Seven Kingdoms: Ancient Adversaries is an empire-building real-time strategy game where the player seeks to achieve victory through Expansion, Trade, Diplomacy, War and Espionage and offers a world where History and Mythology clash. The game offers ten playable civilizations, from traditional factions such as Normans and Vikings to unusual and exotic ones such as the Maya and the Mughals. There are three modes of play: scenario, skirmish and multiplayer modes. The game’s simple graphics however belie its prodigious depth:
The game goes beyond the simple mechanics off typical rts games. Once a game is launched, the player is launched into a world populated by various nationalities (up to ten are present in-game); these populations which dwell in villages and towns spread across the map are the centers of power for all the civilizations vying for power. From here the various factions raise and train their armies, produce domestic goods and war materiel, employ scientists to discover new devastating weapons and trade with other empires. Towns are not static, they change and evolve with time and have majorities as well as minorities and it is here that the game’s loyalty mechanism comes into play – will you win the hearts and minds of those minorities or devastate them with your superior military prowess?
Such villages and towns also provide specialists which will form the background of your empire.
In every game there will be a limited amount of resources evenly spread across the map. Control of these resources is the key to the game as they are the life-line of your empire since money is mainly generated through trade, apart from allowing you to build war machines.
Another interesting feature is espionage, where the player can covertly gather info on a particular empire, sow dissent amongst the enemies' populace and even assasinate generals or the king himself! Here espionage is really a sort of mini-game which adds a lot of depth and provides you with a way of harming your competitors without going to war.
The seemingly peaceful world of the humans is however threatened by sinister mythological creatures called Frythans, who present a threat to all the civilizations. The extermination of these vile creatures can also reveal long-lost scrolls which allow the factions to summon their protective god to provide significant benefit and power to that faction.
There are lots of diplomatic options available which allow you to strike alliances, trade treaties, friendly treaties and so on with other empires apart from declaring war. However these do not always work well and allies might still demand extortionate amounts of money on the pain of belligerence should you fail to oblige. Yet despite such problems i was able on more than one occasion to cause wars between various alliances without being dragged in myself. The AI is also fairly good, and while this game is easy to learn, it might be challenging to master. Although the difficulty varies widely the game's high customizability ensures that one is able to tweak the challenge to fit his playing style. The music quite complements the game and each faction has its own flavor theme - however not much can be said for the voice-overs and sound effects which are lacklustre and barely adequate.
Presentation is quite good though. The game comes packaged with a detailed tutorial and a meaty manual. There is also an intro and an encyclopedia which provides fairly good background info on the world of Seven Kingdoms.
The main drawback is that there is no story-line campaign. There are only a string of unconnected scenarios which only provide a sketchy background and the gameplay is not that different from standard skirmish games. Due to the game's venerable age, there is no multiplayer community in existence and you would probably have to find willing players yourself and invite them in order to play an online game.
Overall the game is a must have for all rts afficionados who want to enjoy some good classics which made this genre as popular as it is today. It is also recommendable to gamers who want to play something different from the 'gather-build-destroy' drill of most contemporary rts games, provided they can get over the simple yet charming visuals of this game. The AI is solid and this ensures replayability and therefore value. No rts fan can afford to miss it especially at this convenient price - at least take a look at what the fuss is all about! Truly a good old game.