"AI War" PC Game

[Galaril]

This one is from an indie developer who has done agreat job from my limited play with the AI. It is somewhat like the other ecent space combat strategic war games but with a great AI. One big eye opener in the game is that it can have up 30000 units in game and the maps are randomly built each time using 16 billion procedural maps! The neat thing I noticed witht he AI it feels alot more like a human since it really reacts to what is happening in game this has tons of strategy in it forsure along with a high replay value. The guy posts some over at wargamer and seems real decent.

features:
- Cooperative RTS game (1-8 players) with numerous unique ship types.
- Challenging AI in 26 styles, many with unique superweapons.
- Insanely high unit counts: 30,000+ ships in most games.
- Lengthy campaigns featuring 80+ simultaneous planetary battlefields.
- Different Every Time: 16 billion procedural maps, each with specific units. - A focus on deep strategy that you don't get in most RTS games.
AI War site:Arcen Games, LLC - AI War Features
User Review:UKGamer: AI War: Fleet Command
Wargamer forums thread:http://www.wargamer.com/forums/tm.aspx?m=352923

[RendeR]

This looks very entertaining, I may have to grab this one.

[Mustang]

How the hell could one control 80 simultaneous battles?

[Galaril]

It was $20 bucks well spent. the developer reminds me of Puresim Baseball's Shaun Sullivan in that it is great game for $20 bucks that seems like a work of love for the guy that he surely is not looking to get rich off of it.

[DaddyTorgo]

hmmm - may have to check this one out, for sure

[Ramzavail]

I can't get the video trailer to work.

[Galaril]

Originally Posted by Ramzavail

I can't get the video trailer to work.

Works fine for me.

[RendeR]

The game is fun, bit complicated to maneuver through but once you get ahold of the UI its not too bad.

I started a test universe with 20 planets, basically outnumbered my way to holding 12 of them, the AI's control number is near 300 though and they're coming after me constantly.

They also have a planet that none of my weapons seems to have any effect on, I must ponder this.....

[Galaril]

What I love about this one is the way it feels like you are in Battlestar Galactica as the humans and being totally outnumbered by the cyclons.

[Galaril]

I love this quote from another board by someone who has the game that really sums up the game:

"

Reminds me of a mish mash of games like Conquest Frontier Wars, Stars!, Space Empires....but thats all good to me."

[DaddyTorgo]

this game sounds pretty sweet...i might have to pick it up. i've been jonesing for something new lately.

[gstelmack]

Gave the demo a whirl last night. I think I'm completely lost, there are just WAY too many options of things to build, and it will take a long time before I remember what tab things are on, etc.

I did like that you could set up repeating queues of ships, and I liked the ship type bar on the right that let you select all instances of a ship class in the system (and with shift-select can do multiple classes). Makes it real easy to grab your fleet and fling them at someone.

I wish there was a way to auto-gather resources, where I just build like four metal miners and four crystal gatherers and they go off and find and gather without me having to hunt over the map and click on the specific resource site to work it. Just go to the closest one that is not manned yet.

I also wish my fleet would stick together. You make a big fleet and then send them at someone, and all your fighters get there and try to fight for 2 minutes while waiting for the next fastest class to show up. That defeats the purpose of having a fleet.

The developer does seem open to suggestions though, so I could see some of these things cleaned up. I'm just not sure my 40-year-old brain can handle the amount of stuff it's being asked to handle and remember; I have enough trouble handling two different firefights in Company of Heroes right now. Now co-op could be cool with someone handling resource building one someone else is dealing with the military end, I would probably enjoy that more.

[Galaril]

Originally Posted by gstelmack

Gave the demo a whirl last night. I think I'm completely lost, there are just WAY too many options of things to build, and it will take a long time before I remember what tab things are on, etc.

I did like that you could set up repeating queues of ships, and I liked the ship type bar on the right that let you select all instances of a ship class in the system (and with shift-select can do multiple classes). Makes it real easy to grab your fleet and fling them at someone.

I wish there was a way to auto-gather resources, where I just build like four metal miners and four crystal gatherers and they go off and find and gather without me having to hunt over the map and click on the specific resource site to work it. Just go to the closest one that is not manned yet.

I also wish my fleet would stick together. You make a big fleet and then send them at someone, and all your fighters get there and try to fight for 2 minutes while waiting for the next fastest class to show up. That defeats the purpose of having a fleet.

The developer does seem open to suggestions though, so I could see some of these things cleaned up. I'm just not sure my 40-year-old brain can handle the amount of stuff it's being asked to handle and remember; I have enough trouble handling two different firefights in Company of Heroes right now. Now co-op could be cool with someone handling resource building one someone else is dealing with the military end, I would probably enjoy that more.

Yeah there is a lot but your suggestions are real good and you should post them I bet you he will have them in the next patch by next week if not sooner. Also the auto gather is a good idea that was in one of the Age of Empires games and would be helpful. It reminds me of the mining ships. originally you had to manually lay the mines which is still true but now the ships will stay in the mined area and automatically relay mines that get destroyed.

dan

[Galaril]

Quite an extensive Interview I did with Chris Park (x4000), indie developer of AI War: Fleet Command
http://www.ukgamer.co.u...s-park-about-ai-war.html

[Galaril]

Originally Posted by gstelmack

Gave the demo a whirl last night. I think I'm completely lost, there are just WAY too many options of things to build, and it will take a long time before I remember what tab things are on, etc.

I did like that you could set up repeating queues of ships, and I liked the ship type bar on the right that let you select all instances of a ship class in the system (and with shift-select can do multiple classes). Makes it real easy to grab your fleet and fling them at someone.

I wish there was a way to auto-gather resources, where I just build like four metal miners and four crystal gatherers and they go off and find and gather without me having to hunt over the map and click on the specific resource site to work it. Just go to the closest one that is not manned yet.

I also wish my fleet would stick together. You make a big fleet and then send them at someone, and all your fighters get there and try to fight for 2 minutes while waiting for the next fastest class to show up. That defeats the purpose of having a fleet.

The developer does seem open to suggestions though, so I could see some of these things cleaned up. I'm just not sure my 40-year-old brain can handle the amount of stuff it's being asked to handle and remember; I have enough trouble handling two different firefights in Company of Heroes right now. Now co-op could be cool with someone handling resource building one someone else is dealing with the military end, I would probably enjoy that more.

Gstelmack,

Did you go through online youtube video tutorials or the in game tutorial? They were a really well done in my opinion and helped alot.

[RendeR]

There is a button at the bottom that turns your ships from solo flight to GROUP flight, select GROUP to keep them all together in one fleet formation (they fly at the slowest ship's speed)

[RendeR]

I've got to do more reading of the manual/FAQ/something because I keep running into stuff that is 2 and 3 times stronger than anything I own and the enemy just wipes my ass. Today i tried start a new game and the very first system I go into has a group of "Leech" ships. these guys apparently STEAL your ships from you and turn them over to the AI.

Lost 150 missile cruiser which turned about and wiped out the base I had just sent them from.


NOT a pleasent surprise.

[Galaril]

Originally Posted by RendeR

I've got to do more reading of the manual/FAQ/something because I keep running into stuff that is 2 and 3 times stronger than anything I own and the enemy just wipes my ass. Today i tried start a new game and the very first system I go into has a group of "Leech" ships. these guys apparently STEAL your ships from you and turn them over to the AI.

Lost 150 missile cruiser which turned about and wiped out the base I had just sent them from.


NOT a pleasent surprise.

I may be mistaken but the game is designed partly so that you will always be fighting superior forces that also much large in size than your own. The only exception is you go more intot he game and steal the AI factories or artifatcs a that will seed you advanced ship types.

[RendeR]

If thats the case then you can never expect to win as a single player, you are required to have more players?

[Galaril]

Originally Posted by RendeR

If thats the case then you can never expect to win as a single player, you are required to have more players?

Yeah to be honest I am guessing you aren't suppose to win this one.It is more about the journey to the human races annihilation I guess

[aran]

From what I've read on the forums, it looks like the game is supposed to be challenging for players of any levels, with the top tier AI (10) being almost impossible to beat.

The guy who designed and wrote the game had the goal of creating a game that you can play hundreds or thousands of individual campaigns and constantly be challenged.

[Galaril]

Originally Posted by aran

From what I've read on the forums, it looks like the game is supposed to be challenging for players of any levels, with the top tier AI (10) being almost impossible to beat.

The guy who designed and wrote the game had the goal of creating a game that you can play hundreds or thousands of individual campaigns and constantly be challenged.

I think this may possibly be the best AI ever in a computer game that is for the masses and not for MIT or Cal Tech.

[Galaril]

Here is a post over at the games forum from the developer answering all the questions we have have had here. I guess he saw this thread but has been waiting to get approval from a MOD to post on FOFC for a few days?


Hi Galaril, definitely, welcome to the forums.

Right now the wiki is the only manual-style reference, but really it is more of a reference or strategy guide than a true manual (well, at least the style of low-content manuals that companies often put out these days). The game was originally designed so that almost everything you need to know is in the tutorials or in hover-tips inside the game itself.

Of course, in practice, advanced players have wanted to know all sorts of detailed questions about the game, and so the wiki was born and has been growing substantially over time. A more traditional manual is something we're considering, but it's not going to be a super short-term thing unfortunately.

By the by... I assume you are the same Galaril from the Front Office Football forums?

I saw the link from that thread over to the Arcen site, and I went over there to comment, but I'm still waiting on a moderator to approve my request days later. I guess they are really backed up.

But, since you came over here I'll go ahead and post a few responses to items from that thread, since I can't yet get over there. I know you didn't ask most of these, but if you point the other people here then they can also have the answers to their questions. Smiley

How the hell could one control 80 simultaneous battles?

You'd never be actually fighting on all 80 planets at once. Usually the max number of simultaneous battles that require your attention is about 3, although in multiplayer it is more. The idea is to try to choose your battlefields wisely, and keep the number of fronts low enough to handle. And keep some planets protected and hidden so that the AI isn't bothering you everywhere at once, etc.

I can't get the video trailer to work.

Presumably that's some sort of issue with flash. There's a version (lower quality unless you hit HQ) on youtube also, if he wants to try that: YouTube - AI War - Trailer

Gave the demo a whirl last night. I think I'm completely lost, there are just WAY too many options of things to build, and it will take a long time before I remember what tab things are on, etc.

The version that just came out today, 1.011, should make the buttons a bit easier to understand and learn. But I suspect that he didn't play through the tutorials, which is going to make anyone lost.

I wish there was a way to auto-gather resources, where I just build like four metal miners and four crystal gatherers and they go off and find and gather without me having to hunt over the map and click on the specific resource site to work it. Just go to the closest one that is not manned yet.

Just Ctrl-click the harvester buttons to do build all your harvesters automatically. It says that in the description on the harvester screen, and I think one of the tutorials mentions that, too. Hence why I thought maybe he skipped the tutorials.

I also wish my fleet would stick together. You make a big fleet and then send them at someone, and all your fighters get there and try to fight for 2 minutes while waiting for the next fastest class to show up. That defeats the purpose of having a fleet.

As someone else pointed out there, there's a "lone move" button on the quick-buttons row that can be toggled to "group move" instead to have it work like this. Or you can hold G to make it work like that for just one movement order. Both ways of moving are of use in different tactical situations.

I've got to do more reading of the manual/FAQ/something because I keep running into stuff that is 2 and 3 times stronger than anything I own and the enemy just wipes my ass. Today i tried start a new game and the very first system I go into has a group of "Leech" ships. these guys apparently STEAL your ships from you and turn them over to the AI.

Some planets are tougher than others, so you have to pick your battles. Some of the planets you can't take until you get much further along in the individual game. Some of them you might never want to take, just because they aren't worth the time/effort/AI-progress-increase that comes with them. In an average game on 80 planets, you'll take at most 30 planets. Picking which 30 is part of the challenge. Smiley

I may be mistaken but the game is designed partly so that you will always be fighting superior forces that also much large in size than your own. The only exception is you go more intot he game and steal the AI factories or artifatcs a that will seed you advanced ship types.

Generally speaking, you should be mostly fighting forces that you have equal numbers to, or even that you outnumber. That's not always the case, especially on the higher difficulties, but generally if you strategise and group your ships and attack them post-by-post, you'll often have the advantage in numbers in individual battles, despite the fact that they outnumber you 100:1 in the galaxy as a whole. It's basically guerrilla tactics on your part, in many cases.

If thats the case then you can never expect to win as a single player, you are required to have more players?

This game is equally playable with any number of players. If there are more players, then there are even more AI ships, which means that the players often need to work together on offense and defense, etc.

yeah to be honest I am guessing you aren't suppose to win this one. It is more about the journey to oblivion kind of thing I guess

Goodness no! If you aren't winning, you might want to tweak the difficulty level. The lowest difficulty levels are completely pushover, but the highest one is probably unbeatable by any but the very best players, if even then. There is a huge range of all sorts of difficulty levels between those two extremes, though, so you should be able to find something that fits. If you've played other RTS games, a good place to start is Difficulty 5 or 6. People on these forums will tell you that the real game starts at 7, which is true in the sense that the AI is way smarter and more interesting there, but it's also a lot more difficult than even difficulty 6. Just depends on what kind of experience you are looking for.

Thanks for stopping by, and let me know if there are any other questions I/we can answer for you!

[gstelmack]

Originally Posted by Galaril

By the by... I assume you are the same Galaril from the Front Office Football forums?

I saw the link from that thread over to the Arcen site, and I went over there to comment, but I'm still waiting on a moderator to approve my request days later. I guess they are really backed up.

If he tells us what his username is, we can ping Ben directly to get him in here. If he's browsing my e-mail is gstelmack AT nc DOT rr DOT com and I'll poke Ben.

Originally Posted by Galaril

The version that just came out today, 1.011, should make the buttons a bit easier to understand and learn. But I suspect that he didn't play through the tutorials, which is going to make anyone lost.

Just Ctrl-click the harvester buttons to do build all your harvesters automatically. It says that in the description on the harvester screen, and I think one of the tutorials mentions that, too. Hence why I thought maybe he skipped the tutorials.

FWIW, I did play through the 3 basic tutorials. I did not do the campaign tutorial or the others past it.

My comment on building was that there are a bunch of tabs with a bunch of items in each and I'm going to have a hard time remembering which one is where. That will take a bit just to remember all the options and find them. I understand the layout, and it makes sense, just a lot to remember.

Ctrl-click on the harvester buttons was not mentioned that I remember in the resource tutorial, although it may have been a line that I missed. It tells you to build them, then zoom out and I think it was right-click on the appropriate resource to place them. A later tutorial may have gone over the Ctrl-click bit, but it would have been nice if the basic tutorial had had you do this, not just mentioned it briefly (if it did mention it).

[Galaril]

Originally Posted by gstelmack

If he tells us what his username is, we can ping Ben directly to get him in here. If he's browsing my e-mail is gstelmack AT nc DOT rr DOT com and I'll poke Ben.



FWIW, I did play through the 3 basic tutorials. I did not do the campaign tutorial or the others past it.

My comment on building was that there are a bunch of tabs with a bunch of items in each and I'm going to have a hard time remembering which one is where. That will take a bit just to remember all the options and find them. I understand the layout, and it makes sense, just a lot to remember.

Ctrl-click on the harvester buttons was not mentioned that I remember in the resource tutorial, although it may have been a line that I missed. It tells you to build them, then zoom out and I think it was right-click on the appropriate resource to place them. A later tutorial may have gone over the Ctrl-click bit, but it would have been nice if the basic tutorial had had you do this, not just mentioned it briefly (if it did mention it).

I think his user name is:x4000

[gstelmack]

Working on it...

[RendeR]

I started a new 10 system gameand I own 4, they only own their main 2 andf the rest I've cleaned out and will occupy as needed. Still unsure how I'm going to overwhelm their big guns. gotta get a LOT more research so I can develope bigger ships.

[aran]

After playing through some of the tutorials, I think I may really like this game. I haven't pulled the trigger on the purchase yet, but I may do so tomorrow after messing around with the "Intermediate campaign".

The only annoyance I've encountered is that you can't select ships around one planet, then give them orders to go to a specific spot around another. Instead, you have to tell them to warp, wait for them to warp through, then select them on the other end of the warp and move them. This wouldn't be too bad, but there's no good way of telling when ships have completed warping without actively looking. It's a pretty minor issue, though, and I'm sure I'll get used to it after playing more.

The interface, aside from that, is pretty damn good for an indie game. After a very brief adjustment phase, I can get around great. It's just a matter of memorizing the positions of different construction buttons. Since this game doesn't require very rapid decision making (because of travel times slowing down the pace of the game), spending a second finding the ship I want to build isn't going to be that big of a problem in these early stages of learning the game.

[Galaril]

Originally Posted by aran

After playing through some of the tutorials, I think I may really like this game. I haven't pulled the trigger on the purchase yet, but I may do so tomorrow after messing around with the "Intermediate campaign".

The only annoyance I've encountered is that you can't select ships around one planet, then give them orders to go to a specific spot around another. Instead, you have to tell them to warp, wait for them to warp through, then select them on the other end of the warp and move them. This wouldn't be too bad, but there's no good way of telling when ships have completed warping without actively looking. It's a pretty minor issue, though, and I'm sure I'll get used to it after playing more.

The interface, aside from that, is pretty damn good for an indie game. After a very brief adjustment phase, I can get around great. It's just a matter of memorizing the positions of different construction buttons. Since this game doesn't require very rapid decision making (because of travel times slowing down the pace of the game), spending a second finding the ship I want to build isn't going to be that big of a problem in these early stages of learning the game.

I have not tried the new update yet but I guess the new 1.12 patch has madea dramatic change in the games AI for the better. Now the AI is more aggresive and there is cross planet attacks. Next on the developers list of additions will be he said AI tactical retreats wow. I wish this guy was making the AI for most of my old RTS favorites

[x4000]

Originally Posted by gstelmack

If he tells us what his username is, we can ping Ben directly to get him in here. If he's browsing my e-mail is gstelmack AT nc DOT rr DOT com and I'll poke Ben.

Hey there, it's me. I just got the approval, so thanks to everyone for helping work on that!

Originally Posted by gstelmack

FWIW, I did play through the 3 basic tutorials. I did not do the campaign tutorial or the others past it.

Gotcha. A lot of strategy tips are given in the campaign tutorial, which really help with how to defend yourself, etc -- it's pretty different from most other RTS games, in that you need to really have good defense at your wormholes and the techniques for expanding and taking new territory are also pretty unique. It's definitely worth a playthrough if you have interest in the game; people have reported it as being both fun and informative.

Originally Posted by gstelmack

My comment on building was that there are a bunch of tabs with a bunch of items in each and I'm going to have a hard time remembering which one is where. That will take a bit just to remember all the options and find them. I understand the layout, and it makes sense, just a lot to remember.

Yeah, that's very true -- this is a pretty huge game, and it's only going to be getting more huge over the next few years with expansions and our ongoing free DLC, so mitigating this complexity is definitely something I am continuously keeping a careful eye on. The 1.012 version that just recently came out should hopefully do a better job of making this all look simpler; build buttons are organized into columns as well as rows, which makes it so much easier to find stuff (because you can parse/understand a column at a time, rather than having to look at each button individually). So hopefully that will be a help in making things easier to remember, even though there is still a the same amount of stuff actually there. That's the goal, anyway!

Originally Posted by gstelmack

Ctrl-click on the harvester buttons was not mentioned that I remember in the resource tutorial, although it may have been a line that I missed. It tells you to build them, then zoom out and I think it was right-click on the appropriate resource to place them. A later tutorial may have gone over the Ctrl-click bit, but it would have been nice if the basic tutorial had had you do this, not just mentioned it briefly (if it did mention it).

This is a great point. Added to my short-term list: Tutorial: Make players in basic tutorial use the Ctrl-click to place harvesters The Ctrl-click feature was added in response to player requests after the tutorials were originally created, and I never thought to really make people go through it there. But that is the easiest and preferred way of doing it now (the manual way is far too time consuming), so it definitely should be what the tutorial highlights. Thanks!

[DaddyTorgo]

i might have to play more of the tutorials tonight...i only made it thru the first the other day.

but i'm itching to pull the trigger on at least one new game, so i ought to give this a chance to be the one.

[x4000]

Originally Posted by RendeR

I started a new 10 system gameand I own 4, they only own their main 2 andf the rest I've cleaned out and will occupy as needed. Still unsure how I'm going to overwhelm their big guns. gotta get a LOT more research so I can develope bigger ships.

The 10 planet maps are actually really hard in certain ways, just because it keeps your amount of knowledge pretty limited compared to the larger maps. The default map size is of course 80 planets, which takes a lot of time to play through, but another sweet spot is around 40 planets, which keeps the games shorter (maybe 7 hours or so, it varies by player and difficulty), and yet also gives you plenty of knowledge to gather.

On the other hand, even on a small 10 planet map, you can still unlock enough stuff to do some heavy damage to your opponent -- it's very easy to get all the advanced research stations you need, for instance. It's just very hard to get a lot of techs unlocked with so few planets (and thus so little knowledge to find). So you're likely to want to swarm the enemy with lots of lower-level ships, and a few key larger ships. I would suggest bombers as a good ship to get Mark III and IV ships of, simply because they do so much more damage to the enemy home planet command stations, force fields, etc. Get enough of those together, with some support for them like cruisers or whatever bonus ships you have, and it should definitely be a winnable situation!

[x4000]

Originally Posted by aran

After playing through some of the tutorials, I think I may really like this game. I haven't pulled the trigger on the purchase yet, but I may do so tomorrow after messing around with the "Intermediate campaign".

Glad you like it! We're always working to improve it, too, so feedback is always welcome.

Originally Posted by aran

The only annoyance I've encountered is that you can't select ships around one planet, then give them orders to go to a specific spot around another. Instead, you have to tell them to warp, wait for them to warp through, then select them on the other end of the warp and move them. This wouldn't be too bad, but there's no good way of telling when ships have completed warping without actively looking. It's a pretty minor issue, though, and I'm sure I'll get used to it after playing more.

This comes up every so often with a few players, but this is just one of the design intents of the game. It is not meant to really be like one big battlefield broken up into sections, but rather a collection of generally-separate battlefields. I've written a bit more about this here, if that helps: Suggestions

I generally try to be really accommodating with player requests, but that's one area that I think is key to certain parts of the game design, hence my reluctance.

Originally Posted by aran

The interface, aside from that, is pretty damn good for an indie game. After a very brief adjustment phase, I can get around great. It's just a matter of memorizing the positions of different construction buttons. Since this game doesn't require very rapid decision making (because of travel times slowing down the pace of the game), spending a second finding the ship I want to build isn't going to be that big of a problem in these early stages of learning the game.

Thanks! We're working on a graphical upgrade, too, so over the next few months you'll be seeing even better-looking interface elements and graphics in general. I funded the whole thing out of my own pocket to start, and hiring an artist was just not something I could afford to do -- all of the initial art was either stuff that I created, or stuff from free sources such as Daniel Cook's excellent work. Now that AI War is actually out and making some money, I'm reinvesting some of that in upgrading the art since that is currently one of the weaker parts of the game (parts of the art are presently pretty charming, but the rest is just serviceable). Some smallish art upgrades are already in place in the 1.012 release, and more is coming in 1.013 (the prereleases for which you can try out for yourself on our forums, if you like playing with open beta versions of software). The explosions are massively better in 1.013, for instance.

Side note -- if you do want a faster pace for the game, you can always toggle on the Fast & Dangerous combat mode: AI War - Combat Styles - ArcenWiki That's my preferred mode, and I think the majority of players prefer it, but there are a lot of TBS and grand strategy players that enjoy AI War only on the normal speed. To each his/her own!

[x4000]

Originally Posted by Galaril

I have not tried the new update yet but I guess the new 1.12 patch has madea dramatic change in the games AI for the better. Now the AI is more aggresive and there is cross planet attacks. Next on the developers list of additions will be he said AI tactical retreats wow. I wish this guy was making the AI for most of my old RTS favorites

Glad you like the sound of it, and hope you enjoy the update. It's been real popular with the "regulars" for the game, who were playing with this in the prerelease versions all last week. The AI is already really formidable and interesting, but it really helps that I am able to listen what players do and put in new behaviorlets to respond to that. Plus, I'm always getting new ideas for how to add more variance or (good) complexity into the AI, so that it seems increasingly human-like in all situations. It's an extended process, and the more I work with this the more I think the downfall of a lot of AI systems is that the developers simply don't have enough time with hands-on player feedback. One of the few advantages of the indie over the AAA developers, I think.

[x4000]

Originally Posted by DaddyTorgo

i might have to play more of the tutorials tonight...i only made it thru the first the other day.

but i'm itching to pull the trigger on at least one new game, so i ought to give this a chance to be the one.

I hope you get a chance to go through all four of the main ones -- the three basic, and the one intermediate. The three basic are all pretty quick and just get you up to speed on the interface and general mechanics, and then the fourth one takes several hours and is actually a mini-campaign that you play (it's not just walking you through everything in that one). But that fourth one introduces you to a lot of the cool strategies available to you in this game, and that's been the tipping point for a lot of my customers deciding to buy the game. I get a lot of emails with things like "I was partway through the intermediate tutorial and I knew I had to get this" or "I had just finished the intermediate tutorial and knew I wanted to get this" or whatever. And a couple of reviewers (The Wargamer, most notably) also mentioned it as being fun, so I think you'll find the time in that tutorial as being well-spent.

[DaddyTorgo]

Originally Posted by x4000

I hope you get a chance to go through all four of the main ones -- the three basic, and the one intermediate. The three basic are all pretty quick and just get you up to speed on the interface and general mechanics, and then the fourth one takes several hours and is actually a mini-campaign that you play (it's not just walking you through everything in that one). But that fourth one introduces you to a lot of the cool strategies available to you in this game, and that's been the tipping point for a lot of my customers deciding to buy the game. I get a lot of emails with things like "I was partway through the intermediate tutorial and I knew I had to get this" or "I had just finished the intermediate tutorial and knew I wanted to get this" or whatever. And a couple of reviewers (The Wargamer, most notably) also mentioned it as being fun, so I think you'll find the time in that tutorial as being well-spent.

oooh - so the 4th i actually get to do something, rather than just go through the interface? Sounds like fun!! That'll definately be a tipping point for me - I just got busy the other day after I made it through the first one, and while I knew I'd need to go through 2+3 to learn the interface I just didn't have the inclination to do it at that point and try to retain what I was learning.

[x4000]

Originally Posted by DaddyTorgo

oooh - so the 4th i actually get to do something, rather than just go through the interface? Sounds like fun!! That'll definately be a tipping point for me - I just got busy the other day after I made it through the first one, and while I knew I'd need to go through 2+3 to learn the interface I just didn't have the inclination to do it at that point and try to retain what I was learning.

Yep, exactly. The intermediate tutorial gives you some tips and then a goal, and then you spend several minutes (1-30 minutes, depending on the goal) achieving it. It tells you a number of strategies that work well as you go, but you have a lot of freedom to do what you want as long as it gets the job done, too. Hope you enjoy it!

[RendeR]

I just finished winning an 80 planet game. The AI were both on the weakest level, I gave myself major economic boosts and I chose a map that was very clearly beneficial to me.

So basically an untrained chimp or perhaps certain members of this board could have won this just as easily. It took playing through an entire game to really get a good handle on game flow and resource management. I hit snags with limits on numbers of things that I could build and about 1/3 of the way through simply stopped building new stations and went on a slash and burn crusade.

Key issue in my game, the AI's were "Hammer" and "Entrenched home world" or something similar. Neither one ever created fleets larger than 20-30 chips at any point to counteract my assault force of 1200+ at a couple stages.

I'm wondering if other AI versions/types will learn from what I'm doing and try to find ways to counter act what I do instead of just sitting there waiting for me to slaughter them.

I like it, and the next game will move up the toughness ladder a few rungs.

[x4000]

Originally Posted by RendeR

I just finished winning an 80 planet game. The AI were both on the weakest level, I gave myself major economic boosts and I chose a map that was very clearly beneficial to me.

So basically an untrained chimp or perhaps certain members of this board could have won this just as easily. It took playing through an entire game to really get a good handle on game flow and resource management. I hit snags with limits on numbers of things that I could build and about 1/3 of the way through simply stopped building new stations and went on a slash and burn crusade.

Key issue in my game, the AI's were "Hammer" and "Entrenched home world" or something similar. Neither one ever created fleets larger than 20-30 chips at any point to counteract my assault force of 1200+ at a couple stages.

I'm wondering if other AI versions/types will learn from what I'm doing and try to find ways to counter act what I do instead of just sitting there waiting for me to slaughter them.

I like it, and the next game will move up the toughness ladder a few rungs.

You'll definitely have a very easy time of it at the lowest levels. Below level 3, the AI is intentionally stupid in a number of ways: running straight at your strongest forces, building only tiny raids, never doing cross-planet attacks, etc. If you've played other RTS games, you'd probably most enjoy playing at difficulty 5 or 6 to start out. Experienced AI War players mostly play around difficulty 7 (which is the first level where the AI goes basically all-out in normal tactics, and is therefore several orders of magnitude harder than difficulty 6).

In general the difficulty increases are closer to being logarithmic than linear, but it can be fun to play on the lower difficulty levels to give yourself a sandbox to just explore the mechanics in, etc. Glad you liked it! You can also mix and match, and so do a difficulty 6 and a difficulty 1, or something like that, to give yourself some breather while at the same time seeing some of the better AI.

The Hammer type is actually named as such because it can really pound the heck out of your planets with really rough incoming waves. The entrenched homeworlder is a lot more balanced of an AI type, and does moderate attacks while having above-average defense. It carries more of a risk of the big cross-planet attacks with it, though (these are the big 1,000 to 2,000 cross-planet attacks that the AI launches as the game goes on, on difficulty 5 and up).

You might find this post interesting (and funny) from a fairly new player in the forums who started with difficulty 6, was unimpressed with the AI, and then moved up to 7 and got smacked around the first time: An Dif 7 After Action Report (also @ Haagenti)

[gstelmack]

This is now on Steam at 25% off so $15.

[Calis]

Apparently this is also version 2.0 of the game from what I see. Not sure what the changes are exactly though.

I've been meaning to grab this one, and think I'll do so now with the sale.

[aran]

This game's gotten significantly better since the 1.0 release. If you're a fan of massive strategy games, it's well worth a buy.

[x4000]

For the full explanation of the changes since 1.0: AI War 2.0 vs. 1.0, A Retrospective

[PilotMan]

So has anyone played this? The sale ends in a couple days, and for 15 bucks seems to be a good buy.

[aran]

It is a good buy if you like diverse, deep, huge RTSes that can provide a real challenge and be replayed many many times without much repetition.

[RendeR]

I like it, I just got wrapped up in other games since I bought it and haven't gotten back to it yet. It takes a LOT of conentration to keep track of everything. LOoooooong learning curve.

[SportsDino]

I'd say it is worth the price, you can pay a lot more for a normal strategy game that is not nearly as deep. The learning curve to me is offset by the richness of the experience, you don't feel like you have found everything out and are just 'upgrading stats' after 5 hours (like most strategy games, mostly a game of logistics where you are racing to get the warriors with +5 to asskicking so you can waste the other guy who has warriors with only +2 to asskicking).

Unfortunately, to a large degree logistics is a major factor in the game, and it is harder to accomplish good results since you are so outmatched. However, I really enjoy the moments where I make some heroic strategic move... so those little highs of feeling 'clever' versus just being a better micromanager make the game worth the money in my opinion, and happen more regularly than other games in my recent rotation.

[Lonnie]

They do have a demo you can download and run through the tutorials to get a taste of it.

[aran]

Just finished my first co-op campaign in AI War. I think it was on a sixty planet map. It took upwards of 12 hours to complete. So much fun! We played 1-2 hours a night for a week and change.

As far as grand strategy games go, AI War is a great buy and for $20 it's hard to justify not playing it if you're a fan of the genre.

[x4000]

Thanks for your support! Glad you enjoyed it so well.