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16 of 16 people found the following review helpful:
All that it promised, 30 May 2006
Fun:
i am quite taken aback at the bad reviews this game has recieved. I was a faithful fan of the first game, and was not disapointed by this one. It has enough extra features to keep you interested and the new format is very good. The campaignes are not as long as the first game which is a shame, however, the possibilities for the war of the ring part of the game are great!
I would recommend this game!!
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21 of 22 people found the following review helpful:
Great but not *quite* right, 14 Mar 2006
I'll give it 4 on the basis that the flaws will not stop me playing this again and again, it's well worth the money for pure entertainment. The Collector's DVD is ok yet it is all fairly obvious stuff, and from what I've seen the only 'whole new dragon that collector's only can get' is just a slightly different graphic of the normal dragon. For a headline that's not much. However, the music added to the game (which I was apprehensive about) is in a lot of places just as beautiful as Shore's original LotR score, which is fantastic.However, despite some minor flaws with the collector's edition, it's worth the extra £2 on Amazon for some of the extra features you do get. The game itself is lacking in a major area - the fact that against a competent player, rushing is order of the day and games are not likely to last long enough to put real strategy into play. When playing as Mordor you simply build 10 or so orc units for only 1,000 resources and mob your enemy, with resistance being fairly non-existent (unless, of course, you're playing against Goblins in which case troops only cost 75 resources per unit). There are no walls straight away which means that either of these two players can destroy the enemy fairly easily, and many subtleties that the Elves, Dwarves and Men get aren't put into practice. It's amazing if you can simply survive the first 15 minutes against a rushing player, let alone have enough time to buy an armoury and upgrade it to rank 3 so you can get worthwhile upgrades. Walls can be taken down by anything - that sucks to be honest.
These are, however, my only gripes with what I think is a fantastic addition to the game's predecessor. You can bet that owners of both games will find playing both exciting as the new one is radically different from BFME 1. Each will remain among the most popular online RTSs, and each will provide different challenges. The War of the Ring feature is an amazing extra and I love it! It's like computerised risk, with some good challenges, and it is intertwined with the game. You can also auto-resolve which helps you tremendously in some respects leaving you to get on with the main strategy. Many players will spend more time on this than on the main game. Create a Hero, despite what some people say, has got a lot going for it in that whatever hero you create it will be balanced (i.e. no word of power at Rank 1!). You can tailor a general, with plenty of summoning powers and train allies, or a battle wizened veteran with mount, Blade master, superior additions to stats and invulnerability for extended durations, depending on your strategy. The interface is easy to use and you can make a ton of interesting heroes.
The game itself is a lot more varied than BFME 1 and it's no longer the case that when you're on top, with all upgrades and Rank 10 troops, there's nothing to do. On the contrary, you can even set up a massive row of castle fortresses and take over the entire battlefield with walls if you have the resources! You can do a lot more in customising defences with rows of battle towers, a building available to all factions. All the factions have every unit type. The balance with powers is superb despite my original doubts, as the game doesn't get to that stage until both players have been playing long enough to get some serious customisation anyway.
One thing I really like is that the unit cap is now Rank 5. It means that no player can truly be on top and just sit back with battlefield control, as their units are not all powerful - it forces players into pressing advantages and attacking when the opponent is on the back foot, leaving a more open game as battlefield control is difficult to maintain in this way.
Overall a brilliant game yet lacking in one or two respects - how long before a mod comes out to fix them though? Not long I'd suggest.
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58 of 64 people found the following review helpful:
Worth the Pennies..., 24 Feb 2006
By A Customer
If you were considering purchasing the game, why buy the original when the colectors edition is only a fraction higher in price. Providing the gamer with unique skins, exclusive DVD capturing the design of the game and soundtrack. Exclusive maps to purchasers of this edition and many other things.Regarding the gameplay, this game is brilliant. I have only experineced two factions that were featured in the demo version of the game and i am already hooked. Whether you refer micromanaging game units (few units controlled well) or macromanaging (spam units, overwhelm the enemy) then this game is for you. Featuring all new factions such as the Elves, Dwarves and goblins this game is liekly to provide a refreshing experinece from the first installment. And if all these new units were not enough to satisfy you, then the game gas been completely estructured. A fan of command and conquer, well this game is practically a LOTR version of the game. No more build plots to restrict strategy. Restructured power trees featuring some army destroying abilities and not to mention the intorduction of new ring heroes if you manage to find gollum and captue the one ring (finding the little b*****d is difficult), Sauron (yes controlling the biggest bad guy in middle earth...swats an enitre group of soldiers in one hit!!) and Galadriel (army destroying tornado ability). New graphical enhancements that are pleasing to the eye and new water battles (nothing special compared with land conflicts). This game is sure to waste away those hours. Anyway enough about gameplay, your probably wondering about the specs of the game, well here they are folks... Microsoft® Windows® XP
PC with 1.6 Ghz equivalent or higher processor
256 MB of system RAM
512 MB of system RAM for online play with 3 or more players
5.5 GB available hard disk space
16x speed or faster CD-ROM drive
64 MB GeForce3-class video card.
--- only officially support cards with ATI and Nvidia chipsets, and the Intel GMA 900 and GMA 950 products. We are not officially supporting the GeForce 4 MX series.
EA is also supporting all other cards in the GeForce 4 series including GeForce 4 TI, GeForce 4 Go, and GeForce 4200.
Sound card with speakers or headphones.
Microsoft Mouse or compatible pointing device.
56.6 Kbps or better modem for 1v1 online play.
Broadband connection for online play with 3 or more players.
DirectX 9.0c or above. Hope the review was helpful. (Review based on incomplete version of the game, however minimum specs are official)
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8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
my thoughts, 2 Mar 2006
By A Customer
this game is in many ways a step forward from the original; the "build anywhere" idea, the new races, expanded campaigns...however, there are a few issues which NEED to be adressed, the most obvious of which is that ANY unit can take down a wall, given enough time....we're going back to the days of AoE here! Secondly, you cant put troops on the walls anymore....why, EA? however, despite some flaws, the game remains fun, and the full game should prove a great experience ( mind you, it is up against Star Wars: Empire at War, so it'll be pretty hard to decide which is better). I'd also like to reccommend the collector's edition over the regular edition, since theres only a £2 difference between them, and the Collector's Edition has loads of bonus material. So overall, the game is good, but EA should tweak it a bit....
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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
Nice, 5 Jan 2007
Fun:
This is a good game but it is not much better then the first one, the gameplay is the mostly the same, although it loses thwe strategy campaign and gains a somewhat confusing War of the Ring campaign map which doesnt make up for the loss. However what akes the game a lot more playable is the new races, dwarfs, elves, goblins and the ability to create your own hero. The collectors edition provides a nice art collection and behind the seens footage and provides some useful gameplay extras such as new maps and more dragons then normal. The game is good none the less but i'm not too sure whether or not the extra money is worth it. If you can get it cheap then go for it.
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11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:
good but not great, 20 Mar 2006
This game is the same as the first but there are many extras. Lets get the moans out the way.
I don't like the fact that you can not keep your units through a whole campaign and i also don't like the fact that they have been limited to a rank of 5. You can not put archers on the walls which, lets face it we all like watching the hordes getting torn apart by the archers. The new Create a hero is great but i have yet to find a good use for my Hero that i have created and even when i have been able to use the hero you can only use one.having said all that heres the good points the build anywhere feature is great and allows you to build massive castles. The units are larger so they look more impressive. also you can get your army to line up together, it does this with you swords men at the front and archers at the rear which looks good aswell. the Maps are really well designed aswell over all the game looks better but there are a few things that could be much better as i say at the top keeping the same troops through the game (specially ones you can rename) gives you a much better sense that it is infact YOUR army so i do miss that and the archers on walls. The build anywhere is the best new feature but other than that very little has changed
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10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
Good., 26 Jul 2006
Fun:
Dont listen to the people who complain about this game due to spec problems, if they are foolish enough to buy a game without reading the spec then they diserve it.
This game is of a good quality, there is a decent balance between the different factions and gameplay is very enjoyable. The graphics are good, I would advise those who can to turn the texture and unit details to high/very high. Although the game is good it seems to be more of an addon to the previous game, despite the system overhaul.
However i do think this game brilliantly captures the feel of tolkiens work without ruining gameplay.
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7 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
Nearly there..., 5 Mar 2006
Ive played the demo, and i can say its a very good game, but its the little things that dissapoint me. on the first BFME you can put units on the walls. on this one you cant, and they can be attacked by ANY unit, which is pointless, cause the AI could easily go to a undefended base and knock down a wall with a little group of units.
There is various other things, but... the new features such as build-your-own hero and the ability to build anywhere, along with the new factions kinda pay off the downside. But they could have gone over all of the bad things in the retail or the patches (which were released before the game). from what i experienced its only as good as the first
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13 of 18 people found the following review helpful:
Awesome, 26 April 2006
Fun:
To Be Honest The Complaints about this game are not all honest..
Ye maybe the Goblins can build like 100 units in like 2 minutes but how fast do they fall... Incredibly quick
You Should Know that if there are stealthed Enemys u get rid of the trees...
This game is Awesome & that the Heroes have been made to the potetional they are in the movies...
Earlier i took out Aragorn with 3 Units of Uruk Hai Soldiers... The Allied Heroes cant be that Overpowered then can they...?
If u like RTS & Like the game to be played the way you want Then buy this 1 =)
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14 of 21 people found the following review helpful:
A backwards step too far, 7 April 2006
By A Customer
This game has some wonderful features. It is a shame that in packing the game full of them EA forgot to incorporate some basic aspects of realism that underpin all good fantasy and RTS - and as a consequence have absolutely ruined the gameplay.Here are a list of my gripes. 1. Arrow and infantry (and heroes) can demolish towers, walls and buildings - making siege weaponry redundant - it never gets used in player v's player.
2. The build price of evil troops is much, much too fast and the units are greatly underpowered - you rush/zerg or you lose - very boring and very repetitive to anyone with a creative brain in player v's player.
3. The build price of good troops is ok but they are FAR too powerful - especially when upgraded - if you survive the first 15 mins in player v's player as the good side you automatically win unless you are an idiot.
4. Heroes - evil heroes are pathetic, good heroes much too powerful and there are way too many good heroes. I have seen a 1st level elven archer hero take down fortifications on his own and kill units that sallied to kill him - result - hero with more xp and power and his oponent loses.
5. Dwarves - don't bother playing them - they are patheticaly underpowered.
6. Buildings - much too weak and vulnerable - esp. towers - they are next to useless even when full of archers - buildings should be much harder to destroy and should be invulnerable to anything but flaming arrows and siege weaponry - and even then flaming weapons whould only do damage from fire - making the builder douse flames action useful.
7. Stealth - badly handled and much too powerful - the elven side is impossible to beat because of the number of stealehed heroes it can deploy in player v's player if they survive the boring rush tactics of evil opponents. Basically the game is great as long as you like having your tactics to win completely dictated by the side you play and the side you play against. Creative tacticians and anyone over 12 years old -look for something more interesting.
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