But its been under development for five years, and by Hammurabis majestic beard does it show.
And of course I am, to some extent, because thats just how liking things works.
Little mesopotamians; hello mates.
Can you… yes, you’re able to build a town centre.
Oop, no population space… lets stick a house there.
Hello, scout: can I right click you around the mini-map?
This is a lot like Age of Empires, isnt it?
Which reminds me… shit!
Ive not queued up any new villagers yet!
Why isnt it here?
Wheres… plopping sound… Good lord, theyregeniuses.
The town centre, my friend, queued and produced a villager all by itself.
Because in a game thats built on the play-procedural chassis of AoE, its genuinely game-changing.
Heres a bit of competitive AoE2 wisdom in a nutshell, to contextualise.
It goes further than the villager automation thing, obviously.
And as silly as it sounds, thats real innovation in the world of real-time strategy.
TFC manages, by and large, to avoid this.
The clue, I suppose, is in the name of the game.
The Fertile Crescent is, overwhelmingly, about the production and consumption of food.
Usually, the historical theming behind a strategy game is precisely that: theming.
Atmospheric set-dressing, from which the mechanics of the actual game are completely divorced.
TFC models this in a way that sounds extremely simple on paper.
But the more villagers you have, the more food is needed.
As I said at the top, you definitely shouldnt expect a vast amount of feature breadth from TFC.
Multiplayer, however, is a different story.
Watching any kind of a meta develop for TFC is going to be an interesting business.
I just hope things get that far.
Still, that will hopefully all change if this game gets even half the attention it deserves.
