Probably, many of us in childhood staged battles between toy soldiers. Plastic figures fought, stormed fortifications made of cubes, died under the feet of their parents, disappeared under wardrobes and beds. People grow up, but the love for toy battles remains – although now in the form of computer games, fortunately there are now enough of them for every color and taste. Tactical battles from Total War – well, why not “soldiers”? Yes, there can now be several thousand fighters in one battle, castles cannot be distinguished from real ones, and a carefully built detachment will not be destroyed by a cat running nearby – but this does not change the essence.
Here’s the recently released one "Teutonic Order" — another “soldiers” in a medieval setting.
Pay attention to the sign in the corner of the screen. The number of different modifiers is impressive; It’s just a pity that the effect of them is not always obvious.
All the attributes of those years are evident – battles, knights, castles… Actually, it’s stupid to expect anything else from the continuation of “History of Wars: Alexander Nevsky” and “XIII Century”. If anyone remembers, then in previous creations Unicorn Games it was exactly the same. But that’s not all: the developers were tired of having only tactical battles, so they decided to add a strategic component. Now you can travel around the global map, hire troops, engage in diplomacy and trade – in short, live the life of a typical representative of the medieval elite. Very reminiscent Mount & Blade.
It sounds tempting, but in practice it turns out that it would be better if the developers did not torture themselves or the players. There is a common journalistic cliche – such and such a regime, they say, was created “for show”. Here is the strategic map in "Teutonic Order" – just such a case.
Everything seems to be in place: across the map, abundantly dotted with castles and villages, peasants and lords, caravans and robbers travel, you can talk or fight with everyone. Looks great, but only at first glance. Almost all “units” wander aimlessly around the map – this is called “patrolling”. Almost all dialogues with NPCs are meager and boring, the plot tasks boil down to one thing: “Go to that village, there will be an enemy there, kick him in the horns and return with victory!"You can trade, but why?? Taxes from peasants and trophies after battles are enough to buy and train troops.
Role system? A dozen and a half skills that can be “pumped up” as you increase in level. All. There’s not even a portrait of the hero – so what kind of “role” can we talk about here??
The only thing that doesn’t cause https://howlcasino.co.uk/games/ a yawn in this mode is that small part of the plot dialogues, which still allow you to feel at least a little of the atmosphere of the Middle Ages. A wandering monk will share memories of his participation in the crusade, an allied lord will talk about some event – and it is not fictitious, but actually happened. But you soon stop paying attention to this, skipping all conversations in an effort to quickly get to the next battle.
You can’t make out anything from this angle. And once real generals commanded their army without a bird’s eye view?
They were filled with corpses
If we discard all the unnecessary tinsel with the strategic map and the “role-playing component”, then we are playing "Teutonic Order" just for the sake of battles. We placed the units on the map, outlined a plan of action – and went into battle.
A concept that is understandable to everyone who is even slightly familiar with the series Total War or with previous projects Unicorn Games. An army divided into several units that can form into different formations: fast cavalry for outflanking, heavy infantry for defense, long-range archers… The outcome of the battle is still significantly influenced by the morale of the soldiers.
The many modifiers that affect the army immediately catch your eye. Is there cover from the rear, are enemy archers dangerously close, is the commander alive – these and a bunch of other factors are taken into account when assessing the combat effectiveness of a squad. For example, a sufficiently strong detachment, having suffered minor losses, can flee from the battlefield only because it was under fire for too long and there were no allies nearby.
And again – at first glance, everything looks great, especially since this is not the first game of this kind for the developers. But in reality..
As a rule, it is not necessary to completely destroy the enemy – to win, it is enough to make the enemy panic. The best tactic for this is to split the enemy army into small parts and beat them with superior forces – this method is almost foolproof thanks to the brainless AI. Seeing the horsemen in front of them, the enemy soldiers forget about everything in the world (including the fact that the infantryman cannot catch the horse) and begin to pursue them, breaking away from the main forces. Having divided the enemy army in this way, you can easily kill individual detachments with the help of archers alone – just have time to order the cavalry to run around.
Yes, you don’t have to use this trick, but there are also plenty of other “bugs” – for example, local soldiers are big lazy people. Two formations collide, cutting begins, the clanging of weapons, screams… However, almost always only the first rows fight – the rest of the fighters prefer to admire the surrounding landscapes. Archers sometimes refuse to shoot at the specified target, continuing to selflessly shoot at some lonely and completely demoralized infantryman running away from the battlefield in horror.
The most interesting thing is that such absurdities do not happen all the time. In some battles, both the enemy and our troops behave quite adequately. Why sometimes a computer commander becomes desperately stupid is unclear. But it is clear that without patches "Teutonic Order" can’t do without.
Don’t expect any tactical advances from the enemy. The only thing he does well is push with numbers. As a result, all battles follow the same scenario – we wait until the enemy riflemen are left without cover, then we attack them with cavalry. We engage the remaining enemy units in battle, not forgetting to shower them with arrows. That’s it, all you have to do is wait for the enemy to run. I managed to lose only when the numerical superiority was strongly not on my side, and even then not always.
But there is multiplayer, which allows you to fight with a living opponent who will not make such mistakes! Maybe it’s not so bad there? Maybe; if you manage to find people willing to fight and after a dozen or two attempts still connect to the game, be sure to let us know. So far, the entire network game consists of the inscription “No connection to the server” and an empty list in the lobby.
A striking example of the stupidity of a computer commander – while the enemy is slowly squeezing through the open gate, my archers can get good practice shooting at living targets. In a couple of seconds the enemy will run.
From "Teutonic Order" It could have been a good game for fans of medieval history – if the developers had paid more attention to the role-playing elements, the plot and the entire strategic mode in general. It could have been a great wargame if the AI wasn’t so stupid during battles and the battles weren’t so monotonous. In the meantime, you can only play this due to the lack of a sane modern alternative. It is unclear whether patches will save the situation, but so far “The Order” is no good – it is outright inferior to the soldiers from childhood.
Pros: if you’re lucky, interesting fights happen.
Cons: unnecessary strategic mode; stupidity of AI in tactical battles; monotonous battles.