f13.net

Anyone else pick this up today? I'd really like to see how Multiplayer works.

I should pick it up tonight. Never played the first one, you'll probably roll me over.  I'll be on vent once it's installed.

I don't know if "rolling over" is how it works. I haven't the slightest how it works really.

got it, its an updated majesty, which is a very good thing :)

Dunno if I will ever do multiplayer, but I hope there are more campaigns than what I am seeing on the overhead map.

Downloading it now. And nothing's on my schedule this weekend. So, yeah.

When one of my local stores gets a copy, I'll be on.  I loved Majesty I.

Looks ok, runs really fast for the graphics.  I have a weird scrolling  glitch and can't find a solution.

From reading the forum trying to find fix, apparently it's not as good as Majesty 1.

Well, fixed the glitch by running on only one processor.  Meh.  Wait a little but if you're short on cash.  Looks boring.

Same developer as space rangers right?

Game won't even start for me. I get a 'ran out of memory' error and a crash when trying to start it (from Steam.)  :oh_i_see:

The game is meh. Completely lacks depth. Survive the first fifteen minutes and you've won the map. Takes great pleasure in cockstabbing you at every turn.

My BiiF would be to avoid.

What maps did you base this on, because I find it absolutely untrue. Also, I always play at 5x which is AWESOME.

Maps 1-8 or so. What is it that you want me to elaborate on? The lack of depth? The initial zerging? The cockstabbing?

I read about the cockstabbing in reviews (in the lack of money) but I haven't really run into it heavily as long as I managed things correctly.

It's not lack of money that bothers me, even if what you do the majority of the game is waiting for cash to trickle in while trying to keep your retarded heroes from commiting collective suicide on a werewolf lair, or even worse, not even properly committing suicide and instead get followed back to town which will be sacked in short order. Unstructured diatribe follows.

The cockstabbing I'm speaking of is the dozen of small design "features" that just rub me the wrong way. Graveyards. Seriously, I just lost a level 1 hero to a marauding mob and I have to build a tower to deal with the magically appearing undead? Same for sewers; they don't perform their function, which would be to deter overbuilding, because when you're at the point where you have overbuilt and produced several sewers, you're so laden with gold that you can just drop towers to deal with them. Building (of anything) that can't be cancelled. Task flags that take your money upfront rather than after completed task. If I drop a flag on a mob, give it a reward and nobody whatsoever appears interested, why is it costing me money? AI that is absolutely atrocious for an in-directly controlled game. Look, your guild hall is on fire, how about killing those two, apparently pyromanical, rats? No, then what about the bear that's chewing on your friend's face? True, I'm sure he had it coming anyway. And, maybe the greatest sin ever conceived in game design, enemies appearing out of nowhere (in MJ2's case, the edges of the map.)

My point is that so much of the difficulty comes from absurd, punishing ideas in combination with the scenario design. Like the "Dark Tower" map, where you have to build a level 2 wizard guild to counter being nuked every third minute. Why didn't they just put a level 2 guild there and cut my funds by 1600? It's not like there's a choice, you can't get anything up and running unless you build that guild first thing. The same thing applies later in the same map, when you're attacking the dark tower itself; you're supposed to use your dwarves as they're extremely resillient to magic, but since they will be pretty high level, you need to drop a significant reward to get them going and that will also draw every other hero there, who will be unconditionally slaughtered. You can't even lose at this point, you're just waiting for your now only two living heroes to finish the job. Everything up to that point was just a slaughter of generic lairs in any case.

"Rat King" and the dragon map are two thematically similar maps, where a boss mob will come and slap you around occasionally, but without ever really being a focus or real danger. You're still going through the motions, expanding to trade posts, murdering generic lairs and finally taking your 20+ level 15 heroes, dropping a 20K reward on the boss for the hell of it and leaning back while the map finishes itself. In general the game can go from brutally hard during the building stages, to a total yawnfest the second half.

I don't know, maybe I'm being too harsh, maybe I was expecting too much. I had been looking forward to the game and I expected a lot more than a gimped RTS. It can be fun in instances, when the game isn't doing its best to fuck with you and just let you focus on the "sim" part of in-directly controlling and levelling heroes.

I haven't played it a whole lot, but as far as I can tell you could just as easily have been writing about the first game. I haven't played enough of 2 to form an opinion yet, but it seems like the problem is more of pacing/tuning than any particular cockstabby features. I imagine multiplayer is an entirely different game in that regard. Anyone care to dork around with it tomorrow?

I haven't played the first, but even so this one has been significantly downsized from that one. Maybe especially grating for me is that they dropped the sandbox mode, which could have saved this game and let me just play with the heroes as I wanted.

As for the perceived cockstabs (don't read too much into my use of that exact word, they're not on the level of what MMOs do, but still severly misguided ideas in my opinion), they were hardly important features even ten years ago. They could easily have been cut, simply because they don't add anything except minor annoyances that together build up to major annoyances. In my opinion this is a kind of game that should take more cues from Settlers than from Warcraft. It should be about enabling construction and "simming", not about trying to burn the player's town to the ground at every turn. I never have time to look at things like what armour or items my heroes carry, in part because it doesn't matter for shit (as you can't affect it, so you just have to run with whatever gear they do or do not have) and in part because I'm busy directing them all over the map. The only real difference between directing the units in MJ2 compared to any other RTS is that it will cost me money here. They won't take any initiatives, they won't act constructively outside of my direct commands. The attack command in StarCraft is more inventive than it is here. The odd ranger may wander off to get killed by mobs he can't handle.

Bear with me here while I enter retard land, but what I wanted or even expected to see was something that more closely resembled The Sims: The Diku Expansion, in which heroes took initiatives, even formed their own fixed parties, raided lairs for gold and loot and where the player could influence the heroes in more than one way. Maybe even a way of forming simplistic quests for your heroes, kill X rats, find holy relic et.c. Build an attractive city to attract more and better heroes, training facilities to let them improve once there and inns to keep them happy. Something that atleast aspired to being a simulation (it's right there in the title of the game, for Christ's sake) worthy of release 2009. It's a much more ambitious concept, sure, but right now it's the usual build-stuff-upgrade-zerg that you apply in every RTS. It feels like this is a significant short-handing of the concept. The Sims: Battle Royale would be awesome.

Oooh, I see what you did there. Had me going again. :-P

I'm not sure I completely understand multiplayers but it seems to be VS only.  If it's the case, it's retarded.

And for Tarami's complain.  So far, the game doesn't even come close to Hinterland as a Sim/Diku which is pretty sad considering the budget difference.

It's versus only. There's no coop in MJ2 (there was in MJ1.)

Thanks.  I was waffling.  You saved me $50.  Quality post.

Hey, at least it runs at all for you.  :oh_i_see:

By the looks of it, is that a bad thing? :grin:

Tarami's post illustrates differences in perception pretty well. For me, Majesty 2 is basically a modified Tower Defense game. So I actually get enjoyment from many if the things he hates.

I've been playing it, just finished dragon level. Didn't play the first Majesty. The things he hates seem to be the point of the game, the lack of direct control, doing the best you can despite the heroes being idiots. You can only make one a lord (a carryover hero) at the end of a win so it doesn't matter too much if half of them get slaughtered at the end of a scenario. Being continually harassed during the first half is what keeps it interesting. If you didn't like how it played out that actually gives you incentive for what little replayability this title might have (which is very little). Example: figuring out if there is a way to create all-dwarf parties and send them after the magic castle while, say, forming your other units in ranger-led parties in an inn on the other side of the map with exploration objectives, or rogue-led healerless parties who will run at the first sign of trouble.

It's true that the tactics don't seem to have much depth, as far as I can tell the details of all the various systems in play don't need to be understood, you just keep building up everything, make sure the money keeps flowing in, and then whenever you feel like it you send the zerg after the final objective. Maybe that will change by the tougher battles by the end, we'll see.

I destroyed the magical towers with only 3 high lvl hero showing to my attack flag.  I had lots of money so I spamed the heal spell on the hero targeted by the towers.

A single hero destroyed all but one of the towers. I didn't even notice it for awhile he would just pound away/run off and heal/return. I cant recall his exact level but it was below 20. The awful Hero AI makes this game painful,im like 3-4 hours in and losing motivation to re-enter.

Well, I played all day.  Having fun.  I'm half way through the campaign.  The dragon mission is the most annoying so far.  The rat king one was the funniest.  It gets much better when you unlock dwarf, elf and advanced class.  Money become an issue and you have to pick what you want, unlike the first levels where you basically build everything.

I just completed a map where you have to accumulate a set amount of money in a time limit.  It played like a puzzle.

My first impression was bad but putting a few hours in it is worth it.  I will have enough for my money if I just complete the campaign and be done with it.  It's also a game starving for content, an expansion really improve gameplay.

This game is majesty with a new skin. You can also create parties. Game's about what I expected, annoying hero AI and all.

Just a note, sewers aren't there to deter you building a massive city, they are there to level your low level heroes until they can go out into the wild without getting instagibbed.

Heroes don't appear from the edges of the map, they appear from the lairs and go directly to your town.

You can level off lairs easily, or just by setting your heroes to defend any building in town. I don't think I ever explicitly used the sewers for levelling my heroes, because it costs money to do it efficiently and you're not accomplishing anything additional. Waiting for the heroes to wander into the proximity by chance can result in a lot of waiting. The fact that sewers scale in number directly in relation to the town size argues that they aren't there for the early game. I think even graveyards scale in type and number of spawns they produce.

And yes, mobs appear from the edges off the map. Try exploring and cleansing all of it and you'll still have mobs trickling in, seemingly out of nowhere. What you mention is true though, mobs spawning from lairs are homing once you've discovered the lair.

They also wander in from off screen,they also lock on to your town before you discover their hidden lairs. Sewers also provide too much pressure to just be an early leveling tool for heroes. You have to divert some pretty substantial resources to make sure you don't get overwhelmed when you have a large town.

For the sewers, I'm doing pretty well by placing a turret and a guild close to them.  Heroes often defend the area around their guild for free when they're not on a mission.  It saves me some cash and let me use my denfed flag on the lone building that sprawl far from the town's tower defend flag in my town.

I also like to build my town in a straight line to a close trading post instead of doing a circle around my palace.  It optimizes the defensive resources of the trading post because it also defend a side of the town.

Weird to hear reviews written as if Majesty 1 never existed.  I CAN'T CONTROL THE GUYS!  

It's possible Majesty 2 exists just as fan service for those of us who loved Majesty 1 (or those who would have but never ran played it for whatever reason).

The whole point of the game is to figure out how to win despite the complete asstardery of your heroes.  If they were smart, the game would be pointless.  By which I mean, it would be Dungeon Siege without inventory control.

This is just Majesty 1 with better graphics and a few tweaks.  Here's my advice to people on the fence: Go buy Majesty plus the Northern Expansion for like a buck-oh-five in a bargain bin somewhere.  If you like that, you will also like this.  If not, you will have saved yourself 48.95.

If you're referring to my "review", you're missing the point entirely. I never complained about the actual indirect control of the heroes. On the contrary, I criticized that it was so limited (as in, I expected more, less obvious ways to manipulate them), in combination with the heroes being fuck-stupid, even more so than they appear to have been in the first game, which by gaming standards is ancient.

A semblance of intellect wouldn't make the game pointless. Looking historically at games with claimed or actual simulation aspects, I can't come up with a game where better AI would make it less interesting, where single-minded stupidity was a feature. Sims 3 for example had some significant improvements in the behaviour of the Sims, which made it more interesting to "meta" your Sims than it was before. In fact, that's pretty much what makes Sims interesting as a game at all; that the characters have lifelike (well, occasionally) behaviour independent of the player. Gaming the systems indirectly IS interesting, that's just not what you're doing in Majesty. I would maybe call the control of units in Majesty deferred rather than indirect, because they are doing exactly what you tell them to, just in a vaguely roundabout and sloppy manner. They're not making a choice, do what I tell you, or do something you like, they do what I tell them or nothing at all.

The bottom line is, with better AI you can make a more interesting and, speaking in absolute terms, a more challenging game.

I'm not looking to convert the choir. I just don't see why I, or anyone, should give the game a pass when it's actually doing less than its almost 10 years old prequel, graphics not withstanding. Like I said, it's enjoyable now and then in its own right, it's just not what it says on the box.

I found the heroes to be roughly as stupid as I expected, personally. But then, I played the first one.

Honestly, I read your review and thought, "Sweet, it sounds just like the first one. I bet he didn't play that." S'cool you didn't like it, but for the people who did like Majesty 1, and basically want an updated version, this will fill your needs.

Is there any way to force a unit into a party? Wizards get slaughtered and I cant find an easy way to snag them into a group,so they get big and mean.

Open the inn interface (the innterface, haaar.) and they will come. Eventually.

Sjofn,
it's cool to like it. And no, as I mentioned, I didn't play the first one. I think I will though. I don't hate MJ2 with every fibre of my being or anything, I'm just really disappointed after having looked forward to what it could have been with this concept. Obviously this discussion has also become a bit blown out of proportion, but I guess it can help any possible buyers.

Heroes feel less stupid than in the first game to me. Not in any way that makes them more useful; they just tend to wander into overwhelming fights and die slightly less. It's like everybody's a rogue (which combined with their transition to melee and a somewhat saner economy makes rogues a lot less useful  :heartbreak:). Not that it matters, because resurrection costs are so cheap. Which really bothers me for some reason. Also, Schild is right; play on quintuple speed.

I'm liking it. Not $40 worth of liking it so far but I haven't unlocked temples yet and they should make things more interesting.

Not specifically, but we can discuss it anyway. 


Well, to separate those two claims:  Can you make it more interesting with better AI?  Yes, probably.  But you also make it more complicated, which can just as well lead to less fun.  Interactive complexity really isn't what Majesty is going for here.  It's going for cat-herding.  The fact that the heroes aren't doing what you want is supposed to be the delightfully novel aspect of the game.  So to your 'deferred' vs 'indirect' distinction, I don't agree that they're doing pretty much what you want them to.  If you just stick a 10 gold bounty on a big boss, they're not going to do that.  You have to learn the art of nudging them toward the right goal (once you figure out what the right goal is), which is the heart of the game.  If they were sophisticated enough to pretty much do what they'd do if you had direct control, then they may as well just give you direct control.  It'd be a hell of a lot easier to program.  The larger the gap between what you'd make them do and what they'd actually do (within reason), the more you're getting that experience. 

Second, can you make it more challenging with better AI?  I'm not sure that's true.  Good enemy AI is challenging.  Good hero AI reduces challenge, sort of by definition of 'good'.  I mean you could make them twice as AI-complex, but half as likely to do something useful (like, add bathrooms or something), but I'm not sure what the point of that would be, since I don't think it would add any fun.  Making them twice as effective would moot most of the game.  I agree that you don't want to confuse 'challenge' with 'frustration' and if you find your little idiots running away from goals more frustrating than amusing, it's probably not a good game for you.

It works on my laptop!

The game is pretty much Majesty 1 reskinned so far. Most of the things that Tarami complains about are deliberate features from the first game, IMO. If the heroes had smarter AI the game wouldn't be the same. The opening video should make it abundantly clear they're not supposed to be perfectly smart/obedient. That's kind of the central point of the game.

Remember, what is being "simmed" here with the heroes. It is the often stupid, sometimes self-destructive, always self-interested behavior of players in a D&D game. It isn't a realistic simulation, but it isn't supposed to be. I mean, Dwarf Fortress would suck if everyone always did what you wanted them to, right?

Just to add..

I never played Majesty 1, so i'm unsure about how much was brought over from that game. However, this really feels like a map on W3 played sometimes called "square defense" (not 100% sure about the name). In that map modification, one of the builder types you could choose allowed you to build stuff and play almost exactly the same as majesty 2 plays now... albeit four years ago. In that map modification, you start off with your builder, and then you build some buildings that either spawn heroes, let them buy stuff, or upgrade their weapons.. exactly the same to majesty 2. Even the focus of the game, to survive against mobs coming in offscreen, was the same. However, it was pulled off better, because the mobs being summoned in offscreen were actually being sent from opposing teams of players (the map was 4vs4vs4vs4).

Funny how a four year old warcraft 3 map modification allows for more people and more fun using almost the exact same concept as this fully fledged and developed game. I mean seriously, wtf?? Couldn't the modified square defense map creators just take their map and sell it as a competitor to majesty 2? What a waste of time and money, creating Majesty 2, when a simple mod of warcraft 3 performed better.

Holy subjectivity batman!

The map you're talking about sucked compared to Majesty 2. I have now countered your argument.


They really need to add random maps and let you play past victory conditions though.

Like Dawn of Discovery? ^^

Yeah, I'd really like a random map option too.

Shit, there was something else I was wishing for and I can't for the life of me remember what it was now. Clearly it was really important.

Was it the inexplicably missing gnomes? That made me sad.

Oh shit, yes! Yes, it was! I mean sure they weren't that awesome in Majesty 1 but still. :( They were just a gnome.

Gnomes were for uber repair...i always got a kick out of seeing them level up while hammering away on something.

Hell, I could soooo use them. :(

Hey, they're getting better at this!

I'M A CHAMPION!

I'm not buying this game without gnomes.  Any sound clip that sticks in my head for 10 years deserves to reappear.  :heartbreak:

Bored me a lot. Quite disappointed.

Given a quest to destroy 5 towers that spam fireballs. Without specific controls on how and when your heroes move, I had to let them zerg blindly in order to get anything done. It was painful seeing the wizard arrive first, eating two fireballs before dying, then the ranger, then the rogue. Both faceplanted in seconds, before finally the knight or cleric came close and start the tanking process and playing damage sponge as the rest of the heroes zerg arrive.

Just one mission left for me. It took me a billion tries to do the DESTROY YOUR RIVALS mission.

I forget if you have the capability to use the inn to make parties in that mission. If so, you should do so, and make sure your wizards are all in a party with a healer and ideally a warrior. That's generally a good idea for wizards in general. They're slow and easy to kill on their own, but they're really strong with support and protection.

Most maps are like puzzle.  For the destroy your rivals missions : took me three try until I figured out that 2 regular towers + a dwarven one was enough to old the rogue/archer side with out any hero defending it.

I'm not sure how many tries it ACTUALLY took me, but definitely more than I am accustomed to. Tower placement was one of the things that took me a while to settle on a system that worked.

This is today's D2D Holiday sale at $7.50. (http://www.direct2drive.com/holiday/)

Must... resist...

I snapped it up during the recent Steam sale because it sounded interesting enough to pick up on the cheap.  Haven't dared to try it yet.

Ah yes.  It was the same day as L4D2 & KotOR so I didn't notice it.

Necro!  I finally fired up this game last night and am loving it so far.

What exactly does putting dudes into a party do?  Do they all stick together all the time, even when just chilling out in town, or does it just force them to do quests together?  Or none of the above?

I never noticed if they hang out it town together but they definitely stick together for quest.

So heroes that do fairly well solo (like, say, rangers that I want to be doing exploration quests) are better left unpartied, whereas heroes that need support in combat (like rogues and wizards) should be grouped up whenever possible?

Yes.

I usually grouped my rangers so they stood a chance while exploring.

I often let rogues go solo too, since they're easy to sway to do stuff with cheap flags. I throw the elves in the groups instead.

If I build multiple guilds of the same type, do I need to redo the upgrades at all of them, or does the tech apply to all heroes regardless of what guild they hatched from?

You have to redo all the upgrade.  It's still worth it.  2 Priestess guild is especially useful.

I did the dragon quest last night and finally threw something like 20 high-level guys at it.  3 of them outlived the dragon.   :why_so_serious:

You need to micromanage your spells on bosses.  Lots of healing and direct damage.

For some reason I find the slow buildup followed by a massive zerg rush of death much more satisfying.

So, that goddamn Gold of Chyort quest.

IIRC the way I finally did this one was to build almost no upgrades and get the trading posts up ASAP.  I think I went with ranger/warrior/cleric, maybe rogue too.  Send explorers everywhere to find the trading post spots and the rogue's guilds, but wait to explore the northeast until your guys aren't too busy, then when you get the escort mission put a huge defense flag on it (and use the majesty healing spell if necessary).  

Between the escort reward and the piles of gold from the rogue guilds you've almost got enough to win the map; just need to avoid spending too much of that sweet cash along the way, and then let the trading posts deliver the rest.  Once it gets toward day 30 or so you've got so many elementals gangraping you that it's impossible to keep making money, so you have to win early and get out of there.

It was long enough ago that I don't remember 100% sure what I did on this mission, but it pretty much boils down to 'kill the rogue houses (and build economic crap and towers)'. They give you a large gold boost each time, like 5 grand. If you can manage to guard that merchant guy you get even more but that can be tough if he wakes up early in the mission. You shouldn't need a ton of heroes, I don't think I built anything but the basic 4 types on this one? It is probably worth partying them up to save ressurection costs.

I don't remember if you have the income++ clicky power yet on this one but if you do obviously it will help a lot.

EDIT: I basically just said all the same stuff as Samwise.  :uhrr: But if you have the money thing, mash that sucker whenever it is off cooldown!

Thanks, I'll give those a shot tomorrow.  I know there's a trick to it, just didn't find it yet. 

Yeah, it took me a bunch of tries but when I finally got it I had 40k by around day 20.  It's really hard to break yourself of the habit of upgrading stuff for the long haul, but for this one map it's essential.

It looks like the Kingmaker expansion and most recent patch came out everywhere but Steam.  Anyone check it out yet?

Okay, looks like the expansion is finally out on Steam as well now.  Anyone actually pick it up prior to now?  Is it worth bothering with, or is it primarily a hook for future DLC?

I haven't, but if anyone else does I am also interested in hearing about it.

Haha, I was bitching JUST YESTERDAY that it was ridiculous the expansion still wasn't on Steam. And now it is! Tremble before my power!

I'll go download it right now! :P

OK, I've played two missions so far. I wish they had added some new buildings for me. Like gnome hovels.  :heartbreak:

They added a randomize feature, though, which should up the replayability quite a bit. I haven't actually used it, since the new maps are still all new to me, but it'll apparently randomize where the lairs and shit are if you select it.


EDIT: The expansion cost me 15 bucks, I am pretty sure I am going to get at least that much enjoyment out of it. :P

Are there any new upgrades or unit types or anything like that?

I'm about to start playing it again and I can't say for absolute certain, but no, it seems there isn't anything new for you, just new enemies to zerg you.

Grr, third mission is a pain in the ass and not in a way I'm enjoying right now. I'll come back to it. The new enemy, goblins, are fucking assholes.

I just picked up Maj2 for 8 bucks and played the first two levels.  Not a bad game for that price.  Reminds me of a very well done flash game.  Took me a while to figure out cash flow vs. spending money.  I needed to up the rewards to get my heros to react to them faster.

Broke down and bought it as well. Looks kind of like Hinterland. Even if I'm wrong, there isn't much lost at that price.

The main difference from Hinterland is you don't control the people fighting monsters, you have to herd them into doing what you want. Some people (as you'll see if you read the early thread) don't like this. Some people (such as myself) consider this part of the charm.

They can be REALLY fucking dumb though. "Goblins are burning down my guild hall! Time to go shopping!"

That's not the definition of the term "fire sale"?

Truth be told, I don't think the issue was the sentience of the units, but the fact that the game kept piling on micromanaging bullshit (like the sewers) eventhough one has no practical way of handling them. The frustration I felt was much like that of trying to drive a nail with a baseball bat. Love the concept of the game, loathe much of the implementation, a relation which maybe just added to my frustration.

Not trying to say you're wrong to like it, just clarifying I guess for those that don't want to read the old bashfest. :-P

Sewers require micromanagement?  I just put a tower next to each one.   :awesome_for_real:

Hell, I don't even do that (unless there's like ... three clumped together). Most of the time my heroes cheerfully faceroll over 'em. If they eat a house or two before my heroes get around to it, oh well!

Today's discoveries:

On the good side, the randomizer works for the original campaign too! That's nice! On the bad side, APPARENTLY I HAVE TO PLAY THE DAMN THING AGAIN BECAUSE IT RESET MY PROGRESS. I wouldn't care, but my favorite zen-garden map (the Lich king one), the one I like to play when I want to not think at all, is deep in that campaign. Waah!

What's the randomizer?

It'll scramble where the monster lairs and stuff are on a map so it's not all so static and boring after a few playthroughs.

So hey! In one of the missions (I stopped playing this by accident and started back up yesterday) I DID get a new unit type! ICE MAGE. They're pretty mean. I kinda suspect you can only make them in that one scenario, although I made one a lord and so I have him FOREVAR. So I guess we'll see if that is one time thing or not as I CONTINUE MY JOURNEY.