An excellent addition to the turn-based world

Age of Wonders 4, developed by Triumph Studios and distributed by Paradox Interactive, is going to be released on May 02, 2023, and available for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5 Xbox Series S, and Xbox Series X. 

Age of Wonders 4 is a turn-based strategy game, with strong RPG and resource and army management elements, set in a fantasy world with diverse races and attributes, has a great emphasis on character and tribe customization and allows the creation of a completely personalized experience, taking the player's choices very seriously, directly impacting the course of the game.



A Classic Beginning

First of all, the dynamic of the game's development is given by its beginning, the game's tutorials appear as things happen and are very informative, not forcing you to go searching through the game's interface without a direction. I found the beginning of the game very organic, I didn't feel lost and the hints and suggestions brought me comfort. 

Personally, I think this model adopted by the game is excellent since we can be completely new to this style, and we will be comfortable, despite having by nature the intention of making us make decisions that can be excellent or terrible, the game mechanics do not strictly punish at the beginning.

Although our decision-making is constant, there are many more benefits than hindrances and it was a factor that motivated me to play the game longer. 

The game itself is quite difficult, but not frustrating, despite having numerous resources to manage, and requiring constant reading for a satisfactory understanding of the mechanics, the experience Age of Wonders brings is very immersive. I feel that character creation and advanced customization are big draws of the game that held me for quite some time before I even started the actual game. 

It is undeniable that Age of Wonders 4 resembles other games in the genre and even its predecessors, for example, to fans of the Civilization franchise such as myself, the resource management systems such as knowledge, currency, influence, and power are very familiar, but it has the addition of all the fantasy employed.

It is a brilliant mix of all these tactical trappings, reminiscent of classic RTS games like Warcraft, Command and Conquer, and the aforementioned Civilization franchise itself, with an atmosphere and theme that has a lot of personality. 

One feature present in the game that is very inclusive is the possibility to choose pre-assembled characters and use them, not mandatory for the whole part of character creation, but the most interesting, in my experience, was being able to select a ready-made character and customize small details to enhance my experience. 

This dynamic is useful for many people, as it was for me, to get an idea of where and how to start. 

The game sessions are very challenging, but they don't lead you to exhaustion, despite a lot of added information, everything makes a lot of sense and as I said, the learning curve is organic, and everything is presented at the right time, in a not-so-intrusive way. 

As is expected of the genre, the story is part of the background, and much of its development is the responsibility of the player, the decisions we make, the race we choose, everything ensures a new experience, since the great goal of the game is to "conquer" the world.



What I mean by "background" is that, initially, we have an introductory cinematic showing Ancient Wizard Gods who have come into the world seeking new magics and realms to conquer and a dynamic that we are already quite familiar with, an ancient evil power that was dormant has returned, and from there the game's story unfolds through notes, texts, conversations, and negotiations. 

In this way, we have numerous ways to become conquerors, from extreme magical advancement or military might to dominating everything with the use of force and completely ignoring diplomatic means, and frankly, all the freedom offered is satisfying.



Blood or diplomacy?

The difficulty of the game is a point that has a lot of variation, wrong decisions weaken you and right decisions consequently make you stronger, the combat of the game tells you your chances of winning or losing, which makes it a little easier to predict, but the question of economy and functions of the game is the point that can lead to having an easier or harder game. 

In the beginning, this setup won't punish you too much, it is quite easy to get around the obstacles and get along, however, the more we advance, the more our choices weigh and dictate the difficulty of everything, for me, it is a very positive point, that even leaving the game prone to become frustrating, makes us think better to make decisions and choices.

Like when to ally with a free city or not, when to dominate a certain gold mine or defeat a certain enemy that has positive relations with some partner city, all of this impacted my gameplay and decision-making. 

Age of Wonder 4, in general, is a lot of fun, what impressed me most about the game is how we can dictate the pace of how everything happens, not because it is a turn-based game, which naturally does this, but this feature is enhanced by the dynamism that your turn has, there are many units to move, many resources to manage and many decisions to be taken, moreover, for those who are not a fan of managing the combat, the game gives you the option to do this automatically, using the probability of victory and defeat that I mentioned above.



More resources on the one hand, and less accessibility on the other

In Age of Wonders 4, we cannot separate theory from practice, what was thought for the game, and what the game delivers, as I explained, the list of features is quite extensive and everything has its function and makes a difference when well or poorly managed. Consequently, the gameplay is considerably slower, but don't take this as a negative point.

The game is full of explanatory texts, menus, tabs for selecting items, attributes, troop management, city management, and diplomacy, all without translation. Taking this detail into consideration, a game that is naturally slow, for those who have difficulty with other languages, becomes practically dragged, and this is undoubtedly its greatest negative point. 

Age of Wonders has no chronic problems, or functions that break the game, it will simply drive away MANY players by its lack of translation. 

Being such a complete project, with a huge potential, it is sad not to have such a large community recognized. Anyway, if we put this detail aside for a moment, the game is excellent in every way, there will be no lack of mechanics and long hours of fun. 

The game delivers an immersion that deserves to be highlighted, due to its theme and environment, as the use of the isometric camera is standard during much of the gameplay, we can see several details that are excellent additions to the package of qualities offered, what I liked most were the details of the scenery and how the points of interest stand out in the midst of the whole world generated. 

Because it is a tactical game, we can move the camera closer or farther away to access useful information, for example, when we move away completely, we have access to the multiple maps and have a sense of how extensive it is. 

The controls are easy to adapt, basically, we can do everything with the mouse when playing on PC, and with the use of control, nothing that a few minutes do not serve to have a complete adaptation. 



An excellent experience with only one drawback

My experience with Age of Wonders 4 was excellent, with great emphasis on the number of existing mechanics, the immersion provided and its graphics very well done. 

The game, in general, brought me great experiences and I would definitely recommend playing it, even more if it was translated. 

It is worth mentioning that the soundtrack is also very good, they are fantasy songs, which are very nice added to the whole experience that the game delivers.



Quickly, it is a turn-based strategy game, a classic dynamic RPG, which has many features and mechanics to offer the player, which make the whole set very pleasant to play, and fortunately, in my opinion, it is a slow game, made to be that way, which leaves no action gaps, there is always something happening. 

For this review, the game was experienced on the PC, using the Steam platform. Thanks to Paradox Interactive for providing the access key.