A new battlefield: America
Even before the release of Cossacks: The Art of War, it was known that GSC Game World was thinking of something else. They don’t want to infuse the Cossacks game with American style notes and nations, but rethink much of the gameplay. The American Conquest implemented more meticulous and realistic mechanics, some of which they wanted in their previous games, but didn’t want too much of a change after the base game came out – such as morale, cannon crews, wildlife, neutral factions on the map. , etc. Since the Cossacks was set to the 17-18th century, the American Conquest took place in the era after the discovery of the continent (16th-18th centuries), so firearms also underwent major changes: not all rounds were hit, the arcade system was replaced by a system using real physics. Fans awaited the game with great enthusiasm before its release, which finally debuted on the European market on November 15, 2002. Interestingly, it only hit store shelves in North America on February 6, 2003, even though they focused directly on the market there.
After the release, the players ’attitudes toward the American Conquest were completely different: one camp loved it outright, while the other returned to the Cossacks. The main reasons were that the realistic, meticulous novelties simply slowed down the gameplay, making thousands of units more difficult to produce and then manage, despite the larger map view (L-mode), and fewer nations to play.
The poor reception was also reflected in weak sales (only 20,000 units were sold in the UK in the first half of 2003), leaving financial success behind.
In contrast, most of the critics performed well in the game, which is reflected in the game’s Metacritic score of 76.
Development of the first parts of the Cossacks is over, the studio is already in full elan of thinking about the second part. Although, they were only in the brainstorming phase at the time, but they wanted to implement a more serious, grandiose project. Still, they didn’t set aside the American Conquest, and in November 2003 they even launched a standalone add-on called Fight Back. The existing 12 nations were joined by 5 more nations, with additional campaigns and fine-tuning of the title. Unfortunately, no blockbuster was achieved with this game either.
Driven by a higher idea
A S.T.A.L.K.E.R. was developed with total vapur power in 2003, however, GSC Game World came up with a deathmatch-like FPS game called FireStarter. The fast-paced action has been spiced up with some RPG elements in the already very meaningful game: 6 selectable characters, 20 weapon types, 16 levels from 4 worlds. Due to the difficulty of the game and poor marketing, it did not bring box office success.
The development of Cossacks II – albeit in mind – was already underway with the release of Cossacks: The Art of War, but the project did not “slip” in vain for years, they simply strived for perfection. Luckily for them, something came up: the Alexander movie was directed by Oliver Stone. Hollywood at the time sought to present a game alongside every single movie. In relation to the latter, the rights were in the hands of UbiSoft, who opted for the strategy and GSC Game World. During this collaboration, Alexander appeared in November 2004, which was considered by critics to be poor, sometimes half-finished, or a strategy without real tactics (and this was a criterion for Alexander the Great) compared to the movie.
Despite the success of movie, the game, which seemed like a “mandatory craft,” could not be a success, but it is also due to the fact that the strategies were already a smaller slice of the market at the time.
Back to the saddle
The long-conceived and developed project, Cossacks II, was finally released on April 15, 2005 under the subtitle Napolenic Wars. The sequel was successful in this regard as well: the game now takes us back to the 19th century, the age of the Napoleonic Wars. From a technical point of view, big changes can also be observed: now 64,000 people can appear on a map, the moral system has become more realistic, according to real ballistic calculations, the battles take place and the difference between the different unit types is very visible.
However, due to more realistic battles, the gameplay has become more complicated and thus slower. This divided many despite the fact that most critics liked it. In fact, the simple Cossacks mechanics have been replaced by a gameplay that forces you to focus more on the fight. Here we will no longer only have to worry about construction, boosting the economy, producing and placing soldiers, but we will expand to meticulously manage each unit.
The 6 playable nations also seem small, but the developers actually focused on the Napoleonic Wars, so only France, Austria, Prussia, Russia, Britain and Egypt are available in Skirmish and Battle for Europe mode. The single-player campaign was short, actually as a tutorial feature. Fortunately, historical battles such as the Battle of Austerlitz or Ulm were also included in the game.
The game was picked up by the audience as well, the multiplayer mode was very popular. Perhaps the only bitter taste was the StarForce DRM copy protection solution, which made life even harder for those with the original game, many times the game didn’t even start, and more than once it disconnected you from a longer multiplayer game [It happened me to several times – ed.] .
There was no doubt after the success that the first expansion would arrive. It was named after Battle for Europe mode and not by accident: it expanded the mod of the same name with 7 new provinces and 3 new nations: Spain, the Principality of Warsaw and the Rhine Alliance. Other new historical battles arrived: the Battle of Borodino, Waterloo and Leipzig.
It should also be mentioned that it appeared on the market in a standalone form.
Through independence
Around the house of GSC Game World, several projects were in the pipeline that eventually did not appear. One of these would have been the Warlocks, but it was in a somewhat different form, but it eventually came to light. Instead of a turn-based strategy, an RTS / RPG hybrid was born, inspired by the Heroes of Might and Magic and Cossacks series – called Heroes of Annihilated Empires.
The story and world of the game were first to be solved in-house, but they soon realized that it wasn’t deep enough and overall insufficient to create a standout. Dmitriy Zelnin, the game’s lead designer, decided to involve an “outsider”. The choice fell on Ilya Novak, who received the “Encouragement Award” for her work in 2005 at the usual annual Eurocon event. He designed a total of 5 novels in the world of epic dark fantasy, of which 3 parts were finally published by November 2006 and the story stopped here. Just like the game itself, but let’s not go that far.
The development of the ambitious project took years and, as already mentioned, grew out of the Warlocks concept. It’s no coincidence that one of the game’s famous wallpapers shows a tank and another a helicopter that looks like an exception, but actually serves as a reminder. With the game world becoming more and more outlined – which, as mentioned, drew heavily from Heroes of Might and Magic, but even from Warcraft – the finally known world of medieval fantasy finally emerged.
GSC Game World enjoyed complete intellectual freedom. There was no company in the background, a quasi-publisher, that had a say in the development. Heroes of Annihilated Empires is designed to be published by GSC World Publishing, founded in 2004. This was the subsidiary’s first cared-for toy. Thanks to the then widespread use of digital distribution, this barrier was successfully removed by the Ukrainians. However, this cannot be said of the game.
He wasn’t too successful among the critics, as Metacritic’s score suggests: 65. He also shared the players, he didn’t get as picked up as he should have to continue. It should be noted here that it is difficult to break into that market, as the Hungarian-developed and larger-budget Armies of Exigo also failed at both the critics and the audience.
So the meager success didn’t bring a sequel, even though Chapter I proudly abounded on the cover when the game came out. On the island of Atlans, home to the elves, our heroes bowed their heads for eternal rest.
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