Legion Gold

Rating:
Summary: not a whole lot better than legion 1.06b
Review: dont waste you time or money on this. wait for TOTAL WAR: ROME
to come out. If you have the upgraded version of the original legion, stick with it instead. On my machine, running winxp home, pIII 933, 512k ram, the game locks up too many times to make it an enjoyable diversion.

Rating:
Summary: But, don't take my word for it.......
Review: I was initially hesitant about purchasing this simulation especially after having read several reviews on this board that gave "Legions" a poor rating. However, I chose to take my own advice and give it a whirl. After having played several levels of difficulty on each different campaign my humble opinion is: It's not perfect, there is room for improvement but, it's not all that bad either.

Specific criticism lies with 1)The Combat engine; 2)The threshold for victory; 3)Diplomacy. The combat engine is inflexible and doesn't allow the user the opportunity to adjust tactics "on the fly" while in the combat screen. Many of us military historians know full well that the Romans, as well as other ancient armies, were well adept at making changes to tactics and employing them while engaged in combat. Absence of this option was initially disappointing but I learned to adjust to it and employ some of the tactics that the Romans used for success. (i.e. quality with quantity).

The threshold for victory in each campaign is set very low and this is identified in the instruction manual. I'm not certain that this makes the game a bit more realistic but, 40% dominance does make campaigns shorter.

Diplomacy is sorley lacking. Creating an alliance is easy in the game, but with no option to utilize you allies against common enemies, (the enemy of my enemy is my friend), as every empire in history has done, leaves something to be desired. Nor can you store abundant resources and "buy off" or "bribe" if you will, a hostile neighbor just to get some "breathing space." This is a tactic every empire has used and without that option diplomacy seems a moot point.

Finally, and this is a bonus rather than a cristicism, the act of carefully harnessing and balancing resources for the purpose of raising and maintaining a large military force for conquest is very challenging and, for me, was ample enough motivation to retain the game and playing through to ultimate victory. But don't take my word for it.......:)

Rating:
Summary: But, don't take my word for it.......
Review: I was initially hesitant about purchasing this simulation especially after having read several reviews on this board that gave "Legions" a poor rating. However, I chose to take my own advice and give it a whirl. After having played several levels of difficulty on each different campaign my humble opinion is: It's not perfect, there is room for improvement but, it's not all that bad either.

Specific criticism lies with 1)The Combat engine; 2)The threshold for victory; 3)Diplomacy. The combat engine is inflexible and doesn't allow the user the opportunity to adjust tactics "on the fly" while in the combat screen. Many of us military historians know full well that the Romans, as well as other ancient armies, were well adept at making changes to tactics and employing them while engaged in combat. Absence of this option was initially disappointing but I learned to adjust to it and employ some of the tactics that the Romans used for success. (i.e. quality with quantity).

The threshold for victory in each campaign is set very low and this is identified in the instruction manual. I'm not certain that this makes the game a bit more realistic but, 40% dominance does make campaigns shorter.

Diplomacy is sorley lacking. Creating an alliance is easy in the game, but with no option to utilize you allies against common enemies, (the enemy of my enemy is my friend), as every empire in history has done, leaves something to be desired. Nor can you store abundant resources and "buy off" or "bribe" if you will, a hostile neighbor just to get some "breathing space." This is a tactic every empire has used and without that option diplomacy seems a moot point.

Finally, and this is a bonus rather than a cristicism, the act of carefully harnessing and balancing resources for the purpose of raising and maintaining a large military force for conquest is very challenging and, for me, was ample enough motivation to retain the game and playing through to ultimate victory. But don't take my word for it.......:)