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Strategy & War

Warlords III
Rating: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 best

By Hugh Falk
(9/4/1997)

Game at a Glance
Recap: A very yummy strategy game
Ups: Deep, balanced, graphically astute
Downs: No scenario editor, no turn-based mode for Internet play
Multiplayer: Very good
Single player: Very good
Demo: Available.
Patch: NA
Just as the Chinese calendar names each year after an animal, I name each year after the computer game that monopolized my spare time during that period. So while 1993 was the Year of the Rooster to billions of people, to me it was the Year of the Warlord--Warlords II that is. After four years, Red Orb Entertainment comes to stuff the Rooster with the release of Warlords III. It's too late in the year for me to name 1997 after it, but this game is one of the finest fantasy-based strategy games ever produced.
For those unfamiliar with Warlords, gameplay is similar to the classic Empire games by Interstel and New World Computing. Those unfamiliar with Empire need to stop reading until they've played at least one version--I refuse to continue until you do. Good. Let's move on. Warlords has taken the basic Empire premise and beaten it with a big fantasy stick. There are 64 fantasy army types, 10 hero types, 16 spells, and 31 abilities. Despite the change in scale and genre, Warlords maintains a rare Empire-like addictiveness that makes even the sleepiest person say "just one more turn" until Mom finally locks up the computer or his or her spouse threatens to leave.
Play With Distinction
Warlords III bears all the fruits of a game that has matured over the years. Aside from the great graphics that can be viewed in resolutions up to 1024 by 768, Warlords has many configurable options to make it as challenging as possible. The map can be hidden or visible; fog of war can be turned on or off; the diplomacy model is one of the best I've seen; and units can be set to defend or automatically vectored to the front lines. Warlords has also improved drastically as a single-player game. There's now a campaign mode, which makes it more interesting. Most impressive is the fact that heroes survive and improve with each Warlords III scenario, giving the game a welcome RPG quality. I am always annoyed at campaigns that make players start from scratch with every scenario.
If you're looking for a multiplayer strategy game, you can't do any better than Warlords III. For starters, even though Warlords is a turn-based game, players take their turns simultaneously. Although this has been done a few times in the past, Warlords is the first game I've seen do it successfully.

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Warlords III

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