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Diplomacy in Empire Earth II
In this second of my monthly letters, I wanted to highlight the Diplomacy System. What passes for diplomacy in many RTS games is simply choosing which team you're on at the beginning of the game and then occasionally sending chat messages to your team.
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In Empire Earth II you'll mastermind your civilizations rise to power through 12,000 years of human history. The span of the game is divided into 15 epochs that span from the dawn of man into the near future. As you advance through the epochs, new and improved units and structures become available. Each month we'll unveil three epochs in this newsletter. This month's featured epochs are:
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Iron
1000 BC - 400 AD
The Iron Age is witness to the brutal rise and fall of mighty empires as well as the teaching of the world's most profound philosophies. Advances in construction in various types of stone have made cities more permanent, while advances in currency and government have allowed more leisure time for citizens. The results are giant leaps forward in all areas of civilization.
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Dark
400 AD - 800 AD
Although Western Europe suffers a loss of stability and a stagnation of learning, the rest of the world manages to continue advancing in certain areas. Innovations in farming and mathematical processes continue to improve humanity's quality of life, while the battle between logic and magic create social upheaval. This epoch will concentrate on the advances that historically took place all over the world during this time, not necessarily the effects of Europe's darkest years.
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Middle
800 AD - 1300 AD
The feudal system takes hold as a social, economic, and military means of governance in many areas of the world. Several technological and social innovations improve weapons and learning. Inventions in the area of sea travel also begin to open up more possibilities for trade and warfare.
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Empire Earth II includes over 350 unique units and structures – 33% more than the original game. Every month we will unveil new units in this newsletter. This month's featured units are:
Medieval Cavalry
Medieval Cavalry are heavily armored knights who charge into battle on war horses. RPS bonus against Light Infantry and Heavy Artillery.
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Scorpion
The Scorpion is a light artillery piece with a two man crew. Firing large arrows, the Scorpion has an RPS bonus against Heavy Mounted and Light Infantry.
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Trebuchet
The Trebuchet is a siege engine capable of hurling projectiles over large distances. RPS bonus against Heavy Infantry and Light Mounted.
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Where we came from in developing Empire Earth II is the rich tradition of board games and the real world: where diplomacy is more fluid and gives you many more tools to coordinate with your allies, and many more chances to stab them in the back, too! Three subsystems combine to make up the Empire Earth II Diplomacy Suite: Sole Survivor Multi-Player Mode, our Diplomacy and Treaties System, and the Warplans.
The first feature is Sole Survivor Mode. In either Skirmish or Multi-Player this mode is similar to Conquest, but with one caveat: only one player can win. This means that any team that vanquishes all other teams is immediately split up and set to war with each other. In and of itself, this creates a dynamic in which you want to be very careful about with whom you ally and how tight the alliance is. You know from the first moment of the game that at some point you'll backstab your ally - or he'll backstab you!
Next, our Diplomacy System allows you to establish different relationships with different players (either human or AI) at different times in the game. You can establish LOS (Line-of-Sight) and border-crossing agreements, timed alliances, tributing units, resources, and territories...it's really given players strategic choices and opened up a ton of gameplay. The most common options to play with are Timed Alliances and LOS. In Sole Survivor games, you can opt to have Timed Alliances be unbreakable, which guarantees you an ally for a while, but guarantees you an enemy after. Virtually all of the alliances I make are timed, and I manage the timing of them so as to maximally screw my allies. ;) Part of that is limiting the information they have, such as not giving them LOS from your units and/or your buildings - and, if you really want to be careful, not giving them border permissions to move troops onto your land!
Finally, the Warplan System lets you quickly draw up graphical plans of attack (complete with arrows, Xs, Os, and text) in a little "paint" type of interface and send them to your allies. The warplans then get overlaid onto your minimap and fullscreen map so you can see exactly how to best help your (then) ally. You can still handle diplomacy in Empire Earth II as you would in any other RTS game, but if you take advantage of the new Diplomacy options in the game, you'll be richly rewarded!
Our goal is to give fans a truly epic gaming experience. In the end, Empire Earth II will hit gamers with new strategic choices, more realistic gameplay, easier management systems, innovative, advanced AI, greater depth of gameplay, and more. Perhaps we should refine that initial statement: our goal is to give fans a truly epic gaming experience . . . while making Empire Earth II the best historical RTS ever.
Until Next Time,
Ian Davis, Ph.D. "The Mad Doctor"
CEO & Founder, Mad Doc™ Software
Creative Director, Empire Earth® II
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Legal: © 2005 Sierra Entertainment, Inc. All rights reserved. Empire Earth, Sierra and the Sierra logo are registered trademarks or trademarks of Sierra Entertainment, Inc. in the U.S. and/or other countries. Vivendi Universal Games and the Vivendi Universal Games logo are trademarks of Vivendi Universal Games, Inc. Mad Doc Software, Mad Doc®, the Mad Doc flask, and the Mad Doc logo are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Mad Doc Software, LLC. All rights reserved. Portions of this software are included under license. © 2005 Mad Doc Software, LLC. GameSpy and the "Powered by GameSpy" design are trademarks of GameSpy Industries, Inc. The NVIDIA logo and "The Way It's Meant to be Played" logo are registered trademarks or trademarks of NVIDIA Corporation in the United States and/or other countries. The ratings icon is a registered trademark of the Entertainment Software Association. Pentium and the Intel Inside logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of Intel Corporation or its subsidiaries in the United States and other countries. All other trademarks are property of their respective owners. For additional legal credits, click here.
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