Running along the banks of the Yellow River are the trailing edges of the Gobi Desert, a deep valley runs through this particular bit of country side producing spectacular cliffs and valleys.
You have a vassal city up north, Canton that can help out by trade. and the eastern side of the higher cliffs is perfect for a large palace to be built. Millet, fish, game, tea and wheat are available as food stuffs, and Canton supplies spices.
The Xiongnu Empire in the south might pose a problem so you should build up an army to fight them off.
Playability: 2
My fun factor was below average on this one. It was a one-mission campaign with little scripting, and I found myself bored for most of the time. To me, it felt like playing Open Play.
Balance: 3
I played at 'Very Hard' so beginning with only a little over $8100 in my treasury provided a good challenge. Especially when my only vassal rebelled in the first game month. So I pulled myself up by my bootstraps after that, opening trade with other cities and defending myself from invasions. A couple of the invasions from the mongols and nomads were quite strong. It was difficult defeating invaders who bring catapults (mongols) when you don't have cavalry to flank them (cavalry is disallowed in the campaign). The map had a few placement restrictions (example: fishing) that made it a bit more challenging. There was really no difficulty obtaining needed commodities, although spice was only importable from the mongols. The mission goals were easily obtainable after solving the early cash flow challenge.
Creativity: 2
The map looked to be cloned from one in the core game library, with little changed on it to make it interesting. The commodities for trade among the cities on the empire map could have been better thought out. The city of Asdal never activated during the 11 years I played the mission. It might have had other commodities which enhanced trade (jade to make carved jade), but if it never is scripted to activate, that is useless. Housing evolution is retarded at Humble Compounds and Ornate Apartments because the Daoist and Buddhist temples have been disallowed. That doesn't stop the mission from being winnable, but it seems like an oversight since tea is growable and drama and theatres are available. The few scripted goods requests are for very small amounts of commodities. It's almost like the designer forgot to change the default amounts on the events when he generated them in the editor. A few of the invasions were bigger and rather tough to defeat.
Map Design: 3
The map appeared to be a cloned version of one in the core game library. It was ok but a lack of trees near the terrain elevation changes and rocks made my quest for perfect Feng Shui a real chore. The map would have had better flexibility (which promotes replay value) if more trees had been placed near these terrain features. The map also had a few graphical glitches that caused black spot tiles to appear during gameplay. These should have been caught and fixed during testing. However, they did not impact playability. The empire map was done adequately. The city names were not historic or placed on it in their historic locations, but they did adhere to the regional climates. Trade routes were shown more realistically, not just straight lines.
Story/Instructions: 3
The story was fictional but it was adequate.
Additional Comments:
We recently found this old campaign miscategorized over in the Open Play cities download section. We moved it over here to the campaigns downloads, since it is indeed a campaign.
This is a decent play experience for a beginning-to-intermediate level player. It feels very similar to Open Play. Advanced players may find it lackluster, though.