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StarForce!!!

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 44 / 51
Date: June 20, 2006
Author: Amazon User

This game has StarForce copy protection, which is software that you do NOT want on your computer. Reportedly, it replaces your CD and/or DVD drivers, and often causes extreme hardware and software problems. I've been a victim of the software problems, it basically crippled my very expensive SCSI scanners and it was extremely difficult to figure out what was doing it. It could be the best game that's ever been produced, but anyone who's had the StarForce experience is going to steer clear. I don't know why a company would knowingly try to sell you software that is known to cause so many problems, it's downright malicious.

The game ive been waiting for

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 10 / 15
Date: June 23, 2006
Author: Amazon User

Ever since the first Total War game came out "Shogun" I have always thought, man it would sure be cool to be able to just zoom down and play as just one of the soldiers on the field instead of always just commanding the whole army.
Dont get me wrong...theres nothing I love more than being able to send whole legions of infantry and cavalry into the fray...and watching them duke it out Braveheart style, ala Rome Total War, but there was always that itch of...oh no my left flank is collapsing, instead of switching a unit from my right side to the left I wish i could just play a single guy in a 3rd person mode to go over and back my men up. And now, we have Rise & Fall which allows you to do exactly that.

Rise & Fall is your basic RTS game where you build structures, gather resources, amass an army and go to town on the enemy.
If you ever played Age of Empire you know what I mean.

By comparison to other RTS games R&F very much in my opinion simplifies the resource gathering system. Instead of having to gather....wood....coal...food...gold...and anywhere up to 6 resources at once just to maintain an army. R&F only makes you gather Gold and Wood which allows you to focus more on building that army up. And in this game it can be a rather decent size army, the population cap is 5000 which is divided between the number of players in the game which is from 2-8
So in a 2 player game it splits to 2500 per player. Which is pretty good for the type of game it is.

So the battles can be huge, and with a newer graphics engine, they look rather cool when they are large, if your rig can run it otherwise youre looking for some graphical slowdown, in that case you can drop the pop cap down to keep the fights smaller.

And now for the real treat, this game allows you to take control of just a single hero character to try and turn the tide of a battle you may be losing. There are 4 factions, Greece, Rome, Persia, and Egypt, and each faction has 2 heroes you can pick from, for a total of 8. and each one has their own strength and weaknesses.
And they made the heroes run off this stamina system which goes down for almost every action your hero does, whether its taking damage, or using combat moves. So in that sense it doesnt unbalance the game with the heroes running around killing everything.
The number of different units is also toned down in this game as opposed to like Empire Earth where you have like 20 different types of units to manage, this game makes it easier to control an army based on only 3 or 4 troop types, which I like.

Now I'd have to say the down side is that since it is an RTS game, the fights are not really based on any real tactical warfare, basically its a lot of...whoever has more units...might win. The Total War series allows you to take advantage of and exploit different tactical situations like moving to go around an enemies flank or surrounding them. But this game can easily be forgiven for that.
Another draw is the AI isnt quite satisfactory for siege battles, there are 10 different difficulties for you to pick from. The harder ones make it fun, but the AI doesnt use siege equipment to the max at times. You have ladder units so you can put ladders up to the walls to climb....but i have never seen the AI use them, they usually just use a battering ram or two to come knocking on my gates.

The sound is not bad, the combat sounds pretty good with the exception of the sounds of the men dying can really get repetitive since it seems like the same 3 sound clips are used over and over again...which are really noticeable.

The naval battles are also very cool, where you can basically play pirate of the sea and take over enemy vessels with grappling hooks and catapults.

Although there are some people that would rather stick to games like Age of Empires, personally this is my new favorite RTS game on the market.

I suggest giving this one a try, there is a demo available if youre unsure about shelling 40-50 bucks right away on it

I hope this game becomes popular among the gaming community because i think it has some potential to get big.

This game has software that can harm your computer.

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 28 / 36
Date: June 28, 2006
Author: Amazon User

Starforce is a copy protection program that can harm your computer. It eats up CPU power, and causes slow downs. This cannot be removed. Stay away from this.

BEST RTS GAME EVER MADE !!!!

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 5 / 9
Date: August 08, 2006
Author: Amazon User

I only wanted to place a review because of the bad reviews made regarding the copy protection feature. First off .. THIS DOES NOT DAMAGE ANY PC OR COMPONENTS WHATSOEVER. It's WInXP certified and only installs a few Kb's of data to authenticate the cd when using it to play the game. I have already installed and played half the game and there is no issue with my PC, CD/DCD ROM, system performance, or whatever it was mentioned. I say this also because it would be nice for someone to purchase this without doubts to see how nice Rise and Fall is. Better than Microsoft's Age of Empire's 3, you can move in almost every place in the environment (even through trees) and even inside some buildings built. The best is when you fight along the armie and signal the Armies to shout and sound the battle cry before running towards the enemy armies!! Man, I've never seen better software, and I am sure Midway will come up with a better one soon. Sorry Age of Empire's .. I've turned to Rise and Fall!!

good game

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 1 / 5
Date: October 21, 2006
Author: Amazon User

great game. Lots of fun. I had lot of fun. Best game ever

Game Doesn't Run

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 11 / 13
Date: October 28, 2006
Author: Amazon User

Just got done installing the game, which took about 30 minutes. Running a Pentium D 3.0Ghz, 2GB RAM, Nvidia GeForce 6800 system with Windows Vista and the game doesn't work at all. Tried running in XP compatibility mode. No such luck.

I even had to install their malicious and infamous StarForce Protection Software - for what? Not only does this game not run, it locks up my system. Don't waste your money paying for this garbage. This is the first and last time I'll buy a Midway game. They clearly have no idea what they're doing.

Pros: None
Cons: Doesn't work. Locks up Windows

Game play is great, stability is horrible

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 2 / 2
Date: April 01, 2007
Author: Amazon User

Rise and fall is easily one of the best RTS games I've ever played. It really does a great job of supporting different playing types and feels like they took the best elements from Age of Empires, Warcraft, and Diablo and put them together with many more original ideas.

I always thought it was sort of odd how in every other RTS I'd played, walls were just these barriers erected to block movement, units couldn't stand on them or go over them. In real combat, walls were an impediment, but not a true block. Enemies thew ladders up and scaled the wall while defenders tried to kick the ladders off, they served as a walkway giving archers a high ground advantage, and they served as platforms for anti-ground unit siege equipment. Finally here is a game that gives walls the strategy and respect they're due! That's just one example of how much thought was put into this game as to how ancient wars were really fought.

Hero mode is also lots of fun and makes the hero more than just a super powered unit you have to focus on while using your army. in hero mode, you can issue commands to make the AI follow you, attack with you, etc so you can focus on making the most of the hero instead of frantically toggling between the army and the hero like you have to with Warcraft.

I've had major stability issues with this game, though. No hardware issues, but I seriously question how much this game was tested before going into production. I finally had to turn off my anti-virus protection to get the libraries to actually install properly. I don't install games in the default directory, and after browsing for the right place, the text box to enter in a directory name for the game to be installed in kept comming out of focus every couple seconds. Not a big deal since you only see that screen once, but I think it's telling that I've never even heard of that happening with another game. I've had the game suddenly crash for no reason a couple times a day, and just mysteriously quit on me several more times. On the plus side, there's an auto save feature that works really well. I highly recommend utilizing this. It makes the stability issues merely annoying rather than downright throw-the-disk-against-the-wall-and-hit-it-with-a-hammer infuriating.

For some reason the quest objectives wouldn't always trigger when they were completed. This is especially true of the second learn to play scenario. When this happened, I tried seeing if it was other things that I'd done that had caused it to fail triggering, and I never could figure out what was happening. My ultimate guess is that the logic tests used in this game were again not fully tested enough. This was highly exasperating though, since unlike simply picking up the scenario at the last save point before a crash, the objective failures cause you to basically have to give up on your scenario attempt altogether.

Overall, this is a phenomenal game with some seriously software problems. The fact that I'm still willing to give it 4 stars is testament to just how much fun it is. The stability issues keep this from being a game that you get lost in for months, but it will be a game you keep pulling off the shelf to play as soon as you forget your grievances. I would love to see Rise and Fall's development team get a chance to produce another game with another publisher and/or programming team. Someone dropped the ball on this game, which is a crying shame. This could have been a classic.

MEDIOCRE RTS - DEFINITELY *NOT* WORTH THE StarForce RISK

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 3 / 3
Date: November 18, 2007
Author: Amazon User

I knew this one sported StarForce (thanks to Amazon Reviewers with brass ones - and not intimidated by the gaming industry hyenas); yet, I found it in a electronics megamarket bin for $3 and could not resist. (Goes to show what the value of ridiculously "protected" games becomes in less than a year).

StarForce aside (and after subtracting 2 stars for its intrusive risk to our systems), this RTS seems undecided as to what it aimed for.
Trying to combine strategy with action is not new, WARCRAFT 3 (for one) did it much better. You have your hero (Alexander or Cleopatra) and then you build up your army to complete the corresponding campaign.
You build your base and your workers gather wood and gold. When strong enough you go (or get thrown) into battle - to earn the third resource: glory. All three are needed to advance to the next eras.

The graphics can be adequately good if run on high settings; low settings are pretty disappointing. The units are well designed though, and their movements and spilled blood give a realistic taste.

The controls will take you some time to get used to as, not only do they take up quite a chunk of the screen, but are temperamental in responding as well. Selecting units, especially in the heat of the battle, can be tricky too, as more often than not, workers receive by mistake the order to run into the front line and fight hand-to-hand with the armed enemy: an expensive short-lived sight.

The only thing that keeps this game afloat is, well, its naval warfare. Most RTS avoid them as too messy and complicated (haven't seen a solid effort since C&C: RED ALERT 2), however R&F:CaW demonstrates well designed ships, historically (more or less) accurate naval warfare techniques and quite enjoyable animations.

All in all: not a bad game that, unfortunately, is hardly worth the StarForce trouble it brings to our systems.

best game ever made !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 0 / 0
Date: May 13, 2008
Author: Amazon User

i bought this game off of amazon and it rulz i had to upgrade my computer but my computer was really old but it was worth it when you see those graphics.

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