Formations can be further organized into "supergroups," unleashing up to the game's maximum 200 units at once. Fortunately, mixed formations (limited to fifteen each) will self-organize, placing missile units behind melee, though units in battle will often act autonomously and muck up the most carefully micromanaged plan. Most battles are won or lost according to the way units enter combat. It's a tremendously ubiquitous advantage, but one which results in their need to guard a serious Achilles heel simply knocking out their "soul trap" instantly emasculates the entire Fallen unit base. There's also a welcome bit of variety to the way races accumulate experience: while Empire and Beast units can earn extra hit points by advancing levels, Fallen units must entrap souls to level up as a collective. Each unit has its nemeses for instance, pikemen are fabulous for poking enormous trolls to death quickly, but suck royally on the front line against smaller, faster enemies. Of course, Armies of Exigo is a peasant-pusher from head to toe, so if you're on the lookout for RTS metamorphosis, there's not much to salivate over beyond each race's equivalent 15-16 structures and 14-16 unit types. To its credit, the campaign is paced very well, carefully dolling out growth options through varying mission types so that you don't see top-line technology until the last few scenarios for each race. Missions either involve escorting units across maps, or the traditional dig-your-heels-in buildup toward some awesome final polygon orgy. Maps are divided into resource nodes consisting of gold, wood, and gems, and there's always just enough to accomplish your goals before staking out the next closest lode. The Fallen - an alien race of creatures that seem like a cross between Wizards of the Coast's Drow and the bugs from Starship Troopers - inhabit a dark and loamy underworld. The Empire is composed of your garden-variety knights, wizards, and elves, while the Beasts host the obligatory thuggish bestiary of ogres, trolls, and lizardmen. The game divides into three campaigns that unfold in scripted sequences of twelve missions each. Offsetting the clichéd narrative are some truly spectacular 3D cutscenes, and if you didn't know better, you'd swear you were playing something crafted by Blizzard. The rule of the aristocratic class (The Empire) is being threatened by the forces of anarchy (The Beasts), and - queue X-Files music - there's a sinister third faction (The Fallen) burrowed deep underground that appears to have it in for humans and beasts alike.
You wouldn't know it from the story, however, which seems to meet all the low intellectual requirements of second-banana pulp. It's too bad, because while both are great games, Armies of Exigo actually feels like the "smarter" one, albeit not by much. Leave it to EA to release two epic RTS games at the same time, thus arguably consigning the one without "Rings" in its title (as in "Lord of the") to relative obscurity. Despite its dripping homage to said gold standard, it still manages to distinguish itself with a mature game system, a prodigious (albeit predictable) story, and a few modest innovations that make this one of the better RTS affairs of 2004. This year, however, there's a new kid on the block, and its name is Exigo - as in Armies of Exigo. What's got three well-tweaked races, a lulu of a real-time 3D engine, and more fantasy melodrama than Viggo Mortensen and Liv Tyler in a Gondorian sauna? If you said Warcraft, you're forgiven - it's the gold standard, after all. The game's dual battlegrounds pose new challenges even as they suggest new tactics. Wood, gems, and gold, the game's three main resources, are found both above- and below ground, and each of the three factions has units and abilities to allow its troops to move through either realm. Players can choose to lead the humans, the beasts, or the fallen, and the single-player campaign gives them a fair turn at each. On the surface of the land (and in the skies above), battles of swords and sorcery play out in a recognizable fashion, while beneath the earth, armies plan ambushes and mount surprise attacks. Armies of Exigo offers nearly all the contemporary conventions of the RTS style - a fantasy setting, three distinctly different factions, and online competition for as many as eight players - but it also offers something relatively innovative to 3D RTS gaming: warfare both above and below ground.
Gamers wage war on dual fronts in this RTS from first-time developer Black Hole Entertainment.
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