Very good automatch game between equally skilled players on a Plains Map WW1-2. Nice battles throughout the match and a refreshing change of two players who understand countering very well. An enjoyable watch that reminds me of the old days of Empires!
I was so happy to see a new recorded game from RTE that I downloaded this right away. Unfortunately, I was disappointed.
First, it is ironic that a new strategy guide was just posted on attacking an economy, and this match has no economy raiding whatsoever. It is clear to any good players nowadays that a French player needs to raid the opposing economy. That's what the ability to walk through forests helps with the most, and that's the only way France's weak units can defeat an opponent who knows what he is doing.
That said, the game opened with a normal France rush- nothing special. Neither player micromananaged very well and they both lost many units that could have been saved and used to a greater extent. The micromanagement did not improve at all throughout the match.
France needs an armory! Everyone knows it! The France player took 23 minutes to get an armory, and instead went quick tank factory- not a terrible idea, but this causes him to lose the smoke ability which is endlessly important for France. At the same time, the Russian SHOULD have made a quick tank factory but instead doubled up on barracks, losing him 4 precious minutes of which he could have used to produce armored cars instead of trash conscripts (which he never used for any specific reason).
The rest of the match just went back and forth over a field in the center... which I don't think was ever designated as "The Battlefield" but both players used it as such. The micromanagement was just terrible- many units were lost for no reason in every attack. At one point the French player put his army into an idiotic formation and attacked head on without any micromanagement, placing smoke grenades in no useful area- this caused him to lose half his army and inflict almost no casualties against the smaller and weaker Russian army. If you are in the mood for a good laugh, this and other odd occurrences in the match might be the only reason I would suggest you download it.
Players did counter each other, as should be expected of good players, but the France player never seemed to have AA in the right place to stop mass Russian bombers with the attack upgrade.
The Russian should have been in ww2 much sooner than he was, which was in part due to his slow economy. Although he had plenty of food, he still queued up villies at one Town Center in excessive amounts, and when he finally had 5 town centers there were delays in villie building time.
Too much wood and too little gold held back the Russian player from achieving what was obviously the inevitable- due once again to terrible micromanagement (which would always give Russia an advantage) and the absence of eco raiding by the France player. When I was finally utterly disgusted with the Russian player's economy (or lack thereof, he even shared mines with the France player), I noticed it had taken 25 minutes for the France player to get another Town Center, and he forgot to build villagers constantly. Like I said, there was no way the Russian should have lost, but it was questionable at times when his micromanagement was unintelligent.
Additional Comments:
The only reason this deserves a 2 is because this is a new match with two respectful players who adapted.
But you can tell by this review that the match did not meet expectations and was much worse than anticipated.