Set in olden-day
China, Autumn Dynasty follows a scholar as he is sent to investigate
an uprising in the south. After being attacked by rebels and rescued
by a General, it is soon revealed that not everything is as it
seems. Thus begins, Autumn Dynasty, an RTS game developed by Touch
Dimensions, a small Indonesian developer.
The game is beautifully told in the style of hand-painted asian art.
Let me just say that Autumn Dynasty is one beautiful game - from
the cut scenes that tell the story to the eye-catching maps, it is a
joy to behold. Each of the cutscenes, each of the maps and even the
units looks hand-painted, with visible brush strokes. Even the
controls are akin to brushing, as you drag your units around, brush
strokes as a visual reference.
The ubiquitous base building, resource gathering, unit creation and
fighting are all there. You are only allowed a certain number of
units under your command until you build more camps. Farms will
increase your gold accumulation while forts create your units.
There are five types of units - Pikemen, horsemen, archers,
swordsmen and catapults. To attack, you just circle your units with
your finger and drag them towards your enemies. The controls in
this game are pretty intuitive.
Heavy emphasis is placed on the fog of war and using the terrain to
your advantage, as you are usually limited by the small number of
units at your command. The difficulty level is also just right -
the initial levels that ease you in are a cakewalk but they are
there just to ease you inand the controls. The difficulty from
there on does get ramped up quickly though and soon, you will
require a couple or so (or even more) turns to complete a map.
Multiplayer is also available for the social gamers amongst us and
is one of the better multiplayer RTS experiences available on our
beloved iPad. The RTS genre seems to be having a mini-revival on
the iOS and Autumn Dynasty is just another example that we are
becoming a little spoilt here. It is an intuitive, beautiful and
enjoyable experience and I would recommend this to all RTS players
looking for something on the iPad.
