, espero que desarrollen de estas mismas características uno de toda la segunda guerra mundial
Really nice game with a lot of depth though you pretty much have to find human opponents because the AI isn't good enough.
Tres beau jeu mais helas des bugs, quelle tristesse avec un tel potentiel....
Changing this review to negative because the mid to late game bugs and crashes ramp up in intensity and make the game nearly unplayable past a certain point.
Old Review Below
-------
The best/most interesting AGEOD game I have played so far. The inclusion of warplans to guide the start and the ability to have them be dynamic and ahistorical means every game will be different, and seeing as there are actually 3 sides and not 2 it means there can be such a huge amount of variety for not only solo, but especially multiplayer games. It is unfortunately VERY buggy, and you could make a cup of tea during the loading times for turns, but having tried most of their other games now I can say not one compares to this one in terms of fun-factor. If they did this idea again, but in WW2, it might be their most successful game on this engine ever.
It runs VERY poorly on modern PC's - only 32 bit. Don't expect fast turn times, and don't expect client stability. The game is still a gem, but hasn't aged well.
cool mais mien bien que pride of nation !
Naaajssss!!!
This is an excellent game about Great war of 1914 - 1918.
There are not that many good strategy games covering
this time period and simulates quite realistically not only
military aspects of this conflict, but you have also to
deal with diplomacy, politics, technological and
scientific advances ... Big thumbs up!!
Can take up to 40 turns but as few as 10 but the game crashes every time! I've reinstalled the game several times but never fixed.
It takes some time to get into this complex and rather quirky strategy game, but it's ultimately time well spent it you're looking for a deep grand strategy game about the Great War. A bonus is that it's essentially the same system as is used in a variety of other AGEOD games about earlier periods, so I'm now able to play those as well. The sheer scale and scope of the game is amazing, and looking at the objectives screen gives a notion of the appalling cost of this conflict. I've played to the autumn of 1915 as the Central Powers, I'm winning the war, and yet I've lost 2.8 million men. Strongly recommended to history enthusiasts with long attention spans.
Enjoyable WW1 Grand Strategy... Get your flask.
I want to love this game but the tutorial is so bad, and there is barely any info on how to play. The idea of the game is great, and I really *want to* be able to play it but at the same time I paid good money to play the game, not do homework and pdfs that hopefully explain the game
The game is very newbie-unfriendly, the tutorial is boring and dry (restarted it about 5 times because I kept losing focus). The arrows in the tutorial are inaccurate and seem to point randomly.
I really want to recommend this game for all ww1 enthusiasts but ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ is so hard to start playing I have to give it a thumbs down. If you want to do the homework, go ahead, I recommend it
Awesome strategic recreation
Oyun arayüzü kötüydü,
Ülke seçimi çok kısıtlı
Oyunda özgürlük yok
The user interface for this game looks like it comes from 2005. Expect it to take a long time to learn how the controls work. Expect to spend a long time going through tutorials.
Great engine and deep, deep, deep historical!
the french error that i had is gone since i fixed my pc. its a fun game.
It lacks the one element every game should have... fun. It's taken one of my favorite episodes in history and made it incredibly dull.
To End All Wars is, if I'm not mistaken, the first and only global simulator about the First World War. Rating - For fans of the First World War: (9.0 out of 10)
Pros:
✅Change of tactics throughout the game - namely, at the beginning, the game itself is incredibly maneuverable, there are offensives and encirclement on both sides. After which a stupor appears you need to start a trench war to build up strength force in the rear and conduct a decisive battle.
✅In the game you can build troops and factories, which in turn requires you to think through tactics for the next few years. Resources are not infinite, but the army/navy/aviation requires more and more production. So sometimes you have to choose to invest in a battleship or spend the same amount of money to build one or two divisions.
✅The variety of units and their perks made me very happy. There are marines, regular infantry, reservist infantry, engineers, combat pioneers (eng.), etc. It's the same in ships and planes. But what is also interesting is that there is such a parameter as nationality, for example, if you take Austria-Hungary, they have Hungarian, German, Slovenian, Croatian, Polish, and several more regiments - which in turn has to use certain generals who can command a certain nation without penalties.
✅A huge number of Generals, with their own perks, skills, and personal traits.
✅Nations have cohesion, for example, during bombings, repeated losses of their troops, or the death of kings and emperors - cohesion falls and people also lose morale at the front and fight worse.
✅There are a large number of campaigns, two campaigns of the First World War, one is historical, and the second allows you to choose the plans of the generals for the basic disposition of troops at the beginning of the game (and several small ones). And with a relatively inexpensive addition, you have the opportunity to play the campaign of the Austro-Italian Front (it is by default in the huge campaign, but there you can play for Italy), also the Romanian attack on Austria-Hungary, the War in Judea between Turkey and Britain.
✅Diplomacy can also be considered an advantage; from the beginning of the game, you have several ambassadors whom you can send to bribe countries and lure them to your side - quite an interesting feature. It will be difficult for the central powers to withstand the late period of the war and win without some kind of help.
✅If you set the game for yourself, you can choose the tactics of your corps in battle (about entering the rear or a strong center and weak flanks on the sides, or using skirmisher tactics or delivering artillery strikes to deplete the enemy) - the enemy also chooses his tactics. Also, with the ability to customize realism, soldiers will always desert in low numbers every turn, get sick, and starve - this is a very useful thing and the game reaches a new level.
✅There is a manual
Minuses:
❌At the beginning of the game, you need to move the camera away and go through the entire map so that it loads and no longer slows down - after that it runs perfectly (SSD does not help)
❌Rarely, but it happened that the game crashed.
❌Large barrier to entry.
The note:
⚡There is no Ukrainian language in the game, for me, this is not a problem, I can play in English, but it’s good that there is a localization on the Internet and this immediately increases the number of potential players.
If you have a strong interest in the First World war, you are patient, persevere and devote the time necessary this is one superb, very deep war game. There is a steep learning curve replete with moments of frustration and confusion but of you keep at it evolves into an artful treatment of the great war.. The Ageod website is very helpful when you encounter issues. I'm an old coot but feel that my limited time on the planet was well spent leaning this game and I still have a long way to go.
Good take on ww1 by ageod
Best game in the WWI setting.
This game might be enjoyed by some people, and I can see where they would find enjoyment in this game, however I can not personally recommend this game.
It's clunky, it feels like it's trying to be more than what it is limited to. The complex combat systems mixed with the boardgame and turn-based themes just fail to work together, and it creates a mess of a game that is nearly impossible to play.
AI turns take way too long, and the results of trying to accomplish anything just ends in frustration.
I feel lost whenever I play this game, as if there's missing information I'm not getting.
Overall not worth the time it'd take to learn.
Support has been dropped ages ago, and the engine is still clunky as hell, not to mention the various crashes.
Начну сразу с минуса, который заруинил мои мечты и ожидания в этой игре.
На форуме разработчиков можно увидеть в обсуждениях проблему которая возникает у многих людей купивших эту игру. Все те у кого стоит видеокарта от инвидиа имеют низкий или колеблющийся ФПС в игре и большие пролагивание при скроллинге карты. У меня достаточно мощный комп с i5. RTX 2060, 16 RAM и все новые игры и старые стратежки идут без проблем.
В настройках можно заметить один пунктик который ДОЛЖЕН БЫЛ быть рабочим - использование оперативной памяти.
По умолчанию у всех пользователей будет стоять "память используется на 10%". Повысить же до 75% использования нельзя. Можно конечно попробовать через махинации в корневой папке и через файл general изменить этот недостаток, но не факт что начнет работать, а даже если и появятся улучшения, лаги полностью не уйдут и будут доставать вас всю игру.
Хотелось бы отметить что в игре не чувствуется механика первой мировой. Окопная война с превосходством артиллерии? - нет, тут этим не пахнет. Концепция может подойти для тематики любой другой войны, но не для ПМВ. Сам Пауль Гинденбург будет вертеться с бесконечной скоростью так, что можно будет обеспечить светом не только Германию, но и весь Евросоюз.
Ладно, хватит безжалостно обсирать эту игру....Из плюсов могу выделить
+ Привлекательность, которую компания AGEOD дает вам с первых скриншотов и с первого тизера игры.
+ Очень много информации по юнитам с различными характеристиками, которые расписаны до мельчайших + подробностей.
+ Историчность юнитов и самое главное - историчность личностей времен ПМВ.
+ Очень привлекательная карта. Видно что разработчики продумали все детали: города, ландшафт, водоемы.
+ Большой функционал, который можно изучать часами.
Если вы хотите терпеть хрен*оовую оптимизацию этой игры, то можете смело брать для ознакомления. Но все остальным хочу сказать: "НЕ БЕРИТЕ ЭТО ***, оно не стоит ваших денег и времени"
BONJOUR .ce jeu aura t il une traduction du carnet en francais ??
Every time I open this game to play it, I am only left feeling rather vexed at the vagueness and complexity, Yet the box art seems to draw me in over and over again. It looks rather enticing though so, thumbs up for me! Wish I could play it...SOMEDAY.
This is one of the best and most detailed games on WW1 out there.
It is a tad unfortunate that the patch work is stopped after some efforts due to changes in management and other factors, otherwise this is truly the THE GAME TO END ALL WW1 GAMES
Game has been removed "due to payment issues" from my account 6 years after activation. Thank you Slitherine!
How can I prove payment after such a long time? It is a shame that Valve allows such things.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2041125277&tscn=1585577859
I have the whole AGE series, except the Spanish Civil War "Espana 1936"which is not yet available on Steam.
If you like their RUS, this is you game. The only difference is the supply unit which is now separated into a supply n an ammo unit. The added shorter scenarios are for learning though the Italian scenario is too short. Would like to see a game on the Chinese Civil war 1911 - 1937.
This game is the absolute best WW1 game available out there.
It is by no means a simple game, but once better understood it becomes an absolute pleasure to play. I would willingly spend a couple hundred dollars for To End All Wars 2.
Steam really needs to add a 'Mixed' option for reviews as that's how I feel about To End All Wars. A fantastic game that is, unfortunately, held back by technical problems. I was greatly enjoying the game, and to a degree I still am, when I encountered an issue on Turn 3 where the turn phase would never progress to even Day 0 of 15. Validating the files fixed it, but it cropped up again on Turns 22 and 23. There are a 102 turns in total. Not even a 1/4 the way through and I've run into the same game-breaking issue three times, and I suspect I'll run into it many more times. Validating the files, or perhaps it's sheer RNG whenever you pass the turn, has *knock on wood* always fixed it, but there's no guarantee that'll always work, and a user shouldn't have to jump through these hoops to get a $40 game with $20 worth of DLC to function. I'm going to attempt to keep playing, as even with these issue it's still fun, but I cannot recommend the game at full price. Deep sale only, and expect technical problems.
I need a life, of forgot these historical games are it. ww1 is extremely difficult to recreate but AGEOD has done the best job so far of the genre. You have the option to adopt different political and military strategies or stick to historical plans my only complaint is the Africa battles are really not playable and the great German raiders across Indian ocean are also lost to the platform.
One of the hardest games in the franchise but a fairly faithful recreation of WW1. Civil War 2 is the best place to start
Interesting AGEOD conflict-simulator in the vein of the others. The control is split between Eastern and the Western Entente and the Central Powers. The workings of diplomacy and technology are a cool progression and impact throughout the campaign (As they should be) and you personally create/recruit your units (i.e Civil War 2). I had fun w/ 2 complete play-thru's (so far).
Whats there to say?... its by AGEOD
A great strategy game that lets you re-write history!
More than half my troops could not be moved. Didn't know what the goal was to win the scenario. Maybe just too complicated for me, but I think would be for others too. I won the first scenario without doing anything. Just too weird for me. if you try this, play first, as tutorial, while okay, may not leave you enuf time to get the refund you'll probably want.
.
Is the UI user friendly and does it provide helpful tooltips? No.
Does the tutorial explain at any point how the logistic system that is the very core of the gameplay actually works? No.
Does the tutorial and manual cover the finer points of the underlying rules of the game? No.
Is this game the most detailled simulation of the First World War you can find on Steam? Yes.
Will you struggle to understand how the war works by shedding blood at horrifying rates for little to no gain? Yes.
Will you experience the frustration of economic exhaustion and social discontent? Yes.
Will you constantly be in fear that the war will be lost and the enemy or radicals within in your own nation will tear down your regime? Yes.
Will this war be won not by tactical brilliance, but by industry and by attrition? Yes.
I believe it was Foch who said "It takes 10,000 casualties to train a Major-General." In this game you are put in charge of the entire war effort for your alliance, so expect lose millions before you are sufficiently trained to understand the nuances and idiosyncracies of this game. I think i was well past 40 hours when i finally figured out how this works, more or less. But the struggle was certainly worth it.
This is not for the faint of heart, nor for those without a great deal of patience. This game will take an excessive amount of time to process a turn. This game will take an excessive amount of time to process the fact that you have simply clicked on a unit or select an action. This game will crash if you try and click things too fast. It moves at its own slow and methodical pace. It is, very clearly, not the greatest system ever designed. But this barely functional game is incredibly enjoyable and well worth the time it takes to learn.
No need to mention the huge number of units, excellent artwork, and other great features. If you bothered to read this you probably planned on buying it anyway because you alreay knew it had so many different unti types, great unit card artwork for each period of the war (early, mid, late), and the like.
So if you have enough patience to learn a cryptic game full of hidden mechanics and to deal with instability, then this may just be the World War I simulation you have been searching for.
Can be buggy and I wish there were more units for the Entrente Powers but overall a good buy.
AGEODs more languages ( polish ) please :-)
To End All Wars es un juego de estrategia por turnos que, como resulta evidente, toma el escenario de la primera guerra mundial y abarca el mapa de las naciones europeas en el conflicto además de espacios que representan otros países importantes. El juego se desarrolla como si fuera un juego de guerra de mesa, con áreas designadas para poner “tus cartas” que representan las decisiones que tomas y otra especie de “fichas” que representan tus unidades de batalla.
No puedes tomar el papel de una sola nación en específico, sino tienes el control sobre los grupos de las alianzas, así puedes controlar a la Entente Cordiale o a los Imperios Centrales, pero no específicamente a Francia o a Alemanía. Para el caso de la Entente, puedes controlar a todos los países, o elegir entre los del Este (Rusia y Serbia) o los del Oeste (Francia e Inglaterra). El margen de hacer cambios historicos es estrecho, pero posible. Es difícil convencer al Imperio Otomano de no unirse a los Imperios Centrales y mantenerlos neutrales, pero no imposible, también es posible que los imperios centrales convenzan a Italia de unirseles, pero serán necesarias decisiones, costos políticos que ponen en peligro la estabilidad y mucha, mucha suerte.
El juego requiere mucha atención al detalle y el uso inteligente de recursos y el movimiento de tropas. No siempre gana el que más tropas junte, sino también los líderes asignados, los suministros, sobre todo de munición para grandes calibres, el abastecimiento, la cadena de mando y otros elementos importantes. Aun cuando un simple ataque basado en números puede tener éxito al principio, probablemente estará destinado al fracaso en un par de turnos más.
A pesar de tener una curva de aprendizaje elevada, me parece muy disfrutable pues no llega al grado de complejidad de los juegos de Paradox al apenas tocar decisiones económicas y políticas, y tampoco tiene la gran sofistificación que tienen los juegos de Gary Grigsby, donde un turno puede llevarte 8 horas de planeación.
Lamentablemente los juegos de AGEOD son siempre algo inestables, sobre todo sus versiones de Steam, y muchas veces el soporte es marginal por parte de Slitherine en Steam, aunque hay más de parte de AGEOD en sus foros. A pesar de eso, creo que este juego, junto con Civil War 2, son de los más estables y que además utilizan una versión más moderna del motor de juego, que además permite tomar ciertas decisiones tácticas antes de batallas importantes, donde tiene importancia los rasgos, experiencia y habilidades de los generales en generar opciones, por ejemplo, un general muy competente de tu lado versus un general débil e inexperimentado, te permitirá ver qué estrategia usará para a la vez tú usar una que lo neutralice.
También resulta el más grande en magnitud, tanto en el tamaño del mapa como en unidades, al manejar por primera vez “Grupos de Ejércitos”, las inmensas flotas británicas y francesas al mismo tiempo, el enorme escenario europeo y más de 16 naciones a las cuales tratar de que se te unan con las decisiones de diplomacia.
Por estos motivos puede que To End All Wars no sea el mejor juego introductorio a los juegos de AGEOD, pero debido a la escasez que tiene el tema de la Primera Guerra Mundial en películas, series, cómics y por supuesto, en videojuegos, resulta muy refrescante esta visita de vuelta a la primera guerra industrial y reducir la sobre saturación de juegos de la segunda guerra mundial en todas las categorías y géneros.
Por estas razones doy mi recomendación para To End All Wars.
Excellent product....very realistic. One of the best AGEOD products IMHO. PBEM....old but it works :)
to end all updates*
I know I didnt play for long but it plays like any other Drag and Drop Game.
The Tutoral could be a little better. But I like it and I'll try to dive deeper into "The War to End All Wars".
I also recemand chicking out "The Great War" on Youtube for more info about WW1 and how not to "lose" the War.
Play on Genarels!
This game is fun i wanted to refund it the first couple days but then i began to get a deeper understanding of the mechanics and it is my current favorite game. i say give it a try even if you think its kinda boring and tedious at first
[h1][b]Kurz und Kompakt[/b][/h1]
Ich hatte mir "To End All Wars" echt gut vorgestellt, aber mit durchgehend 5 FPS auf der Hauptmap kann ich dieses Spiel echt nicht empfehlen!
Für hard core Strategiefans ist es warscheinlich gut, aber auch nicht mit 5 FPS! Leider kann ich nicht mehr über das Spielprinzip sagen, da das Spiel bei mir nicht flüssig läuft.
Ebenso sind 37€ zuviel für dieses Spiel!
Kuratorseite: [url=https://store.steampowered.com/curator/10855409/][/url]
If you like other Ageod strategy games like CW2, 30 years war, etc. this one is just as good. It is very detailed like all their games and once you get over the learning curve, the more you will emerse yourself into the game. I have owned this game for sometime, but a grad class I am taking is having me write about the simulation, so I figured I would rate the game as well.
Final notes:
Trench warfare does exist in this game. It just gives to an opportunity to exploit the breech and then it becomes a game of flanks. The only negative for this game is the time it takes to process between turns. Find something to do for a min or two when you press the button for the turn.
[h1] Mixed feelings [/h1]
To End All Wars is a great game forced into an outdated game engine.
If you a looking for a deep strategy game about World war one and have alot of patiens and time then I recommend this game. However if you just want a good strategy game you shuold look elsewere. Civil War 2 from Ageod is the superior choise, it works much better, is easier to learn and take a lot less of your time.
I really like the idea of a World war one game on a strategic level and this game have alot of depth. Sadly the engine is clearly not designed to handle this kind of multinational & multifront war. The AI turn time alone is almost game breaking. Moreover there are bugs, lots of them. With that said, when the game works as it should it is really entertaining.
I played this over 30 hours and tried to get a refund. They refused, because anything played over 2 hours will not be refunded. thats a joke, by such a complex game.
I tried it out with the east campaign as Germany/Austria. It is is simply impossible to gain any ground and the AI is just insane. Enemy units all of a sudden apear behind my lines at Danzig and Elbing - yeah, like just entire armys can sneak into East Prussia. they just roam about without any penalyt and they seem to have some sort of magic supply line, because - unlike my units - that are sitting on depots - they just gain strength and I can ocasionaly see how their numbers rise on the counter picture. They go along and demolish my railway system ect.
The building of units is also not feasible. they must have endless suply, although I briefly started the game as russian just to check what they got, and they have less supply. The speed with which they can stack is unbeleivable, considering the long supply routes they have.
History and geography is also not a strong point of the creators. Try building hungarian units and placing them. (Reserves and milita). But you can place polish units ind Debrecen (Hungary)
Austria doesnt have a capital in this scenario. If you pay your money to get the Generals, the Germans will apear in Berlin, the austrians not at all.
then at Lemberg, allthough you are entrenched with an entire army in a Fort, the russian get a victory even with less troops and of course, they can march behind your lines and destroy the rail.
the micromanagement is disgusting and takes most of the time. There are no pop ups to tell you that a unit can be found there and there. You have to click your way through the towns and citys. Enemy units can roam about in your land and you have no idea how strong they are, as if the towns they pass would have no telegraphs.....
And btw. where the Fu** is General Ludendorf in this game?! He was chief of staff of Hindenburg at Tannenberg!
So basicly - Screw it. Frustrating, Funspoiling, historicaly inaccurate, nerv wrecking sh*t. Waste of money even with reduced price.
I really do like this game, it has complex strategy and it gives hours and hours of content to enjoy. My one big issue is this. This game crashes, A LOT! For me it crashed EVERY SINGLE TURN bar 4 at the start. At first it crashed about once a turn right when the turn started. Sure it was annoying but it was quick to load back up the game and after a preliminary crash the turn would finish. Later though is began to crash on day 8, 10 or 14 meaning I would have to watch a majority of the turn and then watch it again. Now its starting to crash at the start and then at the end. The game is becoming unplayable. Its a shame because the game itself is a lot of fun but the endless crashes ruin it. Considering how im so late to the party i doubt a new patch will happen. I do like this game but if im struggling to literally play the game I can't bring myself to give a positive review.
This was an interesting strategy game at first. But suddenly the game started crashing. I was well into my second campaign on the Eastern Front when suddenly all of the data turned to zeros. I then returned to the Western Front game and again into the campaign, the game when haywire.
I like the game. It is a good strategy game. So I will recommend it despite the technical glitches.
Very unrealistic game. AI loves to build huge stacks. There is no trench warfare. Its basically huge stacks chasing other huge stacks. Very buggy movement system, unit power doesn't refresh properly at the end of turn. AI seems to be cheating by seeing what you plan to do. It seems the only way to survive is to print money like mad as AI does the same.
[b]Disclaimer[/b]
Whether this is an alright game or a very bad one depends mainly on whether you want to play single player or you have someone else to play as the other side. Why? The AI is laughable. It will stack forces in the nation's capital while its armies are losing everywhere else. It will waste resources on units that it would leave to rust far away from the front lines. It will waste all of its resources and still won't field a decent army. From what I've experience in several campaigns, you won't experience trenches, deadlocks and even consistent front lines. The enemy will keep most of its forces far away from you and will never manage to create and keep a coherent line alongside yours, like it would in any other strategy game like Hearts of Iron for example.
If you have someone to play with you or you want to play both sides, keep reading:
[b]What works:[/b]
1. A lot of mostly historically accurate units. Uniforms and equipment changes over time so that your men are more effective. Formation of sturm units and their Entente equivalents is depicted too.
2. The engine is pretty decent and can simulate very complex battles - units are very detailed, and they have a lot of statistics that are unique for each unit and historically accurate. For example the British will shoot faster than Germans due to their superior training and better rifles.
3. Map is pretty good, with all the cities depicted.
4. Trenches evolve as they did historically and will get almost impossible to get through over time. To counter this, you will need to use a lot of artillery, gas, and specialized stormtroopers. This simulates how the warfare evolved very accurately.
5. Engine was tweaked to support aerial warfare which is done quite well.
6. Diplomacy is pretty well done and tends to evolve realstically.
7. Supply is modeled pretty accurately and is crucial to any military operation, just like in real life. You can't expect to penetrate enemy's lines and get very far before being cut off from your supply lines and defeated easily.
[b]What doesn't work[/b]
1. The engine is not very good for simulating trench warfare. It was designed with older conflicts in mind - armies march together, fight, and then one of them has to retreat as the loser. WW1 wasn't like that. Armies were close to each other and at least on the Western Front hardly ever retreated to the nearby town/province after being defeated, Also, trenches disappear once the unit has moved - in reality the attacking army simply returned back to its trenches after being defeated.
2. It's really buggy sometimes. They fixed most of it but it can still be quite clunky. Sometimes units may magically move somewhere else for example.
3. Sometimes your units are too stupid. If you want to give an order to your fleet to intercept an enemy's fleet and it just happens to be heading home your fleet will follow it till the end and get blown up on enemy's minefields.
4. AI, as mentioned before. This game is unplayable vs the AI because it makes too many stupid mistakes and won't arrange proper frontlines.
[b]Verdict[/b]
If you have a lot of time to spare and reliable friends to play with, go for it. It's a lot of fun even if the engine can't simulate a static warfare correctly, and technology in the game progresses just as it did in real life, which adds to the accuracy. The main campaign is pretty long and different war plans allow great replayability. I cannot however fully recommend it, as it fails to deliver proper game when you don't have friends around and for its bugs that prevented me from playing it for quite a while.
This has almost everything I want in a war game. It's complex in a good way and very fun. Unfortunately it crashes so often and files become corrupt so often that it's impossible to play. It's really too bad, because otherwise it would have been my favorite war game ever.
Bon jeu sur la première guerre mondiale.
Simply Epic. One of the best wargames ever made. If you are a fan of military PC war games you wont be disappointed. In My opinion, Ageod is by far the best companyy out there. They make games that have such depth, such soul. And the best community of gamers you will ever find. Get this game, learn it and play some PBEM. You wont be playing anything else. Im currently on a single player campaign as Germany (Central Power) and having a blast. What a great, great game!
♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ hard.
Ein hervorragendes Spiel. Das Interface muss man jedoch erstmal verstehen, das Versorgungs- und das Kampfsystem ebenso, die Lernkurve ist schon sehr steil... Wenn man jedoch geduldig dabei bleibt erhält man ein sehr ansprechendes WW1 Spiel, bei dem dann auch das gefährliche Gefühl aufkommt unbedingt noch eine weitere Runde spielen zu müssen, und noch eine... und noch eine... und....
I wanted to like this game. I really did.
But for gods sakes, its so ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ complicated, and I don't have the time to spend hours studying the tutorial!
I've tried to play it without the tutorial, but holy ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ christ, this game is hard. Playing the central powers is like, impossible, and I had it on easy!
The austrians are completely useless because the russian numbers are ridiculous, and the serbian army is nigh-unbeatable. And as germany, a successful takeover of belgium is incredibly hard, and once you finish, you barely have enough troops to guard the border. If they break through your line, you are absolutely ♥♥♥♥♥♥.
I want so badly to love this game. Great historical simulation; they've done their homework on geography, history, and troop composition. This game will teach you the horror of war from feeding your troops and keeping their magazines stocked to drafting new 18 year olds to man the trenches each year.
The game accurately characterizes the leadership challenges faced by the lesser powers and the hopelessness of the Western Front.
HOWEVER, getting the stupid, clunky, 100 year old AGEOD engine to function is a war of attrition in and of itself. I have now spent 4 hour trying to get the August 1915 turn to resolve without an error, apparently inherent to the AGEOD engine. If you have more than one disk drive that you use, DO NOT BUY ANY AGEOD games!!!!!!! The turns in this game take 100 years WITHOUT the stupid errors.
Эта игра оставляет смешанные впечатления и, в принципе, заслуживает своей оценки в стиме.
Минусы:
-Ржавый движок
-Отсутсвие нормальных объяснений
-50 часов ожидания хода ИИ
-Несколько сомнительный баланс (те же австро-венгры просто отвратительны, и хотя это исторически верно, все же они слишком плохи)
Плюсы:
Если вы преодолеете непонятки и разберетесь в игре, то перед вами предстанет лучшая игра про ПМВ. С огромными жертвами за клочки земли, эскалацией конфликта, разными фазами войны (мобильной и позиционной). С крепостями, ютландоподобными сражениями на море, газами и многим другим.
Bought the game based on some positive reviews in this area. Paid £30 for it.
Game will not run at all. I get "Cannot locate compatable Direct3D Device" error, no option to repair it, no access to a "settings" area on the launcher, and then it closes. I've tried finding technical help - only the forum links on the actual game for Tech Support are broken.
After a bit of digging, I find it, and found out that the company provides extremely poor tech support for the game. There are requests for help dating back to March 2016 that haven't been looked at. The Steam Forums are equally neglected.
I cannot find any work-around for my problem, so I've been forced to uninstall the game. A total waste of money.
The game looked incredibly appealing, but the lag makes it absolutely unplayable. I've tried anything; from changing processor affinity to dabbling with every possible setting in the options menu (memory usage can't even be changed from 10%) and nothing seems to make the game faster. A damn shame.
Do not often contribute for reviews but thought I would say something about To End all Wars.
I had been looking for sometime for a good WW1 strategy game. I find most do not capture that deepth of the period. They play more like a WW2 game with old looking units, using "blitz" tactics in a period when it would take weeks to move.
TEAW captures that slower non mobile, entrenched feeling. This game is not a repackaged WW2 clone. In my current game I am playing the Western Entente, the Germans swept into Belgium and through Luxemburg, the french where pushed back (nearly to Paris!!) but then things just jammed up and litterly bogged down. The French/Britsh forces have pushed the Germans back to the Ardenees, with a line of trenches going to Ypres in the north and all along the French Border in the south. The fighting is slow and brutal, with a single German attack against dug in French lines costing over 120k troops!
The feel of WW1 is there. You cannot rush troops around nor do reckless quick attacks. You must find soft spots and plan attacks or your troops will suffer the consequences.
Diplomcy is interesting, have Japan and Portugual on my side and working on Italy. Oddly the US seems to be swing toward the Central Entente, now that would be a problem if they joined germany.
Technoogy is well managed, Gas attacks by the West (my side) where used in early spring 1915 and I am expecting retaliation by the Germans soon.
The interface in clunky and needs work but once you figure it out it does become easier. The map is amazing, really like the detail.
Improvements could be the ability to search. I am constantly trying to find units or generals and there is no real easy way to search, for example you cannot type in a name and find where it is. Also, the command structure is confusing, but maybe command in this period is supposed to be confusing.
Overall, really enjoy the game. It will take you a few starts and restarts to really get a game going. Recommend you print , read and have the manual next to you when you are playing, it helps alot as this game has a lot of depth to it.
If you are looking for that WW1 game to fill the hole in your collections, I do recommend this one.
Terrible game.
You can pick different war plans before the war starts, try your best to gain new allies, its a hard game but man its fun to play. :D
This game is unplayable, one bug after another.
Das Spiel hat kein Kopp und kein Arsch...Genau Richtig für AktenMongos
I'v recently found out about the AGEOD games and I have to admit that I've completely fallen in love with them. From Alea Iacta Est through Thirty Years War, Napoleon, American Civil war, Spanish Civil War to WWI all games use the same engine with some variations and fluff to really make the time period shine.
To End All Wars is no exception, it plays like an excellent WWI Grand Strategy Game and I for one can't recommend it enough. A classic and instant buy if you love these type of games.
Nach dem 20.11.16 und 423 Stunden Spielzeit mein 2. Bericht.
Pro: spannend, und mit vielen Varianten;
Contra:Ausgeprochen ärgerlich ist die beschränkte Zwischenspeicherung.
Immer wieder nervt die engine mit nicht nachvollziehbaren Zügen. Da ziehen 50.000 Mann starke Feindarmeen hinter den eigenen Linien und haben keine Nachschubprobleme. Sie sind auch schlecht zum Kampf zu stellen, weil sie zu schnell sind. Überhaupt ist das Nachschubproblem nicht realitätsnah gelöst. Auch sehr große Armeen werden nicht schwächer, weil ihnen der Nachschub ausgeht. Eine strategische Umfassung des Gegners hat deshalb keinen reslistischen Ausgang, weil ihn die Einkesselung nicht realitätsnah schwächt.
Realistische Bedingungen sucht man deshalb vergebens. Und eine Frage in die Runde: konnte schon mal jemand den Schliefenplan in der realen Variante spielen? also deutscher Vormarsch bis zur Marne? Ich habe grundsätzlich eine zu starke franz. Abwehr;
ergo: Empfehlung wer die reine Strategie mag, aber nicht wer realistische Bedingungen sucht.
Und nach 2 Jahren bestätigt sich immer wieder die völlig unrealistische KI. Sie hat 1916 überhaupt kein Problem, in einem Zug (also 2 Wochen) mehrere britisch/französische Armeen mit knapp 1,5 Millionen Mann über die Mosel bei Metz zu setzen und befestigte (seit 18 Monaten eingegrabene) deutsche Armeen mit starker Artillerie zu überrennen und über den Rhein in das Deutsche Reich zu marschieren (umgekehrt klappt sowas natürlich nie); in keiner Weise wird berücksichtigt, dass sich die riesigen Armeen in der Enge gar nicht entfalten könnten, sondern von starker Artillerie zerschlagen würden. Da mit einem solchen Zug das Spiel im Grunde beendet ist oder bei historischer Sichtweise der Krieg entschieden gewesen wäre, enden alle vorherigen spannenden Spielzüge sehr frustrierend.
i love this game but i do wish that i can get sweden or norway in the war on germany's side so u guys should fix that
Very fun game if you have the patience to learn it. There are lots of very important mechanics in the game that are either not explained very well or not explained at all in the manual or the "tutorial". You'll find yourself constantly on AGEoD's forums trying to find an answer to something. Oh, and be prepared for random crashes that could ruin your campaign 10 hours in, but that's par for the course for AGEoD games. It almost hurts to do it, but I do recommend this game. When it works, it satisfies my craving for grand strategy like no other game can.
This game provides a very deep simulation of the Great War. It exploits the solid AGEOD engine to reproduce all the military aspects of the period. In addition, the diplomacy is covered with a simplified but effective method. The learning curve is rather steep, but very rewarding. The game uses the WEGO system: all the sides issue orders for the following turn (two weeks), then orders of the different factions are all executed realistically at the same time. The time needed to the pc to process turns is one-two minutes, one of the shortest in AGEOD games. In conclusion, I strongly recommend this game.
This is the most realistic WW1 game I've ever played. I have no idea what I'm doing, tons of people are dying, and the frontlines look more or less the same as they did a month ago.
10/10 would order infantry wave assaults on entrenched positions again.
In all seriousness, this game is on the A.G.E. engine. If you've never played one before, it will overwhelm you. I've logged hundreds of hours in Pride of Nations, so most of it was familiar to me, although the sheer scale of WORLD WAR ONE is still a bit difficult to comprehend at first. A good deal of the complexity of Pride of Nations isn't there, such as the "managing everything from fish to timber to automobile exports", plus most of the world other than Europe and some of the Middle East/North Africa is condensed down to hotzones. However, that complexity is more than made up for by the fact that you are, again, managing ALL OF WORLD WAR ONE.
No real buildup time, no ways to delay the war...boom, it's August 1914 and the Hun is basically already in control of Belgium. Plus you're controlling ALL OF either the Entente western or eastern front, or ALL OF the Central Powers...it would have probably been better if you were at least allowed to say "I will play Great Britain, AIs will control France, Belgium, the US, etc." The fact that all supplies, unit mustering, etc. are pooled between the nations is a bit offsetting, plus a rather major issue in the AGEOD engine that may not have been a big issue in previous games, but comes to light here in the war of the trench. Fortifications are a factor of the unit occupying them, rather than a terrain piece, and basically vanish when said unit leaves the region or goes on the offensive. There are ways to work around that, but it still destroys a big part of the First World War: the enemy taking a trench network and immediately being able to turn it againt its previous occupants.
Overall, though, it's mostly just small issues. The BIG one is whether or not you enjoy this level of complexity. If you do, welcome to the front. If not, play literally anything else.
Very fun.
this game runs terribly for most people. scrolling across the sceen takes ages. moving the mouse causes extreme lag. i can run doom 4 on max settings with no problems so it's not my computer. i've tried leave tech support messages, i've tried disabling the gpu, enabling the gpu, running on low settings, implementing various random things other people have tried. it is unplayable. if you look around forums, a lot of people are having this problem.
in fact, after the disaster that was wars of napoleon, nobody should buy an ageod ever again. if you buy an ageod game and it runs slow, it won't get fixed. refund immediately.
i have 81 games and i think this is the first one that is worth a few seconds for a review.
to start, this is the best ageod game, hands down, i've played every one of their games (except the roman ones) from their first civil war game to the russian civil war to the cossacks. in my opinion they pale in comparison to this amazing game.
PROS:
its fast, way faster in processing turns then any other ageod game, max time is 4 minutes and that was near the end date in 1918, for the amount of "moving parts" in this game i am quite impressed.
it's detailed, the units are accurate and the events add flavour.
it has an insane amount of replayability, for example, if you play as france you could choose one of 4 initial army setups, you can invade belgium, defend, attack through the ardennes or attack through alsace-lorraine but, the germans could pick one of their 4 warplans as well, some can counter others, they can invade belgium, attack through switzerland, attack russia or have a balanced defense. austria could choose to focus on russia or serbia, bide its time and not commit to a certain front, or a mix of those first three, russia can charge at berlin, attack galicia, do both, or bide its time too! the game is never the same twice, the ai will choose a different strategy and set up each time! you can randomize all generals abilitys too! in one game i wrecked the serbians and russians with my overpowered austrian generals while germany barely held with her 1-1-1 generals. you can choose different battle strategys too, most options have counters so for example, you could be attack with 250,000 against an equal force and either lose 100,000 men to their 15,000 due to them countering you infantry assualt with mass fire or it could go the other way around! more and more strategys become available with both time and general level. there is so much more then i can describe in this review.
the AI is very intelligent and punishing, yet it is still almost human because it makes mistakes too, the detection system actually works for them! they dont have the usual "all seeing eye" that lets them know everything about you and your troops, they will make costly underestimations but not at an insane rate where it becomes too easy.
very few bugs, unlike other ageod games this one has NEVER CRASHED!
CONS
russia is overpowered, even from the beginning if they attack an equal german army that is entrenched with high cohesion troops and support they can still win even with a countered battle strategy.
it can be very hard to win, in one of my first games i got rebel in alignment in britain to 100% and nothing happened, they kept fighting, same with the russians, rebel alignment was 80% and national moral was at 35 in january 1917 and they kept going...
this is more of a neutral but it doesnt have too many other campaigns, none of them are "unique" and they are really short...
OVERALL.
definitly worth the time to get in to, especially if you've played ageod games before, if you are a new player i'd be more likely to reccomend pride of nations (mixed review only because it takes 5 minutes to process a turn) which is a very good introduction to ageod and easy to learn, although to end all wars would be my second choice.
i was only planning on writing a really short review but got carried away obviously... thanks if you read this, please rate my review! :D
