Stardock announces Elemental: War of Magic

[itchyeyes]

"Elemental is set in a world devastated by cataclysmic war magic from 100 years before, and now life is starting to return," explained Brad Wardell, CEO of Stardock.

Stardock is aiming for a February 2010 release, with a public beta arriving this coming spring. The game has been teased very mildy for several months, with Stardock fans referring to the game as "Not-MOM," or "Not Master of Magic," a reference to the classic fantasy turn-based game from 1993 that influenced the game.

More info here

[Telefrog]

Fuck yes! Stardock has done no wrong so far.

[LongStepMantis]

Just looking at the screens sold me on it. I wish more devs would be like Stardock.

And even if it is "Not-MoM", it gives me all the impressions that MoM did...good ones.

[Ancalagon]

They mention Demigod's, including the Rook, on page 2. Are GPG's Demigod and Stardock's Elementals set in the same universe? I remember GPG saying they were collaborating much closer with their publisher for Demigod, Stardock.

[Telefrog]

Originally Posted by Ancalagon

They mention Demigod's, including the Rook, on page 2. Are GPG's Demigod and Stardock's Elementals set in the same universe? I remember GPG saying they were collaborating much closer with their publisher for Demigod, Stardock.

It does seem that way. I have the beta for Demigod and so far, it's a decent game. It's still pretty rough, so there's a lot of balance issues and it's woefully lacking in variety at this point, but it's a nice take on DotA.

[biosc1]

Art style reminds me a little of PixelJunk Monsters...that's a good thing. I like the look of this game

[Telefrog]

Brad Wardell just clarified that Elemental and Demigod do not take place in the same universe. In fact, he said the Edge interviewer got the communication boned. Brad was talking specifically about how the persistent multiplayer in Demigod would work.

[Ancalagon]

Originally Posted by Telefrog

Brad Wardell just clarified that Elemental and Demigod do not take place in the same universe. In fact, he said the Edge interviewer got the communication boned. Brad was talking specifically about how the persistent multiplayer in Demigod would work.

Ahhh, that makes sense. Thanks.

[Telefrog]

Here's the official website:

http://www.elementalgame.com/

It looks great so far.

[Ghostbear]

Awesome, can't wait to give this a try. I have enjoyed every Stardock game so far, I am certain this one will not disappoint.

[danielOut]

I'm pretty sure it is the GalCiv team making this, and if that is the case... oh man am i stoked.

[Shadowmage952]

Dammit, I came in here specifically hoping that it would be MoM-esque being from Stardock. Not that the game doesn't have potential, but I just want a new MoM so damn badly.

[itchyeyes]

Originally Posted by Telefrog

Here's the official website:

http://www.elementalgame.com/

It looks great so far.

Nice find. I'm really liking the cell shaded look they've got going.

[ShivaX]

Originally Posted by Shadowmage952

Dammit, I came in here specifically hoping that it would be MoM-esque being from Stardock. Not that the game doesn't have potential, but I just want a new MoM so damn badly.

It is MoM-eqsue, its code name was "Not-MoM" because they lost (or couldn't get?) the rights to MoM to make a sequel. Maybe I'm just misunderstanding what you're saying.

[Ten19]

This looks awesome already. As a long-time fan of MoM I'm really excited, even if this isn't the same property.

[Shadowmage952]

Originally Posted by ShivaX

It is MoM-eqsue, its code name was "Not-MoM" because they lost (or couldn't get?) the rights to MoM to make a sequel. Maybe I'm just misunderstanding what you're saying.

Yeah, I noticed that when I started looking into it more and more. Definitely something to be be very excited about. I'm glad there is a company like Stardock out there still making games like this.

[Telefrog]

More details from Brad Wardell:

[Yes, you can build city walls.] One of the key game mechanics of Elemental is how cities are built. In Elemental, when a city grows, it gains a new tile which can be placed where the player wants it to go (as long as it's adjacent to an existing tile). So cities are a multi-tile affair in the game. Now, how you choose to build up your city heavily determines how defensible or productive, or rich it is. Cities are only conquered when the keep tile is taken which could be in the utter center of the city or could be at the end of a peninsula.

On describing the user "pollination" feature:

It's somewhat different than Spore. The idea is that the worlds you get will slowly evolve based on what players make. New races, new types of buildings, new technologies, new spells, new units, etc. will alowly find their way into the game if users choose to the option to allow user submitted content.

The moderation will categorize it and rate it on quality and then users can choose what kinds of content (and of what quality threshold) they want. We do this to a large degree today with WindowBlinds and our other non-game stuff.

Clarifying the screenshot of the strategic map:

When you zoom all the way out, the map becomes the parchment. It's a very seamless experience. You could, in theory, play the whole game that way almost (other than placing new tiles on cities and whether you wanted to have tactical battles).

Are there choices for tactical battles?

There's instant-resolve (i.e. two armies meet, one dies), there's auto-resolve where the game zooms in and shows a tactical battle but it's all handled by the AI (ala GalCiv II fleet battles) and then there's full tactical battles where both sides play.

One thing I should mention about the tactical battles that isn't clear in the screenshots is that they're continuous turns. They're not like HOMM. The player tells where they want their units and uses the space bar to pause the action to give new directions. That way, we can get much more interesting battles.

[bryan]

You seek the spell of mastery...


(This is AWESOME news. My bro is gonna be stoked when I tell him.)

[Telefrog]

More tidbits from Brad Wardell:

On spell balance:

The spells are going to be intentionally de-balancing in late game. I.e. by late game, you'll be able to do Populous level damage to the world. A lot of the reason we had to create a new engine was because we needed one where the world could be truly wrecked.

On the engine:

Not only is 64-bit Windows supported but there will be a native 64-bit edition of it. This info should appear (hopefully) in some of the previews.

Elemental uses a new engine that was developed for Society which is explicity 32-bit and 64-bit and scales based onthe # of CPU and GPU cores. I almost think we should get into the 3D engine licensing business.

Most people will be playing it 32-bit but the 64-bit version lets us have much larger maps because we aren't fighting with the 2 gig limit of 32-bit.

We've had a number of years to think about the game mechanics and learn from GalCiv. What we want is a game where the "winner" isn't decided early on with the rest being just mopping up.

The key to that is to have distinct paths to victory that are truly unique (far more so than in GalCiv) that are action-driven (and by action I mean the player is doing "stuff" on the map and not just making treaties or whatever).

By doing that, you can then open the way to have extremely large maps in which players are viable for a long period of time with different paths to victory.

[danielOut]

DO. WANT.

Stardock = win. Elemental: WoM = win. PC Gaming = epic win.